John Christensen

Tax Justice Network

Numerous scandals have shown that the UK has an ineffective regulatory architecture populated by overlapping, uncoordinated and unaccountable bodies. This has resulted in duplication, waste and obfuscation as matters get shunted around from regulator to another. The UK has 41 regulators for the financial sector alone and at least 14 dealing with ac...

The UK auditing industry is dysfunctional and in disarray. It is dominated by the big four accounting firms and there is little choice and competition at the top-end of the market. The industry is routinely mired in scandals and audit quality is low. Auditors lack independence, enjoy too many liability concessions and have weak and ineffective regu...

This policy paper was submitted to the UK Labour Party and puts forward proposals to check soarway executive pay and secure a more equitable distribution of income. It contains twenty proposals for empowerment of employees and consumers, greater public information and mechanisms that have teeth.

Outlines harms caused to countries hosting an oversized financial sector Argues Britain is subject to a Finance Curse, which carries many similarities with the Resource Curse, afflicting mineral-exporting countries Provides a narrative and framework to analyse the political economy of finance and financialisation The Global Financial Crisis placed...

This paper considers the role of secrecy jurisdictions in creating a supply-side stimulus for corrupt practices and explores the use of the newly created Financial Secrecy Index as a tool for assessing and ranking such jurisdictions. Secrecy jurisdictions are a prominent feature of international financial markets, providing a combination of low or...

This paper examines offshore finance centres and tax havens that are hosted by small island economies (SIEs). In many cases, hosting offshore finance has been a lucrative activity for SIEs since the 1960s in terms of employment (direct and indirect) and overall contribution to GDP and government revenues. Despite the scale and reach of the global o...

This chapter considers the history of a particular campaign for social justice in which the three authors have played a central role. The founding of the Tax Justice Network (TJN) — a rights-based vision of a transparent and a democratic economy — is a combination of diverse pathways, best described as an assemblage of actor, value, issue-based and...

The current pre-occupation of the World Bank and G-8 countries with corruption and money- laundering is based on a narrow definition of both issues, which ignores the role of the offshore financial system in encouraging and facilitating capital flight and tax evasion. In focusing their agenda on bribery of public officials, these institutions have...

Many islands host both tourism and offshore finance, but their coexistence has been little researched. This paper examines their relationship via a case study of the British Channel Island of Jersey. Both sectors require labor, land, and capital—all frequently scarce in small islands. The study considers the nature of the relationship and resource...

Many islands host tourism and offshore finance but research tends to focus on either industry without examining the nature of the relationship(s) between these two where they co-exist. This paper examines the nature of the relationships using a case study of the British Channel Island of Jersey. Both industries demand labour, land and capital that...

TAX REVENUES ARE THE LIFEBLOOD OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT AND THE SOCIAL CONTRACT, BUT THE MAJORITY OF MULTINATIONAL BUSINESSES HAVE BEEN STRUCTURED SO AS TO ENABLE TAX AVOIDANCE IN EVERY JURISDICTION IN WHICH THEY OPERATE. JOHN CHRISTENSEN AND RICHARD MURPHY OF THE TAX JUSTICE NETWORK ARGUE THAT POLICY MEASURES ARE REQUIRED TO REDRESS THE DISTORTION...

Background Hidden from the public eye financial capital has been completely reconfigured over the past thirty years in order to bypass nationally-based tax and regulatory regimes. Using the 70 plus tax havens dotted across the globe, wealthy individuals and transnational businesses have adopted highly aggressive tax avoidance strategies, whilst als...

The stock of wealth held offshore is estimated at US$6 trillion. Many small island economies (SIEs) host offshore finance centers, and some SIEs are highly dependent upon offshore finance. Extreme examples have over 90% of government revenues derived from finance sector activities. Since 1998 a series of international initiatives have been launched...

Like a host of other micro-states which are predominantly tax havens and offshore finance centres, the channel Islands have been identified by a variety of agencies, including the United Nations Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention, the European Union and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, as global problems. In the...

Jersey appears to be a successful offshore finance centre (OFC) with high levels of gross domestic product per capita. The OFC is the largest contributor to Jersey's tax revenue, and accounts for about 20% of local employment. Jersey has become a major OFC in a global industry and is a conduit for sizeable capital flows. However, an unparalleled cr...

Over the past thirty years a large number of micro-states2 and small island economies (SIEs) around the world have attracted offshore finance and tax haven activity. Their low levels of effective taxation, minimal regulatory regimes and bank secrecy made these offshore finance centres (OFCs) highly attractive to global financial capitalism. The une...

Many small island economies (SIEs) and micro-states host offshore finance centres (OFCs). Their low tax, minimalist regulatory regimes and bank secrecy make these OFCs highly attractive to global financial capitalism. The uneven relationship between transnational financial institutions operating offshore and their SIE/micro-state hosts results in t...

Summary The related problems of capital flight, tax evasion and tax competition impact negatively on the majority of countries on the Mediterranean rim and is encouraged and facilitated by failures of the international financial architecture. A large proportion of the capital flight from the countries in the Mediterranean region is motivated by pol...

Summary The related problems of capital flight, tax evasion and tax competition impact on the majority of countries on the Mediterranean rim and is encouraged and facilitated by failures of the international financial architecture. A large proportion of the capital flight from the countries in the Mediterranean region is motivated by political risk...

Está sendo preparado o cenário para uma daquelas lutas épicas do nosso tempo. Nos últimos 50 anos, de forma secreta e audaz, as elites profissionais e seus poderosos clientes construíram uma eco-nomia global paralela – muitas vezes denominada de paraísos fiscais – para fugir de impostos e regulamentações territoriais. Essa economia fornece infra-es...