Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Corruption, meaning the abuse of entrusted power for private gain, runs rampant in the pharmaceutical industry. A current and devastating example of this issue is the mislabelling and misrepresentation of oxycontin that contributed to the current overdose crisis. At present, deterrence theory, which focuses solely and inadequately on offender punishment, is the dominant course of action to address this form of corruption. This poster will present restorative justice as an alternative approach to addressing corruption within the pharmaceutical industry using the current overdose crisis as a case study. Through actively involving victim(s), the community, and the offender in the sentencing process, restorative justice has been proven effective in repairing harms caused to both the victim(s) and communities, while also successfully reintegrating the offender into the community which it harmed. The benefits of this approach extend further as the sentencing process considers and addresses the social and environmental factors in which the offence occurred in order to prevent future harm. While restorative justice is a novel and innovative approach within the pharmaceutical industry, it has successfully been applied to corporate offences in the environmental sector proving its potential to address large-scale institutional crime. The exploration of this approach will have important global health policy implications that have the potential to not only address the overdose crisis that is currently devastating communities across North America and around the world, but also change the current industry landscape that is so conducive to corruption.