Episode 17: Oliver Bullough: Why We Get Fighting Financial Crime Wrong
Laundering money has never been easier, cheaper, or more secure for bad actors, so why do we persist with our current response?
In this latest episode, host Tom Keatinge is joined by journalist Oliver Bullough to discuss his latest book, ‘Everybody Loves Our Dollars: How Money Laundering Won’, which reveals the seeming futility of the current approach to fighting financial crime.
Those who work in the world of financial crime inevitably get caught up on the ‘hamster wheel’ of compliance without stopping to ask: ‘why?’ Oliver’s book takes the time to do just that.
It is a tough read – and an equally challenging listen – for those whose careers have been built on the long-held belief that our approach to financial crime fighting is making a difference. But as Oliver argues, it is past time we considered honestly whether all the money and time spent on fighting financial crime the way we currently approach the challenge is actually making a difference.
Podcast series
Suspicious Transaction Report
This podcast explores the financial dimensions of today’s leading transnational security challenges. Host Tom Keatinge and the team from the Centre for Finance and Security at RUSI bring you unique insights on the challenges posed by illicit finance and practical analysis of the policy responses. They interview top thinkers and influential voices who unpack the complex world of money laundering, corruption, sanctions evasion and illicit flows, and explain how this shapes the evolving global security landscape, and what democracies and international institutions must do to stay ahead when it comes to the financial dimensions of the global threat outlook.
View the podcast series
FEATURING
Tom Keatinge
Director, CFS
Centre for Finance and Security
Oliver Bullough
Author and journalist
