The theme of this year’s 43rd International Symposium on Economic Crime was “Asset Recovery and the Rule of Law – Taking the profit out of crime – from rhetoric to results.” We are delighted that the Law Institute of the Lithuanian Centre for Social Sciences (LCSS) was among the organisers of this major conference, held at the University of Cambridge from 23 to 30 August and bringing together more than 2000 experts from around the world. At this event, presentations were given by two researchers from the Law Institute – Dr. Ingrida Kerušauskaitė-Palmer and Dr. Skirmantas Bikelis. In addition, Dr. I. Kerušauskaitė-Palmer also contributed to organizing the symposium. She was also supported by Karolina Vysockytė, a Project Administrator at the LCSS Law Institute, who volunteered at the symposium secretariat.

Dr Ingrida Kerušauskaitė-Palmer, Senior Research Associate at the Law Institute of the Lithuanian Centre for Social Sciences, coordinated this year’s two-day alternative programme, “Geopolitical Strategic Corruption and Illicit Finance – Under the auspices of the Centre of Development Studies, University of Cambridge and the Institute of Law, Lithuanian Centre for Social Sciences“). Ingrida delivered the opening remarks and moderated the first sessions on both days of the programme. She introduced the key concepts, tools, methods and manifestations of strategic corruption, and discussed the main challenges and questions addressed in the academic literature. On the final day, she presented a summary of the entire programme. The researcher also delivered three presentations, two of them in plenary sessions of the symposium. In the first, during the session “What Should We Do and What Can We Do with the Money We Recover?”, Dr Kerušauskaitė-Palmer presented a chapter she co-authored with Dr Skirmantas Bikelis on the reuse of confiscated assets. Ingrida discussed the model she and Skirmantas developed for categorising the use of recovered assets for social and administrative purposes. In her second presentation, delivered during “Plenary Workshop 48 – What Does It Mean in the Modern World?”, Ingrida spoke about corruption and social norms, focusing on the distinction between identity-based and “one-off” perceptions of corruption. On the final day of the symposium, the researcher also gave a presentation and took part in a discussion on the strategy of the International “Journal of Economic Crime. ” Ingrida serves as Deputy General Editor of the international academic journal.

Dr Skirmantas Bikelis presented two papers at the symposium. During the session “Non-Conviction-Based Forfeiture”, he presented “Civil (?) Confiscation in Lithuania and the EU Legal Framework,” discussing civil confiscation – a field that the researcher has been studying for many years and on which he has published numerous academic papers. In the session “What and Who Are We Missing in Our Discussions on Strategic Corruption and Illicit Finance?”, Skirmantas delivered his second presentation, “Threats as Strategic Corruption?”, addressing the concept of geopolitical (strategic) corruption.