Transparency for Whom? A Critical Examination of Beneficial Ownership Registries

Beneficial ownership registries (BORs) are the latest tool for combating global corruption. While the exact structure of BORs varies across jurisdictions, they generally require controlling owners of companies to submit details regarding their name, birth date, residence, service address, and citizenship to a government registry. The goal is to improve transparency of company ownership by deterring individuals from hiding behind “faceless” corporations to commit crimes and to aid authorities in identifying responsible parties when investigating offences. This paper argues that BORs are an attempt by global capitalism to address and assuage public anger about tax evasion practised by elite state and corporate actors revealed in the series of leaks known collectively as the Panama Papers. We are not looking at the effectiveness of BORs – though the history of laws against the powerful makes it unlikely enforcement will be rigorous. Instead, we argue that BORs represent an attempt at strengthening global capitalist systems by presenting the corporation as a legitimate, transparent entity whose excesses can be addressed through regulatory efforts by capitalist democratic states.