Virtual Money, Vanishing Law: Dematerialisation in Electronic Funds Transfer, Financial Wrongs and Doctrinal Makeshifts in English Legal Structures

In this article the author proposes to traverse various views on money in order to contend that while antiquated notions of its materiality continue to bedevil English legal structures, the law will fail to keep up with current commercial practices, and, equally seriously, fail to detect, prevent or punish coming criminal practices as well. The thrust of the argument is that how money is perceived, and what is conceived of as constituting it, together determine how laws deal with the cultural and commercial need for consensus on what might function as a medium of exchange and a store of value. As a consequence, if the perception of money is locked into its historically contingent aspects, legal structures will become increasingly marginalised by the superior resources and sophistication of contemporary organised crime.