On December 8, 2016, the French Congress passed Bill 2016-1691 on improving transparency, anti-corruption and promoting the modernization of economic life. This bill follows the first anti-corruption bill submitted by French Finance Minister Michel Sabin in 1993, so it is called

On December 8, 2016, the French Congress passed the "Act No. 2016-1691 on improving transparency, anti-corruption and promoting the modernization of economic life". This bill follows the first anti-corruption bill submitted by French Finance Minister Michel Sabin in 1993, so it is called the "Sabin Second Bill". This bill has 9 parts and 169 articles, involving the revision and supplement of French criminal law, criminal procedure law, monetary and financial laws and other laws. The bill absorbs relevant content from the United States' Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the British Anti-Bribery Act, and establishes a system for anti-foreign corruption. The law creates a specialized anti-corruption agency, establishes a mandatory compliance system, requires qualified companies to assume the obligation to establish a compliance mechanism, and establishes legal liability for companies that do not establish a compliance mechanism. At the same time, the law also draws on the legal experience of the United States and the United Kingdom, establishing a French-style deferred prosecution agreement system, allowing prosecutors to sign settlement agreements with companies suspected of committing crimes, and establishing a three-year trial period. During this period, the companies involved Pay fines, compensate victims, and develop or improve compliance plans. For those who have fulfilled the agreement after the expiration of the inspection period, the prosecutor's office will drop the prosecution.

Regarding the standards for effective compliance, the Sabine II Act only established some principle provisions. In December 2020, the French National Anti-Corruption Agency issued an "Anti-Corruption Guide" based on summarizing relevant practical experience, establishing standards aimed at preventing corrupt behaviors. Judging from the role it plays, the anti-corruption guideline is actually an effective compliance standard for corruption cases.

Stones from other mountains can be used to attack jade. Under the background that our country is promoting the reform of the corporate compliance system, understanding the development of the compliance system in the field of anti-corruption in France, especially the effective compliance standards for anti-corruption cases, is not only for the improvement of compliance supervision mechanisms for our country's administrative agencies, but also for The establishment of scientific and feasible standards for effective compliance assessment and acceptance by our country's procuratorial organs is of great reference significance.

1. Mandatory Compliance and Deferred Prosecution Agreement

So far, France has two national agencies responsible for implementing compliance systems in the field of anti-corruption: one is the French National Anti-Corruption Agency (AFA), and the other is the French National Financial Prosecutor’s Office ( PNF). According to the Sabine II Act, AFA is a national agency responsible for preventing and detecting corruption. The main function of AFA is to supervise enterprises to establish compliance systems in accordance with the requirements of the Act and to evaluate the effectiveness of compliance. For those companies that fail to establish effective compliance systems in accordance with legal provisions, the Penalty Committee under the AFA has the power to impose administrative penalties on the companies and their executives. At the same time, once the bill finds that an enterprise has engaged in corruption, the AFA can also submit the case to the prosecutor's office, which has the right to initiate public prosecutions. Prior to the implementation of this law, France also established the National Financial Prosecutor's Office, which is responsible for exercising prosecutorial powers in cases of tax fraud, financial crimes and corruption crimes.

Sabine II created a mandatory compliance system. This system includes two contents: one is the administrative compulsory compliance system; the other is the criminal compulsory compliance system. The so-called administrative compulsory compliance system means that any enterprise that meets legal conditions has the obligation to establish and implement a compliance system and regard this as an important measure to prevent corruption. According to this law, any enterprise that meets the following two conditions at the same time must establish a compliance system: first, it has more than 500 employees, or it belongs to a company group headquartered in France and has more than 500 employees; second, it has annual business operations Revenue exceeds 100 million euros. For companies that meet the above conditions and fail to establish a compliance system in accordance with regulations, the penalty committee under the AFA has the power to impose a fine of not more than 1 million euros and to impose a fine of not more than 200,000 euros on senior executives. At the same time, the penalty committee also has the power to require companies or executives to complete the establishment of a compliance system within a period of no more than three years.

The so-called criminal mandatory compliance system means that for those companies that constitute bribery crimes, French courts have the power to order companies to establish compliance systems in accordance with the requirements of the law within a specified period. AFA is responsible for supervising and assisting enterprises in establishing compliance systems, and regularly reports to the procuratorate on the establishment and implementation of compliance systems by enterprises. All costs incurred by AFA will be borne by the enterprise. If a company fails to establish a compliance system that meets the requirements, French courts have the power to fine the company and its executives and impose prison sentences of up to two years on relevant personnel.

In addition to mandatory compliance, the Sabine II Act also established a system of "Judicial Agreements Based on the Public Interest" (CJIP). Eradicate this system and authorize prosecutors to negotiate with suspected criminal companies. As long as the latter admits the facts of the alleged crime, pays fines, compensates the victims, and establishes or improves compliance plans during the inspection period, the prosecutors can With the approval of the court, a decision was made to withdraw the prosecution. This kind of agreement based on the public interest of justice is often called a "French-style deferred prosecution agreement."

According to the Sabine II Act, the conditions for the prosecutor to reach an agreement with the company involved are that the company needs to pay a fine of no more than 30% of the average annual turnover over the past three years and agree to cooperate with a third party independently under the supervision of the AFA. With the assistance of the regulatory supervisor, the company will establish or improve the compliance system within three years. In those cases where there is a clear victim, the company also needs to compensate the victim for the loss according to the agreed method within one year.

After reaching the above agreement with the enterprise, the procuratorate submitted the text of the agreement to the court. After the court confirmed it through the hearing process, the settlement agreement officially came into effect. After a test period of no more than three years, after reviewing the company's performance of various obligations stipulated in the agreement, if the procuratorial organ believes that the company involved has fulfilled its obligations, it will apply to the court to abandon the prosecution of the company. program. And if the company fails to comply with the obligations established in the agreement, the procuratorate can report to the court, and the court will decide whether to resume public prosecution proceedings.

In 2019, the French National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the National Financial Prosecutor's Office jointly issued legal guidelines on the implementation of CJIP. Based on summarizing the practical experience of the system, they gave a more specific and detailed explanation of the effective implementation of the system. The Guidelines stipulate the procedures for submitting CJIP agreements, clarify the actual benefits that reaching the agreement will bring to the companies and natural persons involved, and establish the prerequisites for reaching the agreement. Among them, when prosecutors consider whether to apply the CJIP agreement, they will fully examine whether the companies involved have implemented effective compliance plans. For those companies that meet the conditions for mandatory compliance, prosecutors will consider their failure to implement compliance plans as The basis for making procedural choices or recommending a harsher sentence. For those companies that do not meet the applicable conditions for mandatory compliance, voluntarily implementing an effective compliance plan can become an advantageous condition for signing the CJIP agreement. At the same time, when prosecutors examine the application of the CJIP agreement, they will also fully consider the cooperation between the companies involved and prosecutors, such as the voluntariness of the companies involved in self-reporting of criminal acts, the implementation of compliance internal investigations, and the status of victims. compensation situation, etc.

2. France’s anti-corruption compliance standards

Whether it is mandatory compliance or a deferred prosecution agreement, there needs to be matching effective compliance standards. To date, this compliance standard has mainly been established around the compliance management system in anti-corruption and related fields. In contrast, the mandatory compliance system requires "prior compliance". After evaluation, the anti-corruption agency can only determine that the company has implemented the mandatory compliance system if it determines that the company has implemented an "effective anti-corruption compliance system." stipulated obligations.The deferred prosecution agreement system imposes "post-compliance" requirements on enterprises. After the enterprise involved in the case reaches an agreement with the procuratorate, only if an effective compliance plan is implemented in accordance with the requirements of the agreement, can the procuratorate possibly determine that the enterprise has fulfilled the agreement. required that its compliance system met the qualified requirements, and based on this, an application was made to the court to withdraw the prosecution. It can be said that establishing a set of operable and effective compliance evaluation standards is the only way to effectively deal with corruption in France.

The Sabine II Act passed in 2016 established the basic principles of corporate compliance systems. According to the law, a minimum corporate compliance system includes the following seven system elements: First, "formulate a code of conduct" to define behaviors that may constitute bribery and other illegal transactions. The code of conduct should become part of the company's internal rules and regulations and needs to be completed by the company through consultation with the company's employee representatives. The second is to establish an "internal early warning system" to collect clues or information about illegal behaviors provided by employees. The third is to conduct a "risk assessment" to identify, analyze and classify the company's bribery risks according to the industry and operating region of the company, and regularly update the risk assessment. The fourth is to develop "internal and external accounting control procedures" to ensure that accounting books, accounting records and accounting accounts are not used to conceal bribery. Such control procedures may be completed by the corporate finance and audit department or by external accountants. The fifth is to establish a "training system" to help those executives and employees closest to bribery risks prevent and detect corruption. Sixth, establish a "punishment mechanism" to punish employees who violate the code of conduct. Seventh, establish an "internal control and evaluation system" to review the effectiveness of the compliance system.

In 2017, the French National Anti-Corruption Agency (AFA) issued a legal guide to help companies prevent corruption, trying to establish operational compliance guidelines for companies in anti-corruption. In December 2020, on the basis of summarizing relevant practical experience, AFA updated and improved the above-mentioned guidelines and issued a full document called "The French Anti-Corruption Agency on Helping the Public Sector and Private Enterprises Prevent and Monitor Bribery and Use of Influence" "Guidelines on power-trading, extortion of public officials, illegal acquisition of benefits, misappropriation of public funds and favoritism" (hereinafter referred to as the "French Anti-Corruption Guidelines"), for the implementation of effective anti-corruption compliance in the public sector and private enterprises. The standards provide more detailed provisions. Although the French Anti-Corruption Guidelines are not binding on the companies involved, they can serve as an important basis for AFA to review the effectiveness of corporate compliance plans. The guide is divided into three parts. On the premise of establishing the basic principles and three pillars of the anti-corruption plan, it establishes relatively detailed standards for the anti-corruption plans of private enterprises and the public sector respectively. A brief analysis of these effective compliance standards follows.

(1) Basic concepts of anti-corruption compliance plan

The "French Anti-Corruption Guide" attempts to establish necessary measures and procedures for enterprises to increase awareness, prevent, detect and sanction related corruption crimes. The Guidelines establish the "principle of proportionality" as a core concept, requiring enterprises to establish anti-corruption compliance plans based on the compliance risks they face. Compliance risk situations are determined by different factors, which can include business activities, Product or service type, governance structure, size, business units, business locations, and different types of third-party business partners, etc.

The guidance believes that a company’s anti-corruption compliance program should be based on three indivisible pillars.The three pillars are: (1) Senior management’s commitment to anti-corruption, including demonstrating integrity and honesty through words and deeds; promoting anti-corruption programs through personal communications; and devoting necessary resources to establish effective and efficient compliance plan; strive to supervise the operation of the compliance program; adhere to the compliance plan in the decision-making process; implement appropriate and proportionate sanctions for violations of the code of conduct or behavior that may be determined as corruption; (2) Risk identification, that is, the use of risk identification Tools to enhance awareness of the corruption risks faced by enterprises; (3) Risk management, to manage identified risks through effective measures and procedures to prevent and detect any violations of the code of conduct or behavior that may constitute corruption, and implement corresponding measures sanctions. This risk management also includes monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of relevant measures and procedures in preventing and detecting corruption.

(2) Senior management’s anti-corruption commitment

Senior managers refer to those senior responsible persons who perform company management responsibilities in accordance with the company’s articles of association and effective standards. In enterprises with a board of directors, the work of senior managers is subject to the supervision of the board of directors, and the board of directors is responsible for ensuring that corruption risks faced by the enterprise are properly addressed through appropriate and effective anti-corruption plans. The anti-corruption commitment of these senior executives in executing the corporate mission, demonstrating capabilities and conducting business is the foundation of any anti-corruption program.

This commitment is not only reflected in senior management's determination to prevent and detect corruption within the enterprise, but also in the appropriate allocation of anti-corruption resources. To ensure that the measures and procedures included in the anti-corruption plan are effectively designed, implemented and monitored, senior management should deploy appropriate resources commensurate with their corruption risks. First, senior management can either take personal responsibility for the design, implementation, and oversight of anti-corruption programs or delegate these tasks to other staff. In the latter case, the staff member concerned must report directly to senior management. Second, senior management should ensure that their subordinate staff have acquired the necessary knowledge through experience or training and have sufficient authority and relevant information to perform their duties. Third, senior management should review the audit results of various measures and procedures of its anti-corruption program to ensure that the program is functioning properly. Fourth, senior management should personally participate in the implementation of certain important anti-corruption measures and procedures, such as identifying and verifying specific corruption risks, making decisions based on the results of third-party due diligence, or punishing those who violate the code of conduct or commit corrupt acts. people to impose penalties, etc. Fifth, senior management should communicate its anti-corruption plans internally and to third-party business partners, emphasizing its strong commitment to ethics and integrity. Sixth, senior management should ensure that appropriate and proportional sanctions are imposed on those who breach the Code of Conduct or engage in corrupt practices.

(3) Corruption risk identification

The identification of corporate corruption risks is the cornerstone of the anti-corruption plan and the basis for taking preventive and detection measures against corruption issues. Through risk identification, enterprises should make specific confirmation and assessment of their existing corruption risks, and adopt hierarchical management measures. The

anti-corruption program is a risk-based compliance management system. According to the requirements of this system, enterprises should understand and assess their corruption risks and implement appropriate and proportionate measures and procedures to effectively manage these risks.

In order to identify risks, enterprises should regularly update relevant documents to obtain an accurate understanding of corruption risks; enterprises should analyze their management processes in detail and adopt identification methods that can truly reflect the actual risks of the enterprise; enterprises should make accurate decisions on the severity of risks assessment, and effectively manage risks through accurate ranking of risks.

Once corruption risks have been identified, senior management should submit them to specialized units for verification, both before implementation and after each update.

(4) Corruption risk management

The so-called risk management means that enterprises design, deploy and implement anti-corruption plans based on the results of confirming, evaluating and prioritizing corruption risks. The measures and procedures included in the anti-corruption plan should achieve three goals: first, to effectively prevent possible compliance risks; second, to monitor ongoing compliance risks; and third, to take action against discovered system deficiencies. Remedies.

1. 1. Prevention mechanism

Generally speaking, the prevention mechanism adopted against corruption risks can include three measures: first, formulating a code of conduct and related procedures and policies; second, raising awareness of corruption risks and taking training measures; third, Third-party business partners undertake due diligence measures.

The so-called code of conduct, or a document with equivalent validity, refers to the ethical rules implemented by an enterprise for management and employees, and is also a prohibitive rule for various improper behaviors that may constitute corruption. These codes of conduct should be clear, direct and unambiguous and are the first step for senior management to strengthen anti-corruption measures within the business. These codes of conduct should be binding on all employees within the company in all respects and should be incorporated into business processes wherever possible. Other ethical rules and good practice policies should also be incorporated into the code of conduct, for example regarding the regulation of gifts, sponsorship, lobbying, management of conflicts of interest, entertainment expenses, moonlighting and other anti-corruption-related procedures. As an integral whole, the company's code of conduct and related anti-corruption procedures and policies should be easily accessible to all employees and communicated to third-party business partners through appropriate means when necessary.

Raising the awareness of corruption risks among all employees is an important part of the prevention mechanism. Both managers and employees performing the highest risk responsibilities should receive mandatory training commensurate with their jobs and potential risks. Enterprises can use risk identification procedures to determine target students and training content. At the same time, companies should ensure that trainees understand the overall structure of the anti-corruption program and identify the specific risks they encounter in their work and the procedures and measures that apply to these situations. To ensure the effectiveness of training, companies should establish various indicators for monitoring and testing trainees.

Insufficient third-party due diligence will make an enterprise involved in corruption crimes, damage its reputation, adversely affect its business development, and even make the enterprise or its senior managers bear legal liability. The main purpose of an enterprise's third-party due diligence is to conduct effective risk management by assessing the risks that occur when the enterprise deals with any third party (including customers, service providers, suppliers, merger targets, users and partners). Potential corruption risks may occur in the process of business contacts between enterprises and the above-mentioned individuals or legal entities.

Of course, the nature and thoroughness of due diligence will depend on the level of risk posed by the third party. Generally speaking, third party groups that are considered to be risk-free or low-risk may not require due diligence, or may only require relatively simple due diligence. For those third-party groups that are considered to have greater risks, more thorough due diligence procedures are required to ensure the security of related transactions. Due diligence can use different methods, including simple searches of open sources, in-depth investigations, and issuing assessment questionnaires to third parties. By conducting due diligence, senior management can make an appropriate assessment of whether to establish, maintain, or terminate a relationship with a third party. At the same time, enterprises should set up anti-corruption compliance clauses in contracts so that when a third party engages in corrupt behavior or fails to comply with the enterprise's anti-corruption compliance clauses, the relevant business relationship can be canceled or no longer maintained in a timely manner.

1. 2. Monitoring mechanism

In addition to effectively preventing corruption risks, the French Anti-Corruption Guidelines have established two management mechanisms designed to monitor compliance risks: one is the internal reporting system, and the other is internal control and auditing systems.For both systems, the Guidelines establish relatively specific effectiveness evaluation criteria.

The so-called internal reporting system refers to a system for companies to obtain confidential reports on behaviors that violate the code of conduct or may constitute corruption. This reporting system should be consistent with the nature of corporate corruption risks, encourage whistleblowers to make reports in good faith, and provide them with effective protection. The system can be managed by the enterprise itself, or it can be managed by a third party stipulated in the contract, but the third party must be able to handle the report correctly and keep the reported information strictly confidential.

This guideline establishes some technical rules for internal reporting. For example, the reporting system can have one or more channels for submitting reports, which can be email, management software, or a dedicated reporting platform. These channels should be open and accessible, both for reporting from within the organization and for third parties to make complaints easily accessible. As another example, the reporting system should accept anonymous reporting and maintain confidential contact with the reporting person through an anonymous email address or postal box. For another example, after receiving a report, the company should implement some necessary handling procedures, such as designating a contact person within the organization to receive and handle the report; keeping confidential the identity of the whistleblower, the content of the report, and the people implicated; The whistleblower should follow the procedures to provide relevant information and documents to support the matter reported; the company should investigate relevant business information and documents based on the reported information or clues; inform the whistleblower about accepting the report, adopting the report content, and taking follow-up actions and relevant time information arranged; if the report does not lead to further action, the document information that can easily identify the reporter and the person being reported should be destroyed in a timely manner; if an automatic reporting program is initiated, the entire process should comply with data protection standards; the reporting system Establish evaluation indicators for the quality and effectiveness of the company and submit the evaluation results to senior management along with other reports, etc.

In addition to the reporting system, enterprises should establish internal control and audit systems commensurate with corruption risks. The purpose of implementing this system is two-fold: first, to prevent and detect corruption within the enterprise; second, to review the effectiveness of the enterprise's anti-corruption measures and procedures and determine appropriate corrective and improvement measures.

Under ideal circumstances, the internal control system can have three automatic lines of defense: one is to take preventive control measures in advance to ensure that the decision-making and transaction process complies with the company's anti-corruption procedures; the other is to conduct checks at specific time intervals or randomly. Detective controls are adopted on relevant decisions or transactions to ensure that the first line of defense is properly implemented and that the entire anti-corruption program operates normally; third, regular internal audit measures are taken to ensure that the control system meets the requirements of the organization and is effectively implemented. and stay up to date. Auditors responsible for the third line of defense should be independent and should be appointed by and report to senior management.

As an important part of the internal control system, accounting controls and audit controls can be the first choice for discovering corruption issues. The accounting control system can ensure that the company's books, accounts and accounting vouchers are not used to cover up corruption issues. This system focuses on those high-risk areas discovered through risk identification and should become a control system that enterprises must build. Ensuring segregation of duties in verifying services, payment requests, payment authorizations and actual payments can help prevent corrupt practices from occurring. Ideally, companies should also have three lines of defense when implementing accounting controls and follow the same three-step procedures as internal controls. Accounting controls can be performed by the organization's internal accounting and finance department, or they can be delegated to qualified external auditors.

1. 3. Remedial mechanism

Once it is discovered that there are institutional loopholes or problems in the anti-corruption plan, corrective or remedial measures need to be implemented. These measures mainly include two aspects: first, sanctions against perpetrators of corruption; second, recording and archiving of anti-corruption documents, information and methods.

Senior management should impose appropriate sanctions for identified non-compliance with the Code of Conduct or behavior that may amount to corruption, and such sanctions should be documented to identify the reasons for the non-compliance and to prevent the recurrence of the behavior. Senior management should communicate the incident and related sanctions within the company, and adopt measures to anonymize the sanctioned persons so that their identities cannot be easily identified.

Enterprises should implement record retention and archiving systems for documents and information generated in the implementation of their anti-corruption programs to ensure that an audit trail mechanism is created. But the system should meet standards for data and privacy protection. The methods used by the company to develop anti-corruption plans and update plans should also be included in the retention and archiving scope.

3. The Enlightenment of France’s Anti-Corruption Compliance System to my country

Since the implementation of the Sabine II Act, France has introduced a corporate compliance system in the field of anti-corruption. The basic feature of this kind of system construction is that by establishing a mandatory compliance system, large enterprises are given the legal obligation to establish a compliance management system, which greatly promotes the rapid implementation of daily compliance management systems ("prior compliance") in many enterprises. . At the same time, through the establishment of a deferred prosecution agreement system, a compliance incentive mechanism has been established for those companies involved in crimes, which has greatly promoted the establishment of an "ex post facto compliance" system for these companies involved. Not only that, through summarizing the practical experience of ex-ante compliance and ex-post compliance, the relevant French departments have gradually formed a unique "effective compliance standard", that is, with the "principle of proportionality" as the core and "top-level commitment" ", "Compliance Risk Identification" and "Compliance Risk Management" are the three pillars of effective compliance standards.

Currently, my country's administrative regulatory authorities are vigorously promoting corporate compliance, gradually expanding the scope of application of compliance supervision, and using compliance incentives as an important means of administrative supervision. This is increasingly evident in regulatory fields such as securities and futures, antitrust, anti-money laundering and export controls. In the field of administrative supervision, in addition to continuing to improve the original compliance incentive mechanisms such as "compliance exemptions", "compliance lenient penalties", and "administrative enforcement commitments", my country can also learn from the French system and introduce a mandatory compliance system. For large enterprises reaching a certain scale, they are given the legal obligation to establish a compliance management system, and administrative penalties are imposed on enterprises that fail to fulfill this obligation. At present, in the fields of securities and futures, data protection and anti-money laundering, this kind of mandatory compliance system has begun to be introduced into our country's laws, but it is far from being universally applied, and no practical system has been formed. In the future, we can learn from France’s compulsory compliance system and generally establish the legal obligation for large enterprises to establish compliance management systems in all areas of administrative supervision in our country. At the same time, the compliance incentive mechanism should also be improved in administrative regulations. Enterprises that refuse to perform compliance management obligations will certainly be held administratively responsible, but enterprises that have established a compliance management system will be given certain administrative incentives, such as granting Compliance qualification certification, etc., when enterprises are subject to administrative investigation due to administrative violations, incentives such as administrative law enforcement commitments and administrative leniency penalties will be given priority.

At present, our country’s procuratorial organs are vigorously promoting the reform and exploration of the corporate compliance leniency system. This system may be established as a formal criminal litigation legal system in the foreseeable future. Prosecution agencies have established preliminary standards for effective compliance rectification. For example, in the normative document issued by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the companies involved are required to establish proportional compliance organizations and staff based on the compliance risks they face, the nature of the company, the type of business, the size of the company, the characteristics of the industry, etc. Appropriate compliance managers. This marks that our country's procuratorial organs have begun to accept the basic concept of the "principle of proportionality".For another example, according to relevant reform documents, the third-party organization's assessment of the compliance rectification of the companies involved should focus on the effective identification and control of compliance risks, the timely disposal of illegal personnel, and the reasonable allocation of management agencies and management personnel. , Adequate guarantee of management system and human and material resources, operation of monitoring, reporting, investigation, handling mechanism and compliance performance evaluation mechanism, continuous rectification mechanism and formation of compliance culture, etc. This also means that the concepts of compliance risk identification and risk management have also been accepted by relevant reform documents.

Although our country's procuratorial organs have initially established an effective compliance evaluation standard suitable for our country's situation, there is still room for further improvement of this standard. In this regard, the effective compliance standards in French anti-corruption cases are of certain reference significance. For example, not only compliance management agencies and managers should also implement the principle of proportionality in terms of compliance risk identification and compliance risk management, and set up corresponding policies based on the company's risk areas, industry characteristics, business types and company size. Compliance improvement plan. In this regard, it is necessary to explore and establish a diversified compliance and rectification model. At present, the model distinction between "simplified compliance" and "paradigm compliance" has been initially formed in practice. It is necessary to refine it on this basis to make it universally operable. For another example, in terms of compliance risk identification, it is necessary to strengthen the company's internal investigation system, supervise and accurately find the causes of crimes, discover loopholes and hidden dangers in the management system, and identify violations found based on the company's exposed violations and crimes. Institutional areas and business links, so as to take targeted compliance rectification. For another example, in terms of compliance risk management, risk prevention and control measures such as regular risk assessment, due diligence, compliance training, and compliance communication can be carried out in a targeted manner with the goal of effectively preventing the recurrence of crimes based on the specific circumstances of the enterprise involved. Measures include selectively adopting risk monitoring measures including compliance reporting, compliance reporting, compliance audits, etc., and applying remedial measures such as internal compliance investigations, punishing responsible personnel, and improving the compliance management system as needed.

Of course, France’s effective compliance standards mainly apply to the field of anti-corruption, and its scope of application is slightly narrow. Its deferred prosecution agreement system only applies to a very small number of very large companies involved in the case, and there is still a lack of experience summarization of effective compliance rectification. Basic data support. The effective compliance standards established by relevant French departments apply to both ex-ante compliance and ex-post compliance, which to a certain extent limits the universal application value of these standards. In fact, unlike the construction of a daily compliance management system, compliance rectification led by the procuratorate requires the establishment of some specialized and targeted effective compliance standards. At this point, while our country's procuratorial organs can learn from France's experience in building a reasonable compliance system, they should also base themselves on their own national conditions and refine the increasingly mature Chinese version of effective compliance by summarizing the successful experience of compliance rectification of the companies involved. Compliance standards. This is the only way to advance the reform of the compliance leniency system.

Author: Chen Ruihua (Professor and Doctoral Supervisor of Peking University)

Source: Quiet Lawyer

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