write an essay on corruption is worse than armed robbery
Answers
Explanation:
Corruption is highly damaging for economic, political, and social development. Corruption suffocates commerce, depraves governments, exploits human vulnerability, undermines justice, and procreates social inequities. Those performing the act of corruption and those inducing it are both equally corrupt. Corruption is both a major cause and a result of poverty around the world. It occurs at every level of society, but the sleaze at government level is its greatest enabler. When corruption abounds, political power means an opportunity to satisfy the hunger for wealth. It is now evident that, in comparable conditions, the countries bedevilled with higher levels of corruption have fared much worse than those with lower corruption levels. It is gratifying for me to see that 2017 has been a tough year for a number of corrupt politicians and rulers in the world from South Korea to Pakistan to Brazil. Hopefully this will stimulate institutional reforms to render governments and leaders more accountable.
Answer:
Corruption is the abuse of public or private office for personal motives. Its most common forms are embezzlement, bribery, nepotism, and discrimination.
Corruption is highly damaging for economic, political, and social development. Corruption suffocates commerce, depraves governments, exploits human vulnerability, undermines justice, and procreates social inequities. Those performing the act of corruption and those inducing it are both equally corrupt. Corruption is both a major cause and a result of poverty around the world. It occurs at every level of society, but the sleaze at government level is its greatest enabler. When corruption abounds, political power means an opportunity to satisfy the hunger for wealth. It is now evident that, in comparable conditions, the countries bedevilled with higher levels of corruption have fared much worse than those with lower corruption levels. It is gratifying for me to see that 2017 has been a tough year for a number of corrupt politicians and rulers in the world from South Korea to Pakistan to Brazil. Hopefully this will stimulate institutional reforms to render governments and leaders more accountable.
Corruption is akin to stealing, but it is much worse than theft or even robbery for three main reasons. One, it always involves a betrayal of trust. Two, its impact for a country, society, or organization is much worse than the monetary loss involved. It enables all other crimes, including such heinous acts as human and drug trafficking. Three, corruption is the single biggest cause for reducing efficiency and increasing inequality. By defeating fair competition, corruption not only compromises quality but also deters domestic and foreign investment in a country. It also distorts priorities and policies as the investments are allocated not to the sectors or projects that are most needed but to those that offer the best prospects for corruption. Generally, health and education sectors are less corruption friendly than infrastructure projects or huge procurements and are thus neglected. A number of credible studies have established the inverse correlation between corruption and the quality of government spending and investments. Corruption, thus, delegitimizes the state as it cannot deliver the basic services to its citizens. Corruption also increases income inequality because the resources are shared between rich and well-connected of the society and the poor are left out.
Seven decades of cold war, as two ideologies jostled for world dominance, was probably the most conducive period for the proliferation of corruption. While communism was always highly tolerant of irritants like corruption for the sake of furthering the ideology, the cold war period also saw rich western governments involving in corrupt practices abroad around the globe – propping up corrupt dictatorships, undermining democracies and accountability, and taking resources like oil and minerals. Illegitimate funds generated in the developing world found a warm welcome in the murky banking, corporate, and legal regimes of the developed world. Tax havens and bank secrecy laws offered a sanctuary for tainted money. At the same time, firms from developed countries showed no qualms about suborning rulers and officials from developing countries to gain business contracts. The influence of multinationals served the company ahead of the country as they disadvantaged domestic firms, enabled flight of capital, and twisted decision-making to favour projects benefiting the few rather than the many. Since the end of the cold war, and as the world has become increasingly global, the western countries have substantially reconsidered their tolerance of corruption abroad. However, corruption still remains a major issue, responsible for inequality and poverty. Also, a number of rich countries still have a lot more to do to close their doors to illicit finances and to hold their corporate businesses more accountable for corrupt business practices in the emerging markets countries.
Corruption is worse than theft because it afflicts the weakest and poorest of the society the most, thus exacerbating the plight of those with already little say about their own destiny. It damages trust –the main theme of this essay-, weakens the rule of law, hurts development, and inhibits government from being efficient.