Talk:Political corruption/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Maricopa County

Even in countries where national politics is relatively honest, political corruption is often found in regional politics. An example is in Maricopa County, Arizona.

What's the deal there? There's no explanation for the example, either on this page or the link to Maricopa County. Maccoinnich 10:28, May 20, 2005 (UTC)

I removed this. The original author may have been referring to a scandal involving alternative-fuel vehicles that happened in 2000-2002 during Governor Jane Hull's administration, but to my knowledge this affected the entire state and not just Maricopa County. Moreover, the scandal may not have involved corruption in the first place; it could be argued that the legislation was well-meaning but greedy citizens took advantage of loopholes. Anyway, I don't think it's a good example even if that was the intended reference, so let's leave all of this out for now. Jeeves 02:45, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Actually, we might want to put it back in. I'm in contact with some members of government, and they emphatically affirmed said corruption, mentioning AZSCAM, a major case of corruption in Maricopa County a few years ago where members of the state legislature were basically caught on film accepting bribes. More research pending, but it's definitely corruption. There was also a case about 20 years ago somewhere in Ohio, I'll look it up.

I still have no idea what this is all about. If it's going to go back it, it definitely needs some explanation. Maccoinnich 17:15, August 13, 2005 (UTC)

I have to agree with the gentleman or woman that wrote and presented facts because if there is proof of bribery there is no reason for that not to be considered any type of corruption.

List of conditions favorable to corruption

Section 1 is a list of conditions favorable to corruption. The presence of a rambling, sloppy list at the beginning of the article could cause readers to ignore the high-quality material later on. This list appears to be a collection of personal gripes and theories of the editors. While some items are universally accepted and well worded (lack of transparency) others are poorly worded and indicate the political agenda of the editor (Apathetic, uninterested, or gullible populace that fails to give adequate attention to political processes.).

All in all, I think the items on this list need to be referenced, and then they need to be written in a consistant manner (currently, some are general and some are specific). AdamRetchless 14:34, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

I've structured the list, grouping related items together. Some improvement in phrasing may be needed. Criticforaday 21:35, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

~~I swear, this world is coming to an end.


Why just "political"?

Who's never heard of the "I'll scratch your back if you scratch my back" principle in the workplace?

Are businesses somehow magically immune from corruption?

Isn't it handy to know the person in charge of purchacing?

I know countless examples of workplace corruption.

Right, but workplace corruption is inherently a different animal from political corruption and is usually regulated under a different set of laws. Also, the term corruption could be used to refer to corruption of information (especially during transmission). So I think that is why the qualifier "political" is necessary here.--Coolcaesar 03:21, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
We do have Police corruption and Corporate crime.--Commander Keane 13:39, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I suggest that the article be split off so that we have:

  • Official corruption, the misuse of an offical position for private advantage
  • Political corruption, corruption of the polical system through bribery, intimidation, extortion, vote buying, destabilization, or influence peddling

Josh Parris#: 03:59, 5 December 2005 (UTC) \


some ideas;

The term "official corruption" could be referred to as "acting out of office" - an even broader concrete concept (i.e. so they opened the office door, walked outside, and started acting out there?). Or simply the act of exploiting others. (Borderline Personality)

Suggest it as:

CORRUPTION - an individual's inability to differentiate right from wrong is compromised ~ rendering them unable to follow, obey, or conform to laws, policies, procedures, protocols, or recognize jurisdictional limitations. So whose decisions ultimately cause mental, physical, or emotional harm to others under their control.

Note - a position of authority would be the logical point of origin for this behavior. Obviously, regarding an object of little consequence as "corrupt" seems an oxymoron. An individual's status could be compromised for different reasons i.e. if physical in origin due to dementia, mental-psychotic disorders, or emotional-personality disorders.

Therefore, someone could be corrupt, because they are incompetent. But if someone is incompetent, can they be corrupt?

btk; 17/1

Inaccurate

Either way, the map is completely wrong or someone bribed the inspectors.

List of Conditions

As far as a "rambling, sloppy list" is concerned, I'd have to disagree. In an article "A Policy-Oriented Theory of Corruption" by Tevfik Nas, Albert Price, and Charles Weber of the University of Michigan at Flint (published in American Political Science Review in 1986), the exact same contributing factors are listed (though not in a list form).

Nas, et al, divide the causes of corruption into "personal characteristics" and "structural influences". The personal characteristics are reduced to either greed or desire for social status (which, in my opinion, is probably the same thing). The structural influences are sub-divided into organizational, quality of citizen involvement, and effects of the legal system. I believe pretty much everything listed in the article can be placed into those divisions.

TL Hart

Christopher Largen's novel JUNK (2005)

This doesn't seem to be a major work of literature, but rather an advert for a vanity publication. Suggest we get rid of it.

While we're at it, the section on corruption in fiction is a bit light. Pretty much all the Conspiracy thrillers of the 1970s alluded to corruption and Watergate, etc. I'll add some more when I have time.

Political corruption in China

Can anyone do an article on political corruption in China? I searched for it on Wikipedia but there doesn't seem to be an article on it, also I don't know how to request an article.

The USA's government

To be totally honest, the US's political state is extremely corrupt as is the country. -Anonymous —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.203.165.11 (talk) 23:34, 4 December 2006

Gombeenism and Parochialism

I added Gombeenism referes to an individual who is dishonest and corrupt for the purpose of personal gain, more often through monetary, while, parochialism which is also known as parish pump politics relates to placing local or vanity projects ahead of the national interest.[19] [20] [21] [22] For instance in Irish politics, populist left wing political parties will often apply these terms to mainstream establisment political parties and will cite the many cases of Corruption in Ireland, such as the Irish Banking crisis, which found evidence of bribery, cronyism and collusion, where in some cases politicians who were coming to the end of their political careers would receive a senior management or committee position in a company they had dealings with

Corruption and Indian Corruption

In India Government gives food grains at subsidised rate through rationing shop on ration card. It appers that all most all the industrialist are having ration card means they are poor and nothing else but poor. Will any reader on this discussion will give opinion about difference in corruption and Indian corruption. vkvora 17:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Don't Forget the Organ Trading Black Market in India and Countries in that area That People have investigated Tirelessly.

Kashmir is by product of Defence Corruption in India and Pakistan

Red Tape, Bureaucracy, Corruption, Political corruption, Bribery, Extortion, Graft, Money Laundering all are part and parcel of Religon. vkvora 05:24, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Type of Abuse

It is simple to list monetary. How about abuse that doesn't involve money? For example, abuse for position gain, political power gains,etc. It make me grief to think about it.

--Sltan 13:58, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

External links

The external links section is full of unnecessary pointers, and is likely to attract more. I've removed the most obvious: columns from private newspapers, private blogs, ads, confusing corruption with other types of crime and misbehavior. I also commented out the examples section, because it can never represent a neutral point of view; anyone can "blacklist" anyone, without discussion or consensus. --Vuo 19:31, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Vuo has a sharp eye. good edit. Rjensen 21:32, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Map

Map is bullcrap, USA should be in black color on this map.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.226.107.91 (talk) 06:28, 15 November 2006

  • Good to hear from an expert. About the map, it's hard to follow. A similar map with better colours is here: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/World_Map_Index_of_perception_of_corruption.png (if link doesn't work, qv the article on Switzerland and scroll down) -Jackmont, Jan 11, 2007.
    • That map is outdated.Ultramarine 13:29, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • There is far more corruption in the USA than anyone would want, but in relative terms the map is not far wrong. I say this based on ten years of experience in international consulting in the areas of corruption, organized crime, and poverty. Citizens of almost any country will tell you that the corruption in their country is terrible, far worse than anyone outside can ever understand, yet there are strikingly clear differences. I think Transparency International's index is reasonably close to objective truth, and improving every year. —Aetheling 03:27, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

USA

I don't see why there's an article about the USA in here, in my opinion, the intire country is corrupt.

And lets give a quadrupple and a half cheer to the person, whomever it might've been, who wrote that, truly one of the most intelligent and cynical persons there is here on wiki! Huzzah! (x4½)81.228.148.164 08:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I second that, and in particular would congratulate him on discovering a new form of spelling "entire" (I use the old spelling for convenience)

Merge with Kleptocracy

Keep separate. Allow me to be the first to object to this proposal. Kleptocracy is a type of government. Political corruption is a mode of behavior (usually criminal), and a disease of political systems. Kleptocratic tendencies are a suitable subject for political science, whereas political corruption is primarily a concern of criminal justice. I really think that each of these two topics deserves its own article, so that each article can focus on what is important to it. To merge them would be to create an even more unwieldy article — and I think that the topic of political corruption is already immense enough as it is. My vote is to keep them separate. —Aetheling 03:17, 5 June 2007 (UTC) Keep separate.Ultramarine 11:24, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Kleptocracy is a buzzword first used for the Jelzin administration for a gouvernement with so much corruption in it that corruption has become the core of the gouvernement. It is a political neologism that is PRODded. Everything there is to say about "Kleptocracy" can be said in Political Corruption, and a redirect is fully sufficient for "Kleptocracy". --85.181.63.14 12:04, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Ultramarine. Corruption may lead to kleptocracy but they are different. Keep separate.

- LC


I believe that although kleptocracy may be a form of political corruption, it is in itself too idiosyncratic to wash into political corruption as merely another subdivision. Keep separate.

- Kyp —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.32.84.229 (talk) 20:05, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

It looks like kleptocracy is a type of political corruption. So there should just be a link on that page to get to this page. But don't merge them--they aren't the same thing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.41.234.69 (talk) 23:42, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Effects

The text of the section "Effects" was also quoted nearly verbatim from "A Handbook on Fighting Corruption" (http://pdf.dec.org/pdf_docs/Pnace070.pdf), p. 5. I haven't read the entire Wikipedia article, but I suspect there is more of the same elsewhere. I'm not quite sure what to do in this situation; for now I'll just flag the article with a template. modify 18:18, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

The addition was made here, with a note that says it's from a public domain source. Can someone who knows about these things verify that it's OK to copy and paste from a US government publication like this? If so, perhaps the {{copypaste}} should be removed. modify 18:44, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

"Unholy Alliance"

Is a term for an alliance between theoretically opposed groups. However, this is not a term specifically used for corruption. There may be an "unholy alliance" between nations in a war, for example.Ultramarine (talk) 17:51, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

  • Correct, but it is also a form of political corruption. Its public face hides its method of operation. "Bootleggers and Baptists" is one classic example. The deliberately hidden relationships between government officials and a wealthy few is what TR thought so dangerous, because it enabled extensive corruption of other sorts. Deceiving the public is dishonest, therefore corrupt if any personal benefit derives from doing so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.98.135.196 (talk) 18:09, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
Most of the soures do not state that this a term commonly used with regards to political corruption, they mention other forms of "unholy alliances". Regarding the usual far left wing capitalist conspiracy theories, they are opinions, not facts. Regarding campaign finance, this is already discussed, although this is not corruption, since it is not illegal or secret.Ultramarine (talk) 18:16, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
"Most of the soures" don't have to. TR didn't have to. Merely using it to identify a form of corruption establishes it, especially if the author is the POTUS viewing the corruption from the inside. The word "conspiracy" is not used here. Converging interests of a powerful few suffices to produce the same effect. Nothing is said here about campaign finance, although that is understood. There must be much about campaign finance that is illegal or secret, otherwise people wouldn't keep going to prison, but "illegal or secret" isn't the requirement for corruption. Merely self-serving and dishonest will do, all the more if on a massive scale. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.98.135.196 (talk) 20:15, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
There already a section on "Campaign contributions". If there is something more that should be added on this, like undue influence by businesses, then this is the place. The references to "unholy alliances" like the one between Nazis and Occultism, or the radical left and islamist terrorists, have no place in this article.Ultramarine (talk) 20:26, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
You removed without all the tags without explanation: [1] Please add explanations for this or the irrelevant material will be removed. Again, why should we mention things like unholy alliances between Nazis and Occultism, or the radical left and islamist terrorists? Ultramarine (talk) 20:32, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

There is vastly more to an unholy alliance than campaign contributions. The fake opposition of the "opposing" parties usually involves one taking a high moral tone, crusading preachers or government officials who are going "stamp out X" or "regulate Y" or bring a "newer, deeper understanding of Z" if folks will just have faith. It is this last example that relates to Nazi occultism, a sort of hocus-pocus preast-craft to distract the lumpen proletariat from the enormity of Nazi intentions. Likewise, some on the Left stand accused of a double standard w.r.t. Islamist terrorism, again, adopting a high moral tone that masks their acceptance of it. When done to confuse the public, for personal gain, and it works, it's corrupt, politically, i.e., results in policies that do not accomplish their stated purpose, but rather benefit only a few, inside the alliance. This is what TR, Smedley Butler, John Flynn, and many others saw.

If Flynn and Smeadly etc it talking about Nazis and Occultism, or the radical left and islamist terrorist, then you should give a quote stating this. You have taken many unconnected uses of the word "unholy alliance" and mixed them together to fit your own theory which is not allowed, see WP:OR. You could maybe use them in an article about the word "unholy alliance", discussing what the word means in general, but no in an article about political corruption. The only one of sources that connects "unholy alliances" and poltical corruption is the Theodore Roosevel one and the book Unholy Alliance about the international drug trade and resultant political corruption.
Your more general theory that a few wealthy people secretly controls and corrupts everthing, is not an established fact, as your text clams, but simply the opinions of a some people, like the not uncommon opinion that the US have a secret "unholy alliance" with aliens who have given the US all new technology, or the theory that the Freemasons or the Illuminati controls everthing. Maybe we could have a section about your view, but then is should be called something like "Conspiracy theories" to cover these aspects.Ultramarine (talk) 11:43, 13 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Both the facts and the synthesis (such as it is, which isn't much) seem well documented. -68.221.118.230 (talk) 23:48, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
    • Please respond to the arguments given.Ultramarine (talk) 15:55, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

You can't debate this without reading it. Here it is.

      • (begin)

An unholy alliance is a coalition among seemingly antagonistic groups, especially if one is religious, for ad hoc or hidden gain. Like patronage, unholy alliances are not necessarily illegal, but unlike patronage, by its deceptive nature and often great financial resources, an unholy alliance can be much more dangerous to the public interest. An early, well-known use of the term was by Theodore Roosevelt (TR):

"To destroy this invisible Government, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day." - 1912 Progressive Party Platform, attributed to TR[1] and quoted again in his autobiography[2] where he connects Trusts and monopolies (sugar interests, Standard Oil, etc.) to Woodrow Wilson, Howard Taft, and consequently both major political parties.

After the breakup of Standard Oil, TR lost the election, and the unholy alliance he had identified, oligopolies of a few big commodities corporations and their political allies, continued otherwise undeterred by the mutually beneficial indifference of both major political parties. In 1935, retired Marine Major General Smedley Butler described how this unholy alliance influenced U.S. foreign policy and how his job abroad had been to be a "muscle man for big business." In 1944, conservative journalist John T. Flynn described how this unholy alliance uses religion to sell its agenda abroad to the American public:

"The enemy aggressor is always pursuing a course of larceny, murder, rapine and barbarism. We are always moving forward with high mission, a destiny imposed by the Deity to regenerate our victims while incidentally capturing their markets, to civilise savage and senile and paranoid peoples while blundering accidentally into their oil wells."[3]

A reference to this unholy alliance today is:

Phillips, Kevin (2006) American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century, Viking Press.

Other unholy alliances are the subjects of other books:

  • Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left, by David Horowitz
  • Unholy alliance: religion and atrocity in our time, by Marc H. Ellis
  • Unholy Alliance: A History of Nazi Involvement With the Occult, by Peter Levenda

Still other unholy alliances are found in "Bootleggers and Baptists"[4] and Dixie Mafia.

  1. ^ O'Toole, Patricia, "The War of 1912," TIME in Partneship with CNN, Jun. 25, 2006.
  2. ^ Roosevelt, Theodore. An Autobiography: XV. The Peace of Righteousness, Appendix B, NEW YORK: MACMILLAN, 1913.
  3. ^ Flynn, John T. (1944) As We Go Marching. p. 240
  4. ^ Bruce Yandle, "Bootleggers and Baptists: The Education of a Regulatory Economist." Regulation 7, no. 3 (1983): 12.
      • (end)

Cleanup?

User:Perspicacite added a cleanup tag, could he please enumerate what to clean up? The article isn't a major mess, just some citation formatting would be in order. --Vuo (talk) 14:17, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia - conditions favorable for corruption

  • Information deficits
    • Lack of government transparency.
      • -> ArbCom ruled Tobias Conradi is not allowed to compile lists of admin right abuses
    • Contempt for or negligence of exercising freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
      • -> admins and users often censor other user's opinion or representation of verifiable facts, labeling the opinion or verifiable facts trolling/vandalism/personal attack
  • Lacking control over and accountability of the government.
    • Lacking civic society and non-governmental organizations which monitor the government.
      • -> creation of Wikiproject to monitor admin right abuses was surpressed by admins
    • Contempt for or negligence of exercising freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
      • -> freedom of speech surpressed by admins
    • Weak rule of law.
      • -> admins do sometimes not apply the written policies, but their own interpretations of them, sometimes openly admintting that certain written rules exist, but should not be followed "in that special case"
    • Weak judicial independence.
      • -> NONE in WP
  • Social conditions
    • Self-interested closed cliques and "old boy networks".
      • -> on WP:AN in a discussion with Conrad Dunkerson regarding Tobias Conradi that can be found. Admins attack Conrad, because he did not side with them
    • In societies where personal integrity is rated as less important than other characteristics (by contrast, in societies such as 18th and 19th Century England, 20th Century Japan and post-war western Germany, where society showed almost obsessive regard for "honor" and personal integrity, corruption was less frequently seen)
      • -> E.g. Tobias Conradi is from post-war Germany - while most of the admins he saw engaging in corrution or supporting it come from the US/UK/AU. Some admins even offered to make deals with Tobias, which Tobias rejected ("You cannot buy me").
    • Lacking literacy and education among the population.
      • -> some admins, or users that think about becoming admins, lack basic logical thinking or ability to understand written policies. Sometimes they even may not have read the existing policies at all.

84.190.47.116 10:44, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

FYI, the above user has had his log-on name banned from editing wikipedia for his own failure to abide by rules and regulations, regularly insulting and harrassing others, and clearly, his own lack of basic logical thinking, which was what led to his being banned in the first place. John Carter 16:42, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
Does he think that Wikipedia is a government organization? --Vuo (talk) 13:58, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Secret societies

Do secret societies count as a factor of corruption ? For instance, if four out of five officers of a Supreme Court or Central Bank are members of a secret society, one could argue that those institutions are corrupt. ADM (talk) 10:42, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

This is probably an instance of an "old boy network", where the official process is circumvented by exclusive personal relations. --Vuo (talk) 16:38, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Hello?..

Why on earth is the world banks statistics put on a page about government corruption. If this isn't irony then what is, how can you make the world bank somehow be above corruption and able to give legitimate statistics, when any educated person knows the source of corruption in the world today is the world bank. The americans government is literally, and sourced as the most corrupt in the world, and it is ovbious that the denial of this corruption creates alot of bias on wikipedia in general. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.8.131.33 (talk) 05:11, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

It is very easy to make accusations of hypocricy to discredit a source of information. Additionally, hypocricy does not mean that the information is false. Obviously the World Bank omits its own involvement if it's involved, but the rest may be accurate. There was an interesting article on this in the last issue of Scientific American Mind. --Vuo (talk) 16:40, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Corruption in Mexico???

Why is there not even an article about corruption in Mexico? Everyone knows it is rampant, and currently may be leading to the collapse of its government. And please, no BS about "weasel words"--everyone knows it's incredibly corrupt. Is Wikipedia so dominated by political correctness that we are all self-censoring now? There's an elephant in the room, friends. Someone, please, have the courage to talk about it! InFairness (talk) 10:21, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

These subsections and articles are waiting for a writer. The topic has not gathered enough expert interest. Another note: It appears that in many countries "corruption" is a generally used slander against any politician or group. However, corruption in the government has a precisely defined meaning, like other criminal acts, and can be written about in a definitive way, without just randomly slandering people. It's like saying that Afghanistan is a major source of heroin — this is a fact, and no political weaseling can change this fact. --Vuo (talk) 20:00, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Not sure what title shall this have

I'm assuming that reporting the top and bottom 12 lists is fair use, or the reporting of facts, or both. Please remove or re-edit if you disagree -- Anon.

Mar 21, 2006 - updated link address from public domain resource at

http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/democracy_and_governance/technical_areas/anti-corruption/index.html "USAID" is the lead foreign aid department for the US State Dept. They have strategies and programs to fight corruption and provide financial support for well known anti-corruption programs like Transparency International and others focused on specific regions. However, many anti-corruption foreign aid programs focus on external projects, and they need to expand efforts to fixing internal government management control systems that are weak and allow corruption opportunities to flourish. Vjochim 13:27, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

An entry is deserved on the UN Oil For Food program don't you think? It is likely the largest corruption scandal in history. - Response - yes, it is huge - do a Google search on Paul Volcker to find websites with details. Vjochim 13:27, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I doubt it is the largest corruption event, but not surprising, elf Aquitaine (now TOTAL SA) was involved.

It is often forgotten in the overall picture, that corruption is not a victimless crime.

When the German Parliament Bundestag created a law that would throw the little people out of the quest to get their land back in the former East Germany, the original owners were systematically disadvantaged by this corrupt abuse of power by the legislators.

The most striking example is the Leuna-Minol-elf Aquitaine deal. There were about 2,500 vacated former gas station allottments which the original owners could not get back unless they proved they had millions to invest and brought forward architectural plans. As this was too costly for the original owners they had their rights scrapped without compensation. The law was designed to facilitate the illegal allocation of the land to the French mineral oil company elf Aquitaine. It was basically a sweetheart deal between Helmut Kohl and the late Francois Mitterrand, set up in a sophistcated manner. The victims of that collusion could not afford to have the sweetheart legislation (investment priority law) thrown out as unconstitutional. It ignored the constitutional right to property but court proceedings of this magnitude are beyond the reach of the little people - and the colluders knew that, of course.

Kickbacks for the ruling CDU party were discovered in Swiss bank accounts, but the findings of the Swiss and French investigations could be ignored by withholding funds for translations from French into German, which the German courts would have needed to act.

Journalists who talked to prosecutors found that the authorities did not want to know about it as any investigation into this collusion between the German Kohl and the French governments would have ended the careers of the investigators.

This writer is one who had their land 'stolen' by this collusion. Corruption does have a very negative effect on individuals as my life has shown and while it is all very well to theorize on effects of society's structures, it should not be forgotten, that the impact of corruption on individuals is very real.

The Leuna-Minol-elf Aquitaine deal would have to be one of the most sophisticated corruption cases in modern history and serves as an example how democracy can be abused, how the collusiion between the political class and companies can disadvantage people, and how they actually can get away with it, when they set it up under the guise of democracy.

Transparency has lost credibility in my eyes as their headquarters are in Berlin and the allottment that was 'stolen' from me in the Leuna-Minol-elf Aquitaine deal was also in Berlin! 121.209.48.222 (talk) 04:12, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Prof. Jon S.T. Quah (National University of Singapore) has excellent articles on Corruption and Corruption in Asia, as well as excellent books on corruption. Makes a good link in your reference or research sections. http://adb.org/Documents/Periodicals/GB/GovernanceBrief11.pdf http://www.currenthistory.com/currentissue.html Jack, April 18, 2006

"Charges of corruption as a political tool Oftentimes, politicians may seek to taint their opponents with charges of corruption. In the People's Republic of China, this phenomenon was used by Zhu Rongji, and most recently, by Hu Jintao to weaken their political opponents."

Please, can someone explain and/or expand this? It sounds like a very subjective claim. - Reply - this is fairly correct: A review of online articles of public corruption would show many times when one aspiring politician is claiming the incumbent has allowed corruption - especially after a big public case. In some cases, entire political parties lose power like Canada, in 2005 when the liberals were caught siphoning money out of government accounts to pay for political campaigns. The liberals lost control of the government after that scandal. Vjochim 13:27, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Combating Corruption: A Policy Tool Kit

This section was copied verbatim from the CIPE website, at <http://www.cipe.org/programs/corruption/index.php>. The page in question does not have a copyright marker, but neither does it have an explicit permission to copy notice. Even if it did have such a notice, it is very poor form simply to copy someone's article into Wikipedia. Not only is it not encyclopedic in style — a Wikipedia requirement — but it contains no references at all, and is thus technically original research. At best we should summarize the policy toolkit, with a reference and perhaps quote one or two of its specific recommendations. As it is now, it is unacceptable. I hesitate to delete it entirely, because there is good material here. — Aetheling 05:40, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

The wisdom that all ills, including corruption, can be cured with a panacea made of three components (in alphabetical order): deregulation, privatization, and tax cuts needs to be challenged. This is old ideology and old rule book.

There are plenty of examples that this does not deliver the goods. The global financial crisis is one, where the panacea created more harm than good. Germany has heavily privatized and the corruption that we have experienced there is not a pretty picture. Russia regularly runs into problems with their privatized enterprises and has to apply a variety of measures to prevent adverse outcomes for the rest of the country.

We are even forced into a new system of regulation with carbon trading, as non-regulation is not delivering lower air pollution. Deregulation and privatization, in carefully measured dosages, is appropriate for some sectors, but that it saves the bacon each and every time plus lowers corruption is a view that looks good on paper. The ideologues need to get out a little more. 121.209.48.222 (talk) 04:25, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Senseless map

Something is awfully wrong with the map shown, on one hand it quantifies corruption in a way one is left unsure whether the greater the number the more corruption there is or viceversa. On the other hand I find it quite ignorant of facts if it supposes that either Peru or the United States are one much more corrupt than the other. As both are respectively as corrupted as their respective power may let them be. The map is out of date now. It needs to be changed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.172.14.80 (talk) 14:43, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

The map is indeed of limited usefulness as the perception of the population reflects only the DOCUMENTED cases and statistics. You may know about Peru and the US, I know about Germany. It also does not reflect the degree of seriousness of corruption in the political arena.

When a township administration is lubricated to buy the four times more expensive sewerage treatment plant, that is bad. Is it being prosecuted and does it enter the statistics? I don't think so. I'd like to see that German who would answer truthfully in a poll about his/her experiences with corruption!

A higher degree of corruption is when a national parliament creates a law to support corrupt acts, legalising a corrupt act afterwards, and denying compensation to the victims. An example for this is the German investment priority act, which came into effect in December 1994 to ensure people could not claim compensation for land which went to the French through a government contract of 1992.

Since such corruption cannot be investigated or prosecuted, this corruption does not enter the statistics and in the map the country looks cleaner than it is. Peer pressure prevents prosecutors from investigating and prosecuting, because the colleagues end up with a higher workload for the other cases, and prosecutors who would want to investigate politcians will find themselves on the scrap heap.

You are right to question the usefulness of such a map. It delivers a distorted picture because the more honest country, which does not sweep cases under the carpet, comes out worse than those who exercise 'omerta'. 121.209.49.20 (talk) 01:38, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Page title and associated categories

I see a mess that needs cleaning up relating to the categories of this topic. Category:Political corruption is currently a subcategory of Category:Corruption, but Category:Corruption overlaps contentwise 100% (I think) with the meaning of "political corruption". I suppose Category:Corruption could be merged into Category:Political corruption, to match the political corruption article. But equally, "political corruption" is probably not the best title for this page anyway - "political corruption" is vague and not normally used and on some definitions would exclude parts of that topic. Maybe corruption should be moved to corruption (disambiguation), and political corruption to corruption, and merge the cats to match? NB see also Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion. Disembrangler (talk) 12:22, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

how to remove corruption? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.253.64.79 (talk) 10:34, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Form of government

"All forms of government are susceptible to political corruption." Agree with that. But wouldn't it be interesting to tell which forms are more susceptible and which forms are less susceptible? Gantuya eng (talk) 02:32, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Corruption of all forms is rampant around the world.

I removed this apocolyptic line from the header - so every kind of corruption we know about happens all over the world? I doubt it. 94.6.52.178 (talk) 17:48, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Dodgy link

"Graft" in the lead pipes to Political corruption#Graft, which doesn't exist. Based on http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=graft graft seems to be a synonym for bribery, but I'll leave fixing this to someone more knowledgeable than me. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 07:40, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

For reference, removing the link alone isn't a good idea. The Graft disambig links here for the criminal act. Without something here explaining the term, the disambig link and this page's link are both confusing. If it's synonymous with bribery, both could just be changed to a link to the bribery subsection. 68.102.228.96 (talk) 03:23, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Return Kickbacks

In 1994 France signed 2 contracts to sell submarines of the Agosta class. Payment of kickbacks to foreign officials was legal in France in 1994, but part of the kickbacks paid to Pakistani officials were probably returned to French politicians to fund election campaigns. In french, these returned funds are called "rétro-commissions" ('backward kickbacks'). Is there an english equivalent for this practice (which seems a special case of embezzlement) ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.168.45.164 (talk) 21:55, 27 November 2010 (UTC)

Judicial/political corruption

In the United States, some cases are more subtle than others. Here is one. Vincent_Illuzzi#Controversy. I can't insert this as an example because it would be WP:OR and no one has used the "c" word in reporting it. But it was a fairly gross example of lack of restraint (misuse) of judicial power. (The liberal media was defending a conservative lawyer against this attack. Unsuccessfully, I might add). Student7 (talk) 16:58, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Norway

Today's news has an article about Transparency International claiming that a Norwegian minister (Audun Lysbakken) has participated in polical corruption, This is political corruption. Transparency International in Norway claims that Audun Lysbakkens handling of the so-called Self defence affair, was political corruption.--24 moto (talk) 22:07, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Merge proposal

In the AfD discussion for Systemic corruption the closing admin's verdict was that that article should be merged to Corruption. However, I think that Political corruption is a better merge target. Notwithstanding the title and definition in its lead ("the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain"), it covers a much broader terrain and already deals with systemic corruption in general. In fact, already now the page title "Systemic corruption" would give a better indication of the content covered.  --Lambiam 14:36, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Personally I think these are two separate, though admittedly related, issues. The articles should remain seperate — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.246.168.220 (talk) 20:02, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Whatever, but this article definately needs more references. Ovr'apint (talk) 00:18, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

The corrupting influence of the revolving door.

Needs to discuss and reference the corrupting influence of the revolving door - post governmental jobs at inflated salaries as individuals revolve from regulator to regulated, and from government to those who should be regulated. Ocdnctx (talk) 12:06, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Corrupting influence of unlimited secret cash floods directed to control election outcomes

The corrupting influence of unlimited financial resources to control election outcomes is the central corruption of the American political system, dwarfing all others. It should be discussed first in this article, and extensively.

Unlimited election-determining flow of money results in [systemic corruption] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systemic_corruption#Systemic_corruption.

We, the people, can effectively control elections through our votes only so long as unlimited secret payments to politicians are illegal, either as "campaign contributions" or as separate entities with the power to make or break campaigns. Only by voter control can we end systemic corruption and political corruption so that government and politicians serve our public interests.

The legalization of an unlimited, secret surge of money, has eliminated voter control, and opened the floodgates of corruption. The financial reality is that money, not votes, has become the mother's milk of politics in the US. Where politicians who stand against the flood are eliminated, serving the public interest becomes a luxury that politicians cannot engage in and still remain in office.

The existing section on campaign contributions needs to be enhanced to reflect the full scope of this problem, and proposed solutions such as [those proposed] by Lawrence Lessig.

Ocdnctx (talk) 12:18, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

I hope Ocdnctx posts his personal opinions on his Facebook page. But they don't belong here. Rjensen (talk) 12:36, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Steps to Reform Section had numerous COPYVIO

There were many sentences taken word for word out of the law article. Any attempt to re-add material should be re-examined line by line. Capitalismojo (talk) 23:55, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Party funding by membership dues

In my thirty years of studying party funding I have not found any democracy where political parties are funded completely by their signed-up party members. How can such unproven, unresearched statements or wishful thinking like this end up in a detailed article's section on "campaign contributions"? To remove an "unacceptable" note from the text is o.k., but easy, to improve an article may require some more effort. How about adding a tag like "citation needed" or "claim disputed".Khnassmacher (talk) 07:21, 12 March 2013 (UTC) ?

Campaign Contributions

The text goes: "Politicians are placed in apparently compromising positions because of their need to solicit financial contributions"

But this is only because the politicians have themselves chosen a system in which financial contributions (or bribery, if you will) is legal. In lots of countries, politicians don't have that "need". The current text makes it seem alright that wealthy individuals or corporations can pay off the politicians like this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HVMC (talk • contribs) 12:17, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Regardless of that (questionable) statement, it already being noted in the section that the alternative leads to the elimination of minor parties, the entire section is vitreolic, and mostely unsourced. I've placed a {{POV}} tag, but other tags (what's anti-{{peacock}}) may be more appropriate. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 22:33, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
This section has had no RS refs since 2010. The two refs that do exist are primary source documents. Primary source documents that are not suitable for Reliable Source purposes. Absent reliable sources and a rewrite, it should go. Capitalismojo (talk) 13:07, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Corrupt Federalist politicians?

The interesting photo about Federalist politicians raised the question about whether they used their influence as politicians to use this tunnel, or whether they were simply flouting the law, a federal felony, but not necessarily politically corrupt, per se. Student7 (talk) 21:21, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

"Notorious" and "Critically acclaimed"

A respected editor restored these adjectives to descriptions of media.

  • For starters, media reporting on itself is generally biased.
  • I have never seen a lengthy report or book that did not include WP:POV phrases no matter how WP:RSed it was. Since we take much of our reporting from the media itself, we need to be careful. The media is constantly "pushing" itself in order to survive through advertising, generally. It may not be inaccurate in the basics, but it often contains non-encyclopedic wording that we would do well to avoid.
  • A reader should fall asleep reading Wikipedia. If we use the same hype that the media does, it won't have this affect. We're "just reporting the facts." Reporting add-on adjectives should not be part of an encylopedic article. Student7 (talk) 00:43, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
I do not see any problem here. We report what the RS say and the NPOV rules do not apply to the RS ...they apply to Wiki editors. Saying that xxx is notorious or acclaimed is a factual statement and has to be based on RS Rjensen (talk) 21:41, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
IMO, using media labeling of people (and probably events) is blatantly wrong for an encyclopedia.
Look at the past month or two! We've had "notorious," and "infamous" incidents in the media, that people would, even today, have trouble recalling the details. I forget now, is Wilson "infamous" for shooting Brown, or are the inciters of the murderers of the NYC Police "infamous?" Or both? Is the NFL culpable for not suspending Ray Rice sooner? Or are they guilty of contract violation for suspending him at all? Who is the "bad guy" here? The media has to have a "bad guy" or no one will watch. Supposedly we don't have that problem. We're not trying to make someone look good or bad! (I remind other editors on less controversial topics that Wikipedia neither favors nor opposes (such topics as) obesity. Obesity, for example, is not a "problem" it is an article!)! We shouldn't have a pov and our editing should demonstrate this IMO.
If we avoid the media labeling of the time period (which may include the otherwise RS NY Times and Washington Post), which is quite transient, we can wind up with a permanent article which will past muster long after the incidents have receded, or even been forgotten, in the fickle public's memory. Student7 (talk) 15:49, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
I think it's more complicated. "Corruption" is not a neutral word. It means something that is evil and to be despised. The public response to corruption is very important and the media tells us what that response is--indeed it may involve supporters who say the action is not corrupt at all and may be praiseworthy. The point is that value judgments are what the term is all abouit andthey cannot be somehow avoided without losing accuracy. Rjensen (talk) 00:40, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
I agree that a person writing a paper might well arrive at a judgement. But the terms we supply do not require that our readers follow any particular trail. We can say the police accepted the doughnut, or the money, and let them decide exactly how "corrupt" that makes the acceptance or the "donation." We shouldn't be spinning it. Many police in the US shrug at some accusations, assuming them to be archaic or unenforceable. But whether that makes them corrupt or not should be up to the reader IMO.
See http://assets.amuniversal.com/f7ba35104b3b0132acb2005056a9545d. Calvin probably not RS!Student7 (talk) 18:02, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

The map should be removed

It's not a map of corruption but of corruption perception, so it is nothing but a poll with dubious importance. And the colours are clearly chosen to highlight a POV (why change from blue to orange at 70? maybe because the US is at 70? Hmmmm) 93.173.41.254 (talk) 10:12, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Or recolored, if possible. The range of colors is unobvious. ochre, mauve, brown, purple, orange, red? Doesn't seem to show any color "progression" that lasts from "good" to "bad". Student7 (talk) 17:17, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Another Map Complaint

There's obviously something wrong with the map and we should remove it entirely. Recent reports prove Canada & American corruption, along with Europe. In short, the whole map should be red. Allen750 (talk) 07:51, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Fictional portrayals

Misuse of his office for sexual favors as "guardian", appointed by a Swedish court, is a major subplot in Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Worth mentioning (with WP:RS of course. Major bestseller and direct inspiration for two financially successful filmsStudent7 (talk) 19:10, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

Bureaucratic Corruption?

I wanted to start a brainstorm here for creating a new subsection under "Types". There is plenty of literature out there covering bureaucratic corruption as a specific type of corruption that is found predominantly in developing nations but elsewhere around the world. The most broadly accepted definition of this is petty corruption, in which lower level officials, mainly government bureaucrats, use their power and resources to extract wealth or favors, or strong-arm local citizenry, and sometimes even tourists. I think a section here on this page would be well-placed. Thoughts? Suggestions? DaltonCastle (talk) 00:47, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

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The JSTOR archives do not bring anything up. The actual JSTOR links require a sign in, and the archives have no record of those pages. DaltonCastle (talk) 00:50, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

I fixed the problem for JSTOR – the problem was using the Simon Fraser University link, which requires a sign in at that university. JSTOR itself works fine – it gives the first page of the article, and gives a routine that you can get some free JSTOR articles. Active Wikipedia editors can get free full JSTOR accounts -- goto Wikipedia:JSTOR . Rjensen (talk) 02:11, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

Dr. Osipian's comment on this article

Dr. Osipian has reviewed this Wikipedia page, and provided us with the following comments to improve its quality:


May add a link to logrolling.


We hope Wikipedians on this talk page can take advantage of these comments and improve the quality of the article accordingly.

Dr. Osipian has published scholarly research which seems to be relevant to this Wikipedia article:


  • Reference : Osipian, Ararat, 2009. "Education Corruption, Reform, and Growth: Case of Post-Soviet Russia," MPRA Paper 17447, University Library of Munich, Germany.

ExpertIdeasBot (talk) 21:29, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Done. Feel free to revise further. DavidMCEddy (talk) 00:54, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

Expansion

Currently lacks a section on sale of offices themselves. — LlywelynII 07:24, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Anthony Rendon

The following text was added to the end of the lede by an IP

An example of this variety of corruption is the scuttling of CA SB562, a state based single payer health plan, by Assembly Speaker An example of this variety of corruption is the scuttling of CA SB562, a state based single payer health plan, by Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon after receiving $475,457 [72] from the Accident and Health Insurance industries.[73]
72. www.followthemoney.org
73. https://speaker.asmdc.org/press-releases/speaker-rendon-statement-health-care

But because the refs were malformed, later user:Ringbang removed the refs and the statement became unreferenced.

In any case, I don't think examples must be in the lede, so I removed it altogether. Please rewiew whether this case belongs to this article (WP:DUE) and where, and re-add it in properly formatted way. Staszek Lem (talk) 00:21, 19 July 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Altitinader.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 06:51, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Corruption in politics

Politicians should not be extorting from people who don't have rather they should be giving 102.89.32.101 (talk) 20:16, 9 April 2022 (UTC)

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