In philosophical, theological, or moral discussions, corruption is spiritual or moral impurity or deviation from an ideal. Corruption may include many activities including bribery and embezzlement. Government, or 'political', corruption occurs when an office-holder or other governmental employee acts in an official capacity for personal gain.

The word corrupt when used as an adjective literally means "utterly broken".[1] The word was first used by Aristotle and later by Cicero who added the terms bribe and abandonment of good habits.[2] Morris,[3] a professor of politics, corruption is the illegitimate use of public power to benefit a private interest. Economist I. Senior[4] defines corruption as an action to (a) secretly provide (b) a good or a service to a third party (c) so that he or she can influence certain actions which (d) benefit the corrupt, a third party, or both (e) in which the corrupt agent has authority.

Contents 1 Scales of corruption

o 1.1 Petty corruptiono 1.2 Grand corruptiono 1.3 Systemic corruption

2 Corruption in different sectors o 2.1 Government/Public Sector

2.1.1 Political corruption 2.1.2 Police corruption 2.1.3 Judicial corruption

o 2.2 Unions 3 Methods

o 3.1 Briberyo 3.2 Embezzlement, theft and fraudo 3.3 Extortion and blackmail

4 Types of corrupt gains o 4.1 Abuse of discretiono 4.2 Favoritism, nepotism and clientelism

5 Preventing corruption 6 Anti-corruption programmes 7 Legal corruption 8 See also 9 References 10 Further reading 11 External links

Scales of corruption

Anti-corruption program in Ethiopia, 2000

Corruption can occur on different scales. There is corruption that occurs as small favours between a small number of people (petty corruption), corruption that affects the government on a large scale (grand corruption), and corruption that is so prevalent that it is part of the every day structure of society, including corruption as one of the symptoms of organized crime (systemic corruption).

Petty corruption

Petty corruption occurs at a smaller scale and within established social frameworks and governing norms. Examples include the exchange of small improper gifts or use of personal connections to obtain favors. This form of corruption is particularly common in developing countries and where public servants are significantly underpaid.

Grand corruption

Grand corruption is defined as corruption occurring at the highest levels of government in a way that requires significant subversion of the political, legal and economic systems. Such corruption is commonly found in countries with authoritarian or dictatorial governments but also in those without adequate policing of corruption.

The government system in many countries is divided into the legislative, executive and judiciary branches in an attempt to provide independent services that are less prone to corruption due to their independence.

Systemic corruption

Systemic corruption (or endemic corruption)[5] is corruption which is primarily due to the weaknesses of an organization or process. It can be contrasted with individual officials or agents who act corruptly within the system.

Factors which encourage systemic corruption include conflicting incentives, discretionary powers; monopolistic powers; lack of transparency; low pay; and a culture of impunity.[6] Specific acts of corruption include "bribery, extortion, and embezzlement" in a system where "corruption becomes the rule rather than the exception."[7] Scholars distinguish between centralized and decentralized systemic corruption, depending on which level of state or government corruption takes place; in countries such as the Post-Soviet states both types occur.[8]

Corruption in different sectorsCorruption can occur in different sectors, whether they be public or private industry or even NGOs.

Government/Public Sector

Public sector corruption. corruption of the political process and of government agencies such as the police. Recent research by the World Bank suggests that who makes policy decisions (elected officials or bureaucrats) can be critical in determining the level of corruption because of the incentives different policy-makers face [9]

Political corruption

Main article: Political corruption

A political cartoon from Harper's Weekly, January 26, 1878, depicting U.S. Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz investigating the Indian Bureau at the U.S. Department of the Interior. The original caption for the cartoon is: "THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR INVESTIGATING THE INDIAN BUREAU. GIVE HIM HIS DUE, AND GIVE THEM THEIR DUES."

Political corruption is the abuse of public power, office, or resources by elected government officials for personal gain, e.g. by extortion, soliciting or offering bribes[10] It can also take the form of office holders maintaining themselves in office by purchasing votes by enacting laws which use taxpayers' money.[11] Evidence suggests that corruption can have political consequences- with citizens being asked for bribes becoming less likely to identify with their country or region.[12]

Police corruption

Main article: Police corruption

Police corruption is a specific form of police misconduct designed to obtain financial benefits, other personal gain, and/or career advancement for a police officer or officers in exchange for not pursuing, or selectively pursuing, an investigation or arrest. One common form of police corruption is soliciting and/or accepting bribes in exchange for not reporting organized drug or prostitution rings or other illegal activities. Another example is police officers flouting the police code of conduct in order to secure convictions of suspects — for example, through the use of falsified evidence. More rarely, police officers may deliberately and systematically participate in organized crime themselves. In most major cities, there are internal affairs sections to investigate suspected police corruption or misconduct. Similar entities include the British Independent Police Complaints Commission.

Judicial corruption

Judicial corruption refers to corruption related misconduct of judges, through receiving or giving bribes, improper sentencing of convicted criminals, bias in the hearing and judgement of arguments and other such misconduct.

Governmental corruption of judiciary is broadly known in many transitional and developing countries because the budget is almost completely controlled by the executive. The latter undermines the separation of powers, as it creates a critical financial dependence of the judiciary. The proper national wealth distribution including the government spending on the judiciary is subject of the constitutional economics.

It is important to distinguish between the two methods of corruption of the judiciary: the government (through budget planning and various privileges), and the private.[13]

Unions

Labor racketeering is the domination, manipulation, and control of a labor movement in order to affect related businesses and industries. It can lead to the denial of workers’ rights and inflicts an economic loss on the workers, business, industry, insurer, or consumer.

The historical involvement of La Cosa Nostra in labor racketeering has been thoroughly documented: More than one-third of the 58 members arrested in 1957 at the Apalachin conference in New York listed their employment as “labor” or “labor-management relations.” Three major U.S. Senate investigations have documented La Cosa Nostra’s involvement in labor racketeering. One of these, the McClellan Committee, in the late-1950s, found systemic racketeering in both the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees International Union. In 1986, the President’s Council on Organized

Crime reported that five major unions—including the Teamsters and the Laborers International Union of North America—were dominated by organized crime. In the early 1980s, former Gambino Family Boss Paul Castellano was overheard saying, “Our job is to run the unions.”

Labor unions provide a rich source for organized criminal groups to exploit: their pension, welfare, and health funds. There are approximately 75,000 union locals in the U.S., and many of them maintain their own benefit funds. In the mid-1980s, the Teamsters controlled more than 1,000 funds with total assets of more than $9 billion.

The FBI currently has several investigative techniques to root out labor law violations: electronic surveillance, undercover operations, confidential sources, and victim interviews. They also have numerous criminal and civil statutes to use at their disposal, primarily through the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Statute. Citation needed

The Teamsters are the best example of how efficiently the civil RICO process can be used. For decades, the Teamsters has been substantially controlled by La Cosa Nostra. In recent years, four of eight Teamster presidents were indicted, yet the union continued to be controlled by organized crime elements. The government has been fairly successful at removing the extensive criminal influence from this 1.4 million-member union by using the civil process.[14]

MethodsIn systemic corruption and grand corruption, multiple methods of corruption are used concurrently with similar aims.[15]

Bribery

Main article: Bribery

Bribery is the improper use of gifts and favors in exchange for personal gain. This is also known as kickbacks or, in the Middle East, baksheesh. It is the most common form of corruption. The types of favors given are diverse and include money, gifts, sexual favors, company shares, entertainment, employment and political benefits. The personal gain that is given can be anything from actively giving preferential treatment to having an indiscretion or crime overlooked.[16]

Bribery can sometimes be part of a the systemic use of corruption for other ends, for example to perpetrate further corruption. Bribery can make officials more susceptible to blackmail or extortion.

Embezzlement, theft and fraud

Main article: Embezzlement

Embezzlement and theft involve someone with access to funds or assets illegally taking control of them. Fraud involves using deception to convince the owner of funds or assets to give them up to an unauthorized party.

Examples include the misdirection of company funds into "shadow companies" (and then into the pockets of corrupt employees), the skimming of foreign aid money, scams and other corrupt activity.

Extortion and blackmail

Main article: Extortion

While bribery is the use of positive inducements for corrupt aims, extortion and blackmail centre around the use of threats. This can be the threat of violence or false imprisonment as well as exposure of an individual's secrets or prior crimes.

This includes such behavior as an influential person threatening to go to the media if they do not receive speedy medical treatment (at the expense of other patients), threatening a public official with exposure of their secrets if they do not vote in a particular manner, or demanding money in exchange for continued secrecy.

Types of corrupt gains

Abuse of discretion

Main article: Abuse of discretion

Abuse of discretion refers to the misuse of one's powers and decision-making facilities. Examples include a judge improperly dismissing a criminal case or a customs official using their discretion to allow a banned substance through a port.

Favoritism, nepotism and clientelism

Main article: Nepotism

Favouritism, nepotism and clientelism involve the favouring of not the perpetrator of corruption but someone related to them, such as a friend, family member or member of an association. Examples would include hiring a family member to a role they are not qualified for or promoting a staff member who belongs to the same political party as you, regardless of merit.

Some states do not forbid these forms of corruption.

Preventing corruptionR. Klitgaard[17] postulates that corruption will occur if the corrupt gain is greater than the penalty multiplied by the likelihood of being caught and prosecuted:

Corrupt gain > Penalty × Likelihood of being caught and prosecuted

The degree of corruption will then be a function of the degree of monopoly and discretion in deciding who should get how much on the one hand and the degree to which this activity is

accountable and transparent on the other hand. Still, these equations (which should be understood in a qualitative rather than a quantitative manner) seem to be lacking one aspect: a high degree of monopoly and discretion accompanied by a low degree of transparency does not automatically lead to corruption without any moral weakness or insufficient integrity. Also, low penalties in combination with a low probability of being caught will only lead to corruption if people tend to neglect ethics and moral commitment. The original Klitgaard equation has therefore been amended by C. Stephan[18] into:

Degree of corruption = Monopoly + Discretion – Transparency – Morality

According to Stephan, the moral dimension has an intrinsic and an extrinsic component. The intrinsic component refers to a mentality problem, the extrinsic component to external circumstances like poverty, inadequate remuneration, inappropriate work conditions and inoperable or overcomplicated procedures which demoralize people and let them search for “alternative” solutions.

According to the amended Klitgaard equation, limitation of monopoly and regulator discretion of individuals and a high degree of transparency through independent oversight by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the media plus public access to reliable information could reduce the problem. Any extrinsic aspects that might reduce morality should be eliminated. Additionally, a country should establish a culture of ethical conduct in society with the government setting the good example in order to enhance the intrinsic morality.

Anti-corruption programmes

This section may be too technical for most readers to understand. Please help improve this section to make it understandable to non-experts, without removing the technical details. The talk page may contain suggestions. (May 2014)

A document[19] produced by the economic and private sector professional evidence and applied knowledge services help-desk discusses some of the existing practices on anti-corruption. They found:

The theories behind the fight against corruption are moving from a principal-agent approach to a collective action problem. Principal-agent theories seem not to be suitable to target systemic corruption.

The role of multilateral institutions has been crucial in the fight against corruption. UNCAC provides a common guideline for countries around the world. Both Transparency International and the World Bank provide assistance to national governments in term of diagnostic and design of anti-corruption policies.

The use of anti-corruption agencies have proliferated in recent years after the signing of UNCAC. They found no convincing evidence on the extent of their contribution, or the best way to structure them.

Traditionally anti-corruption policies have been based on success experiences and common sense. In recent years there has been an effort to provide a more systematic

evaluation of the effectiveness of anti-corruption policies. They found that this literature is still in its infancy.

Anti-corruption policies that may be in general recommended to developing countries may not be suitable for post-conflict countries. Anti-corruption policies in fragile states have to be carefully tailored.

Anti-corruption policies can improve the business environment. There is evidence that lower corruption may facilitate doing business and improve firm’s productivity. Rwanda in the last decade has made tremendous progress in improving governance and the business environment providing a model to follow for post-conflict countries.[19]

The adoption of an anti-corruption programme is necessary for an organization to prove that despite a particular case of bribery it nevertheless has adequate procedures in place to prevent persons associated with it from bribing. The analysis of case law shows that companies are demonstrating the effectiveness of their programmes and reduce their potential liabilities[disambiguation needed] by selfdeclaring situations to relevant authorities.[20]

Legal corruptionThough corruption is often viewed as illegal, there is an evolving concept of legal corruption,[21][22][original research?] as developed by Daniel Kaufmann and Pedro Vicente. It might be termed as processes which are corrupt, but are protected by a legal (that is, specifically permitted, or at least not proscribed by law) framework.

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Definitions and Types of Corruption31 Jul 09

By being able to define what something is then we can understand how to prevent it.  That is not the same as suggesting that you ignore corruption. It is the opposite. Blandly labelling something as corruption is meaningless. For example, we can not cure cancer unless we know what type of cancer it is.  Traditionally, intellectual argument on ethics in Ireland has qualified as assuming that corrupt behaviour is wrong. We know that. The challenge is to diagnose it so we can cure it.  My book, Political Corruption in Ireland, which will be published next year, will demonstrate example after example, of how we got it wrong over two hundred years because we reverted to such crude analysis. 

 

“The challenge is to distinguish between systemic and individual corruption; petty and grand corruption; moral and legal corruption; and rumours and reality of corruption.”

 

 A Glossary of Terms:

 

 

 

 

 

Systemic corruptionAs opposed to exploiting occasional opportunities, endemic or systemic corruption is when corruption is an integrated and essential aspect of the economic, social and political system, when it is embedded in a wider situation that helps sustain it. Systemic corruption is not a special category of corrupt practice, but rather a situation in which the major institutions and processes of the state are routinely dominated and used by corrupt individuals and groups, and in which most people have no alternatives to dealing with corrupt officials. Examples might include contemporary Bangladesh, Nigeria, Kenya, Cameroon and many others. (Michael Johnston: Fighting Systemic Corruption: Social Foundations for Institutional Reform.)

 

Sporadic (individual) corruptionSporadic corruption is the opposite of systemtic corruption. Sporadic corruption occurs irregularly and therefore it does not threaten the mechanisms of control nor the economy as such. It is not crippling, but it can seriously undermine morale and sap the economy of resources.

 

Political (Grand) corruptionPolitical corruption is any transaction between private and public sector actors through which collective goods are illegitimately converted into private-regarding payoffs. Political corruption is often used synonymously with “grand” or high level corruption, distinguished from bureaucratic or petty corruption because it involves political decision-makers. Political or grand corruption takes place at the high levels of the political system, when politicians and state agents entitled to make and enforce the laws in the name of the people, are using this authority to sustain their power, status and wealth. Political corruption not only leads to the misallocation of resources, but it also perverts the manner in which decisions are made.

Political corruption is when the laws and regulations are abused by the rulers, side-stepped, ignored, or even tailored to fit their interests. It is when the legal bases, against which corrupt practices are usually evaluated and judged, are weak and furthermore subject to downright encroachment by the rulers.

 

Grand corruptionHigh level or “grand” corruption takes place at the policy formulation end of politics. It refers not so much to the amount of money involved as to the level in which it takes place: grand corruption is at the top levels of the public sphere, where policies and rules are formulated in the first place. Usually (but not always) synonymous to political corruption.

 

Petty corruptionSmall scale, bureaucratic or petty corruption is the everyday corruption that takes place at the implementation end of politics, where the public officials meet the public. Petty corruption is bribery in connection with the implementation of existing laws, rules and regulations, and thus different from “grand” or political corruption. Petty corruption refers to the modest sums of money usually involved, and has also been called “low level” and “street level” to name the kind of corruption that people can experience more or less daily, in their encounter with public administration and services like hospitals, schools, local licensing authorities, police, taxing authorities and so on.

 

Above taken from: h ttp://www.u4.no/document/faqs5

 

Legal and Moral Corruption

Corruption is derived from the Latin verb rumpere, to break. According to this approach,

corruption is where the law is clearly broken. This requires that all laws must be precisely

stated, leaving no doubts about their meaning and no discretion to the public officials. A legal

interpretation of corruption provides a clearly demarcated boundary between what is a

corrupt activity and what is not. ‘If an official’s act is prohibited by laws established by the

government, it is corrupt; if it is not prohibited, it is not corrupt even if it is abusive or

unethical’. (John A. Gardiner, 1993. “Defining Corruption.” In: Corruption and Reform 7)

 

 

The legal approach provides a neutral and static method of adjudicating potentially emotive

and perception determined concepts of corruption. An understanding of corruption from law

perspective serves to underline a deterioration of self-regulated behaviour and a dependence

on the legal approach to determine right from wrong. The complexities of modern

governance and a proliferation of corruption scandals have corresponded with a proliferation

of complex corruption legislation.

 

Legislating for behaviour warrants focus upon the legality of an action and not the morality

of that same action. Morality is increasingly being legislated for in the absence of and a loss

of faith in self regulated behaviour. Although an act is committed within legal parameters it

may lie outside moral boundaries. A corrupt act can be camouflaged by lawful justification.

For example, ‘undue emphasis on narrow legalism has obscured more subtle yet costly

manifestations of misgoverance’ where ‘“legal corruption” may be more prevalent than

illegal forms’. (D. Kaufmann, September 2006, Corruption, Governance and Security. In:

World Economic Forum. Global Competitiveness Report 2004/2005.)

 

From this perspective corruption encompasses undue influence over public policies,

institutions, laws and regulations by vested private interests at the expense of the public

interest. Cultural change, rather than legal change, may be necessary to impede corrupt

behaviour. Non-corrupt actions may be within the letter of the law but do not account for the

spirit of the law. The legal approach diminishes the role of moral discretion and is

constrained by clearly defined edicts.

 

Above taken from Elaine Byrne, 2007. The Moral and Legal Development of Corruption:

Nineteeth and Twentieth Century Corruption in Ireland. PhD Thesis, University of

Limerick.

Corruption in IndiaFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Political corruption

Concepts

Bribery

Cronyism

Kleptocracy

Economics of corruption

Electoral fraud

Nepotism

Slush fund

Plutocracy

Political scandal

Corruption by country

Europe

Albania

Armenia

Belgium

Denmark

Finland

France

Germany

Cyprus

Czech Republic

Greece

Iceland

Ireland

Italy

Latvia

Lithuania

Luxembourg

Macedonia

Poland

Portugal

Romania

Spain

Sweden

Switzerland

Ukraine

Asia

Afghanistan

Bahrain

Bangladesh

China

India Indonesia

Iran

Kyrgyzstan

North Korea

Pakistan

Philippines

South Korea

Africa

Angola

Congo

Egypt

Ghana

Kenya

Mauritius

Nigeria

Somalia

South Africa

Zimbabwe

North America

Canada

Mexico

United States

Cuba

South America

Argentina

Brazil

Chile

Colombia

Paraguay

Peru

Venezuela

Oceania and the Pacific

Australia

New Zealand

Papua New Guinea

Transcontinental countries

Russia

Turkey

v t e

Corruption in India is a major issue that adversely affects its economy.[1] A study conducted by Transparency International in year 2005 found that more than 62% of Indians had firsthand experience of paying bribes or influence peddling to get jobs done in public offices successfully.[2][3] In its study conducted in year 2008, Transparency International reports about 40% of Indians had firsthand experience of paying bribes or using a contact to get a job done in public office.[4]

In 2012 India has ranked 94th out of 176 countries in Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, tied with Benin, Colombia, Djibouti, Greece, Moldova, Mongolia, and Senegal.[5]

Most of the largest sources of corruption in India are entitlement programmes and social spending schemes enacted by the Indian government. Examples include Mahatma Gandhi

National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and National Rural Health Mission.[6][7] Other daily sources of corruption include India's trucking industry which is forced to pay billions in bribes annually to numerous regulatory and police stops on its interstate highways.[8]

Indian media has widely published allegations of corrupt Indian citizens stashing trillions of dollars in Swiss banks. Swiss authorities, however, deny these allegations.[9][10]

The causes of corruption in India include excessive regulations, complicated taxes and licensing systems, numerous government departments each with opaque bureaucracy and discretionary powers, monopoly by government controlled institutions on certain goods and services delivery, and the lack of transparent laws and processes.[11][12] There are significant variations in level of corruption as well as in state government efforts to reduce corruption across India.

Contents 1 Politics 2 Bureaucracy

o 2.1 Land and property o 2.2 Tendering processes and awarding contracts o 2.3 Medicine o 2.4 Science and technology o 2.5 Income tax department o 2.6 Preferential award of mineral resources o 2.7 Driver Licensing o 2.8 Trends

3 Black money o 3.1 Black Money in Switzerland

4 Business and Corruption 5 Judiciary 6 Armed forces 7 Anti-corruption efforts

o 7.1 Right to Information Act o 7.2 Anti-corruption laws in India o 7.3 Anti-corruption police and courts o 7.4 Civic anti-corruption organisations

8 Factors contributing to corruption in India 9 Impact of corruption

o 9.1 Loss of credibility o 9.2 Economic loss o 9.3 Lower corruption, higher growth rates

10 See also 11 References 12 Further reading 13 External links

PoliticsSee also: Booth capturing

As of December 2008, 120 of India's 523 parliament members were accused of crimes, under India's First Information Report procedure wherein anyone can allege another of committing a crime.[13] Many of the biggest scandals since 2010 have involved very high level government officials, including Cabinet Ministers and Chief Ministers, such as in the 2G spectrum scam (1760 billion), the 2010 Commonwealth Games scam (700 billion), the Adarsh Housing Society scam, the Coal Mining Scam (1860 billion), the Mining Scandal in Karnataka and the Cash for Vote scam.

BureaucracyA 2005 study done by Transparency International in India found that more than 62% of the people had firsthand experience of paying bribe or peddling influence to get a job done in a public office.[3] Taxes and bribes are common between state borders; Transparency International estimates that truckers pay annually 222 billion (US$ 4.5 billion) in bribes.[8][14]

Government regulators and police share in bribe money, each to the tune of 43% and 45% respectively. The en route stoppages including those at checkpoints and entry-points take up to 11 hours in a day. About 60% of these (forced) stoppages on road by concerned authorities such as government regulators, police, forest, sales and excise, octroi, weighing and measuring department are for extorting money. The loss in productivity due to these stoppages is an important national concern. The number of truck trips could increase by 40%, if forced delays are avoided. According to a 2007 World Bank published report, the travel time for a Delhi-Mumbai trip can be reduced by about 2 days per trip if the corruption and associated regulatory stoppages to extract bribes was eliminated.[14][15][16]

A 2009 survey of the leading economies of Asia, revealed Indian bureaucracy to be not only the least efficient out of Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan, Vietnam, China, Philippines and Indonesia, but also that working with India's civil servants was a "slow and painful" process.[17]

Land and property

See also: Illegal housing in India

Officials are alleged to steal state property. In cities and villages throughout India, consisting of municipal and other government officials, elected politicians, judicial officers, real estate developers and law enforcement officials, acquire, develop and sell land in illegal ways.[18]

[page needed][better source needed]

Tendering processes and awarding contracts

A 2006 report claimed state-funded construction activities in Uttar Pradesh, such as road building, were dominated by construction mafias, which are groupings of corrupt public works officials, materials suppliers, politicians and construction contractors.[19]

Corruption caused problems in government funded projects are not limited to the state of Uttar Pradesh. According to The World Bank, aid programmes are beset by corruption, bad administration and under-payments. As an example, the report cites only 40% of grain handed out for the poor reaches its intended target. The World Bank study finds that the

public distribution programmes and social spending contracts have proven to be a waste due to corruption.[20]

As an example, the government implemented the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) on 25 August 2005. The Central government outlay for this welfare scheme is 400 billion (US$6.7 billion) in FY 2010–2011.[21] After 5 years of implementation, in 2011, the programme was widely criticised as no more effective than other poverty reduction programmes in India. Despite its best intentions, MGNREGA faces the challenges of corrupt officials reportedly pocketing money on behalf of fake rural employees, poor quality of the programme's infrastructure, and unintended destructive effect[clarification needed] on poverty.[7][22]

Medicine

In Government Hospitals, corruption is associated with non-availability/duplication of medicines, getting admission, consultations with doctors and availing diagnostic services.[3]

National Rural Health Mission is another health care-related government programme that has been subject to large scale corruption allegations. This social spending and entitlement programme hoped to improve health care delivery across rural India. The programme has been managed since 2005 by the Ministry of Health of the Indian government. The Indian government mandated a spending of INR 277 billion in 2004–05, and increased it annually to be about 1% of India's gross domestic product. The National Rural Health Mission programme has been clouded by a large-scale corruption scandal in which top government appointed officials were arrested, several of whom died under mysterious circumstances including one in prison. Corruption, waste and fraud-related losses from this government programme has been alleged to be 100 billion (US$2 billion).[23][24][25][6]

Science and technology

CSIR, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, has been flagged in ongoing efforts to root out corruption in India.[26] Despite being established with the directive to do translational research and create real technologies, CSIR has been accused of transforming into a ritualistic, overly-bureaucratic organisation that does little more than churn out papers.[27][28]

There are many issues facing Indian scientists, with some - such as MIT systems scientist VA Shiva Ayyadurai - calling for transparency, a meritocratic system, and an overhaul of the bureaucratic agencies that oversee science and technology.[29][30][31] Sumit Bhaduri stated, "[t]he challenges of turning Indian science into part of an innovation process are many. Many competent Indian scientists aspire to be ineffectual administrators [due to administrative power and political patronage], rather than do the kind of science that makes a difference".[32] Prime minister Manmohan Singh spoke at the 99th Indian Science Congress and commented on the state of the sciences in India, after an advisory council informed him there were problems with "the overall environment for innovation and creative work" and a 'warlike' approach was needed.[33]

Income tax department

There have been several cases of collusion of officials of the income tax department of India for preferential tax treatment and relaxed prosecutions in exchange for bribes.[34][35]

Preferential award of mineral resources

Protests against corruption in Pune.

See also: Illegal mining in India

In August 2011, an iron ore mining scandal became a media focus in India. In September 2011, Janardhana Reddy – an elected member of Karnataka's legislative assembly – was arrested on charges of corruption and illegal mining of iron ore in his home state of Karnataka. It was alleged that his company received preferential allotment of resources, organised and exported billions of dollars worth of iron ore to China in recent years, without paying any royalty to the state government exchequer of Karnataka or the central government of India, and these Chinese companies made payment to shell companies controlled by Reddy and registered in Caribbean and north Atlantic tax havens.[36][37]

It was also alleged that corrupt government officials cooperated with Reddy, starting from government officials in charge of regulating mining to government officials in charge of regulating port facilities and shipping. These officials received monthly bribes in exchange for enabling the illegal export of illegally mined iron ore to China. Such scandals have led to a demand in India for consensually driven action plan to eradicate the piracy of India's mineral resources by an illegal-political-corrupt government officials-business nexus, removal of incentives for illegal mining, creation of incentives for legal mining and domestic use of iron ore and steel manufacturing.[36][37]°

IAS officers who have worked on to put up a stronghold against the illegal mining mafia have faced severe backlashes from the government in direct and indirect ways in the past. Recent and glaring example of this is the suspension of the IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal in UP after her strong response to illegal sand mining mafia in the corruption riddled state.

Driver Licensing

A study conducted between 2004 and 2005 found that India's driver licensing procedure was a hugely distorted bureaucratic process and allows drivers to be licensed despite their low driving ability through promoting the usage of agents. Individuals with high willingness to

pay make a significant payment above the official fee and most of these extra payments are made to agents, who act as an intermediary between bureaucrats and applicants.[38]

The average licensee paid Rs 1080, approximately 2.5 times the official fee of Rs 450, in order to obtain a license. On average, those who hired agents had a lower driving ability, with agents helping unqualified drivers obtain licenses and bypass the legally required driving examination. Among the surveyed individuals, approximately 60% of the license holders did not take the licensing exam and 54% of those license holders failed an independent driving test.[39]

Agents are the channels of corruption in this bureaucratic driver licensing system, facilitating access to licenses among those who are unqualified to drive. Some of the failures of this licensing system are caused by corrupt bureaucrats who collaborate with agents by creating additional barriers within the system against those who did not hire agents.[38]

Trends

Professor Bibek Debroy and Laveesh Bhandari claim in their book Corruption in India: The DNA and RNA that the public officials in India may be cornering as much as 921 billion ($18.42 billion), or 1.26 per cent of the GDP, through corruption.[15] The book claims most bribery is in the transport industry, real estate and government delivered services.

Bribery and corruption are pervasive, but some sectors tend to witness a relatively higher degree of such instances. A 2013 EY(Ernst & Young) Study[40] reports following sectors, perceived as the most vulnerable to corruption: Infrastructure & Real Estate, Metals & Mining, Aerospace & Defense, Power & Utilities. There are a range of specific factors that make a sector more susceptible to bribery and corruption risks than others. Factors like high use of middlemen, large value contracts, liasioning activities etc. drive the depth, volume and frequency of corrupt practices in vulnerable sectors.

A 2011 KPMG study reports India's real estate, telecommunications and government-run social development projects as the three top most corruption plagued sectors. The study found India's defence, information technology industry and energy sectors are the most competitive and least corruption prone sectors.[11]

CMS India claims in its 2010 India Corruption Study report that socio-economically weaker section of the Indian society is most adversely affected by government corruption – these include the rural and urban poor. The study additionally claims that corruption perception nationwide has decreased between 2005 to 2010. Over the 5-year period, significantly more number of people from the middle class as well as the poorest segments of Indian society surveyed, in all parts of the India, claimed government corruption had dropped over time, and they had lesser direct experiences with demands for bribes.[41]

The table below compares the perceived anti-corruption effort across some of the major states in India.[12] A rising index implies higher anti-corruption effort and falling corruption. According to this table, the states of Bihar and Gujarat have experienced significant improvements in their anti-corruption efforts, while the conditions have worsened in the state of Assam and West Bengal. Consistent with the results in this table, in 2012, a BBC News report claimed the state of Bihar has transformed in recent years to become the least corrupt state in India.[42]

Index trends in major states by respective anti-corruption effort [12]

State 1990–95 1996-00 2001–05 2006–10

Bihar 0.41 0.30 0.43 0.88

Gujarat 0.48 0.57 0.64 0.69

Andhra Pradesh 0.53 0.73 0.55 0.61

Punjab 0.32 0.46 0.46 0.60

Jammu & Kashmir 0.13 0.32 0.17 0.40

Haryana 0.33 0.60 0.31 0.37

Himachal Pradesh 0.26 0.14 0.23 0.35

Tamil Nadu 0.19 0.20 0.24 0.29

Madhya Pradesh 0.23 0.22 0.31 0.29

Karnataka 0.24 0.19 0.20 0.29

Rajasthan 0.27 0.23 0.26 0.27

Kerala 0.16 0.20 0.22 0.27

Maharashtra 0.45 0.29 0.27 0.26

Uttar Pradesh 0.11 0.11 0.16 0.21

Orissa 0.22 0.16 0.15 0.19

Assam 0.21 0.02 0.14 0.17

West Bengal 0.11 0.08 0.03 0.01

Black moneyMain article: Indian black money

Black money refers to money that is not fully legitimately the property of the 'owner'. A white paper on black money in India by the Government of India suggests two possible sources of black money in India.[9] The first includes activities not permitted by the law, such as crime, drug trade, terrorism, and corruption, all of which are illegal in India. The second, more likely source is that the wealth may have been generated through a lawful activity but accumulated by failing to declare income and pay taxes. Some of this black money ends up in illicit financial flows across international borders, such as deposits in tax haven countries.

A November 2010 report from the Washington-based Global Financial Integrity estimates that over a 60-year period, India lost US$213 billion in illicit financial flows beginning in 1948; adjusted for inflation, this is estimated to be 462 billion in 2010 dollars, or about $8 billion per year ($7 per capita per year). The report also estimated the size of India's underground economy at approximately US$640 billion at the end of 2008 or roughly 50% of the nation's GDP.[43]

Black Money in Switzerland

According to a 2010 The Hindu article, unofficial estimates indicate that Indians had over US$1456 billion in black money stored in Swiss banks (approximately USD 1.4 trillion).[44] While some news reports claimed that data provided by the Swiss Banking Association[45] Report (2006) showed India has more black money than the rest of the world combined,[46][47] a more recent report quoted the SBA's Head of International Communications as saying that no such official Swiss Banking Association statistics exist.[48]

Another report said that Indian-owned Swiss bank account assets are worth 13 times the country's national debt. These allegations have been denied by Swiss Bankers Association. James Nason of Swiss Bankers Association in an interview about alleged black money from India, holds that "The (black money) figures were rapidly picked up in the Indian media and in Indian opposition circles, and circulated as gospel truth. However, this story was a complete fabrication. The Swiss Bankers Association never published such a report. Anyone claiming to have such figures (for India) should be forced to identify their source and explain the methodology used to produce them."[10][49]

In a separate study, Dev Kar of Global Financial Integrity concludes, "media reports circulating in India that Indian nationals held around US$1.4 trillion in illicit external assets are widely off the mark compared to the estimates found by his study." Kar claims the amounts are significantly smaller, only about 1.5% of India's GDP on average per annum basis, between 1948–2008. This includes corruption, bribery and kickbacks, criminal activities, trade mispricing and efforts to shelter wealth by Indians from India's tax authorities.[43]

According to a third report, published in May 2012, Swiss National Bank estimates that the total amount of deposits in all Swiss banks, at the end of 2010, by citizens of India were CHF 1.95 billion ( 92.95 billion, US$2.1 billion). The Swiss Ministry of External Affairs has confirmed these figures upon request for information by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs. This amount is about 700 fold less than the alleged $1.4 trillion in some media reports.[9] The report also provided a comparison of the deposits held by Indians and by citizens of other nations in Swiss banks. Total deposits held by citizens of India constitute only 0.13 per cent of the total bank deposits of citizens of all countries. Further, the share of Indians in the total bank deposits of citizens of all countries in Swiss banks has reduced from 0.29 per cent in 2006 to 0.13 per cent in 2010.

Business and CorruptionPublic servants have very wide discretionary powers offering the opportunity to extort undue payments from companies and ordinary citizens. The awarding of public contracts is notoriously corrupt, especially at the state level. Scandals involving high-level politicians

have highlighted the payment of kickbacks in the healthcare, IT and military sectors. The deterioration of the overall efficiency of the government, protection of property rights, ethics and corruption as well as undue influence on government and judicial decisions has resulted in a more difficult business environment.[50] Corruption has become a particularly significant issue for India Inc. - the corporate sector in India - which fears that India's business worthiness is eroded because of endemic corruption.[51]

JudiciaryAccording to Transparency International[unreliable source?], judicial corruption in India is attributable to factors such as "delays in the disposal of cases, shortage of judges and complex procedures, all of which are exacerbated by a preponderance of new laws".[52] Over the year there have been numerous judge who have faced allegations of corruption, however in 2011, Soumitra Sen, a former judge at the Kolkata High Court became the first judge in the India to be impeached by the Rajya Sabha, the Upper House of the Indian Parliament for misappropriation of funds.[53]

Armed forcesThe Indian Armed Forces have witnessed corruption involving senior armed forces officers from the Indian Army, Indian Navy and Indian Air Force. A number of scandals in the 2000–2010 period damaged the military's reputation; such scandals included skimming of armed forces money, re-selling of government property, and faking combat missions.[54]

Anti-corruption efforts

Right to Information Act

Main article: Right to Information Act

According to a study published by the Government of India's RTI site, the Right to Information Act (2005) and equivalent acts in the states, that require government officials to provide information requested by citizens or face punitive action, computerisation of services and various central and state government acts that established vigilance commissions have considerably reduced corruption or at least have opened up avenues to redress grievances.[3][55]

However, people seeking information under RTI have been identified and harassed, attacked or killed.

Anti-corruption laws in India

Public servants in India can be penalised for corruption under the

Indian Penal Code, 1860 Prosecution section of Income Tax Act,1961 The Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 The Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Act, 1988 to prohibit benami transactions. Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002

India is also a signatory to the UN Convention against Corruption since 2005 (ratified 2011). The Convention covers a wide range of acts of corruption and also proposes certain preventive policies.[56]

The Lokpal Bill, 2011 is a bill pending before the Rajya Sabha.

India's lower house of parliament, the Lok Sabha voted to pass The Whistle Blowers Protection Bill, 2011. The bill is now pending in the Rajya Sabha, the upper house.[57]

At present there are no legal provisions to check graft in the private sector in India. Government has proposed amendments in existing acts and certain new bills for checking corruption in private sector.

Big-ticket corruption is mainly witnessed in the operations of large commercial or corporate entities. In order to prevent bribery on supply side, it is proposed that key managerial personnels of companies' and also the company shall be held liable for offering bribes to gain undue benefits. The Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 provides that the properties of corrupt public servants shall be confiscated. However, the Government is considering incorporating provisions for confiscation or forfeiture of the property of corrupt public servant in the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 to make it more self-contained and comprehensive.[58]

A committee headed by the Chairman of Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), has been constituted to examine ways to strengthen laws to curb generation of black money in India, its illegal transfer abroad and its recovery. The Committee shall examine the existing legal and administrative framework to deal with the menace of generation of black money through illegal means including inter-alia the following: 1. Declaring wealth generated illegally as national asset; 2. Enacting/amending laws to confiscate and recover such assets; and 3. Providing for exemplary punishment against its perpetrators. (Source: 2013 EY report on Bribery & Corruption)

In August 2013 The Companies Bill, 2012 [59] neared passage. It will regulate fraud by corporations and is intended to avoid the accounting scandals such as the Satyam scandal which have plagued India.[60] It replaces The Companies Act, 1956 which has proven outmoded in terms of handling 21st century problems.[61]

Anti-corruption police and courts

The Directorate General of Income Tax Investigation, Central Vigilance Commission and Central Bureau of Investigation all deal with anti-corruption initiatives. Certain states such as Andhra Pradesh (Andhra Pradesh Anti-corruption Bureau) and Karnataka (Lokayukta) also have their own anti-corruption agencies and courts.[62][63]

Andhra Pradesh's Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) has launched a large scale investigation in the "cash-for-bail" scam.[64] CBI court judge Talluri Pattabhirama Rao was arrested on 19 June 2012 for taking a bribe to grant bail to former Karnataka Minister Gali Janardhan Reddy, who was allegedly amassing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income. Investigation revealed that India Cements – one of India's largest cement – had been investing in Reddy's businesses in return for government contracts.[65] A case has also been

opened against seven other individuals under the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act.[64]

Civic anti-corruption organisations

A variety of organisations have been created in India to actively fight against corrupt government and business practices. Notable organisations include:

Bharat Swabhiman Trust established by well-known Yog Guru Swami Ramdev running a large campaign against black money and corruption since last 10 years.

5th Pillar is most known for the creation of the zero rupee note, a valueless note designed to be given to corrupt officials when they request bribes.

India Against Corruption is a movement created by citizens from a variety of profession and status to work against corruption in India. The movement gathered tremendous media attention and came to the forefront in 2012. Prominent people associated with the movement were Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi & Anna Hazare. In late 2012, Arvind Kejriwal took the route to form a political party to fight corruption while Anna Hazare & Kiran Bedi remain apolitical. The apolitical movement is currently headed by Anna Hazare while the political party formed by Arvind Kejriwal & his followers is called Aam Aadmi Party .[66]

Jaago Re! One Billion Votes is an organisation originally founded by Tata Tea and Janaagraha to increase youth voter registration.[67] They have since expanded their work to include other social issues, including corruption.[68]

Association for Social Transparency, Rights and Action (ASTRA) is an NGO focused on grass-roots work to fight corruption in Karnataka.

One organisation, the Lok Satta Movement, has transformed itself from a civil organisation to a full-fledged political party, the Lok Satta Party. The party has fielded candidates in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Bangalore. In 2009, it obtained its first elected post, when Jayaprakash Narayan won the election for the Kukatpally Assembly Constituency in Andhra Pradesh.

Factors contributing to corruption in IndiaIn a 2011 report on Corruption in India,[11] one of the world's largest audit and compliance firms KPMG notes several causes that encourage corruption in India. The report suggests high taxes and excessive regulation bureaucracy as a major cause. India has high marginal tax rates and numerous regulatory bodies with the power to stop any citizen or business from going about their daily affairs.[11][69]

This power of Indian authorities to search and question individuals creates opportunities for corrupt public officials to extract bribes - each individual or business decides if the effort required in due process and the cost of delay is worth not paying the bribe demanded. In cases of high taxes, paying off the corrupt official is cheaper than the tax. This, claims the report, is one major cause of corruption in India and 150 other countries across the world. In real estate industry, the high capital gains tax in India encourages large-scale corruption. The correlation between high real estate taxes and corruption, claims the KPMG report, is high in India as well as other countries including the developed economies; this correlation has been true in modern times as well as for centuries of human history in numerous cultures.[11][69]

The desire to pay lower taxes than those demanded by the state explains the demand side of corruption. The net result is that the corrupt officials collect bribes, the government fails to collect taxes for its own budget, and corruption grows. The report suggests regulatory reforms, process simplification and lower taxes as means to increase tax receipts and reduce causes of corruption.[11][69]

In addition to tax rates and regulatory burden, the KPMG report claims corruption results from opaque process and paperwork on the part of the government. Lack of transparency allows room for maneuver for both the demanders and suppliers of corruption. Whenever objective standards and transparent processes are missing, and subjective opinion driven regulators and opaque/hidden processes are present, the conditions encourage corruption.[11]

[70]

Vito Tanzi in an International Monetary Fund study suggests that in India, like other countries in the world, corruption is caused by excessive regulations and authorisation requirements, complicated taxes and licensing systems, mandated spending programmes, lack of competitive free markets, monopoly of certain goods and service providers by government controlled institutions, bureaucracy, lack of penalties for corruption of public officials, and lack of transparent laws and processes.[12][71] A Harvard University study finds these to be some of the causes of corruption and underground economy in India.[72]

Impact of corruption

Loss of credibility

A study on Bribery and Corruption in India conducted in 2013[73] by one the largest global professional services firm Ernst & Young (EY), a majority of the survey respondents from PE firms said that a company operating in a sector which is perceived as highly corrupt, may lose ground when it comes to fair valuation of its business, as investors bargain hard and factor in the cost of corruption at the time of transaction.

According to a report by KPMG, "high-level corruption and scams are now threatening to derail the country's credibility and [its] economic boom".[74]

Economic loss

Corruption may lead to further bureaucratic delay and inefficiency as corrupted bureaucrats may introduce red tape in order to extort more bribes.[75] Such inadequacies in institutional efficiency could affect growth indirectly by lowering the private marginal product of capital and investment rate.[76] Levine and Renelt showed that investment rate is a robust determinant of economic growth.[77] According to the neoclassical growth model, institutional variables contribute to determining steady-state per capita income levels and speed of convergence to its steady state, hence affecting its growth rate.[78]

Bureaucratic inefficiency also affects growth directly, such as through misallocation of investments in the economy.[79] Additionally, corruption results in lower economic growth for a given level of income.[76]

Lower corruption, higher growth rates

If corruption levels in India were reduced to levels in developed economies such as Singapore or the United Kingdom, India's GDP growth rate could increase at a higher rate annually. C. K. Prahalad estimates the lost opportunity caused by corruption, in terms of investment, growth and jobs for India is over US$50 billion a year.[1]

Is the Indian middle class becoming an active agent of change?

The recent outcry of middle-class men and women, many of whom not associated with any political party or developmental organisation, is an important phenomenon that deserves careful attention. Prior to the Delhi rape case agitation, there was also significant middle-class participation in the anti-corruption movement. Also the popularity of 'Satyamev Jayate' is a pointer towards something new happening in India. Does this mean that the Indian middle-class, the chief beneficiary of the liberalisation process, is dissatisfied with the way things are in the country and are increasingly coming out of their closet and taking active interest in the affairs of the country? Is activism on various issues becoming the norm rather than exception? Or is this just a flash in the pan?

In the absence of any serious research on this issue, one can only make some tentative conclusions. One thing is absolutely clear - the role of television is changing rapidly and social network sites have become an important arena for public debates and expression of viewpoints. It is clear that media is moving from a "reporter" to a "reporter-activist" model of functioning. Development issues clearly have TRP and therefore we have dramatic live coverage of protest movements and debates on TV are becoming less "debate" and more "interrogation" of public figures. 'Satyamev Jayate' proved that a Sunday morning television show on development issues can have huge TRP and can also generate donations for various organisations. There are other popular TV shows like Crime Patrol which bring out cases of violence against women and end with some lessons for the viewers. This phenomenon is not restricted to national channels only but also can be seen in regional TV channels. Social networking sites have opened the possibility for the ordinary citizen (as opposed to the expert columnist) to express his/her viewpoints, share news items, and enter into active discussions.

This is a change from being a passive recipient of news and views via the newspaper and occasionally writing "letters to the editor". Expressing views on various developmental issues has become quite popular in the social network sites. The social network sites have also become a space for various organisations and individuals to share news of their activities which encourages others to do similar activities.

Increasing television coverage, social network sites, candle-light protests in the street are perhaps solving one of problems that the middle class have felt since Independence - as voters, the middle-class simply did not have the numbers to make a difference. Now the game has changed. Not only the middle-class has grown in numbers but more importantly they can now have an impact on the political class without having the numbers thanks to television and social network sites.

There is another significant change if we take a relatively long-term view of things. During the nationalist movement and during the days of the Naxalite movement of later 60s, a large number of middle class youths were inspired by the idea of "sacrifice" and indeed some even sacrificed their lives. I think that the new middle-class activist is no more into "sacrifice". Hence, there is no more any contradiction between dressing up and going to a shopping mall and also participating in an agitation or expressing one's discontent on social networks. In an age of multiple identities, it is possible to shift from being a consumer of a MNC brand to an

agitator on the street within a few hours and go back home to watch the favourite mega-serial.

This may look like "shallow" activism to a twentieth century person but this is the trend of the new century. It is possible that the middle-class is finding agitation as much "fun" as visiting a trendy coffee shop. The middle-class agitators love a little bit of glamour that comes with television coverage of their activities and they like to post images of themselves in street corner protests. It's the new cool thing.

Another aspect of this new phenomenon is perhaps that "ideological battles" have become obsolete or at least less important than they were during the nationalist phase or the Naxalite phase of middle-class agitation. This also makes the new agitations in India somewhat different from the "Occupy Wall Street" type of clearly anti-capitalist movements in Europe and America. While the financial meltdown in Europe and America has resulted in a new interest in systemic thinking about capitalism and its negative effects, in India the new activists are not "ideological" in nature but are into specific issues - corruption, rape, safety of women, poor governance, education, so on and so forth. A section of the middle class is not into agitation but is quietly contributing to various organisations working for the disadvantaged. But they share a common trait - they are not interested in ideological debates but are interested in specific issues like education, health, care for the elderly etc.

So neither Marx nor Gandhi nor Savarkar are attractive but good organisations doing specific tangible programmes are attracting volunteers. Pratham's ASER Centre is an example. It will be wrong to say that no one is interested in ideological texts but they are certainly less in number than those who prefer to work on specific issues. Apart from volunteers, there are also a large number of young people who are joining the development sector as professionals. They like to work for the poor but also enjoy their i-pads.

Two elements of the new middle-class agitators make them a difficult category for the old political class, left, centre or right. The first of course is that they are articulate and know how to make an impression on television. The second, paradoxically, is that they are unpredictable. Gone are the ideologically committed "I shall sacrifice my life" category of youths. They were easier to predict.

It is no longer easy to predict on which issue the new agitators will flare up and which issue will start snow-balling. Hence in their frustration, the less intelligent members of the old political class end up saying that they are "dented and painted". One young female student of Delhi University being interviewed on TV recently, during the anti-rape agitation, perhaps summed up the new age mindset when she said "What's wrong if I try to look good during an agitation?

Feb 20 2013: Corruption can be stopped almost in its entirety.Is "almost" not good enough?Most people are taught honesty of a sort but if one grows up in a world where they must really fight for what they need, then honesty and morals become teaching a child how to get what they need to survive. That trumps honesty and morals. In fact, it would be dishonest and immoral to oneself

to not get what one needs to survive. In fact, survival is not an immoral endeavor although there are those whowish to make it so and keep it that way because they hold most of the cards needed to win over others.

Want to stop corruption? Get rid of the reasons for corruption. Get rid of the causes or reasons for committing crimes.It isn't human nature to be criminal, corrupt, greedy, selfish and the kinds of elements we see in those who commit crimes.Those are all different responses one can make and does make in the environment in which they live and which they appraise as to whether or not it is a friendly, supportive environment and will provide what they need to live.If not, they will respond differently and how they respond is what is correct for them.Let's eliminate the reasons for corruption.People continually want "fair, just, honest, ethical" leaders which they will never get because the system is a corrupt and unjust system, by default, and cannot be fixed, meaning it can not be made just.It has to be completely dismantled and a new and just system put into its place. If it has reasons to be corrupt it has to go until a just one is figured out and implemented. If there are no reasons to be dishonest, then there is no dishonesty because there is nothing to gain from it. Corruption and its other features only happens when there is something to gain.

The reason and cause is money. Get rid of money.If you can't think that way, or imagine that, then start thinking that way until you find yourself finally crossing over and imagining a new world that is minus corruption. Build it.

Pabitra Mukhopadhyay 50+

+1

Feb 20 2013: Teaching the value of honesty at all circumstances to our children and practicing it like a popular fashion.

Feyisayo Anjorin 100+

+1

Feb 20 2013: I think you mean reducing it.Corruption can not be stopped.One big step is working on our foundation; raising children in good home environments and families where values and character are inculcated in them.

A free press is important. A truly free press; its amazing how a nation can take an illussion for reality and a lot of mess gets covered because the media is controlled by a cabal.

The judicial system would have to be led by men and women of intergrity; unfortunately if the nation is under the grip of immorality and depravity, then it would have its share of crooks and thugs in suit as judges.

Random Chance 30+

0

Feb 23 2013: There is corruption, that is true.It cannot be fixed or eliminated. That is probably true.So what else is true, is eliminating the reasons for being corrupt.That is true. With no reasons, meaning no gain, most all corruption will be gone becausethe "game is corruption", it is "based on corruption", and it cannot function"without corruption".But if the causes or reasons are gone, so too is corruption gone.If you have a system that has no reasons for corruption, no gain from corruption and no chance of being corrupted, then you have a just system and that is very, very achievable.There will be no place for corruption to hide, to seed and grow and to gain power.That is true.It isn't in the hearts of humans to be corrupt.It isn't in the genes of humans to be corrupt.It isn't human nature to be corrupt.Corruption is one response that is used most profusely, but only when there is a reason to become corrupt.In a just system (not the ones we currently have), corruption cannot exist.That is what a just system is and humans act accordingly.If that were not true, then they wouldn't act accordingly in a corrupt system (corruption)which is to become corrupt for survival.