Bribery and Corruption in the Public Sector Is Endemic and Unavoidable in All Societies

Bribery and corruption in the public sector

is endemic and unavoidable in all societies

Bribery and corruption is a serious problem and can occur anywhere. Corruption is most commonly defined as the misuse or the abuse of public office for private gain (World Bank, 1997, UNDP, 1999) or in other words, people get their own personal benefit by using official position, rank, power,resources or status with office bearer. Business corruption focuses on bribery which is defined as an offer or receipt of any gift, loan, fee, reward or other advantage to or from any person as an inducement to do something which is dishonest, illegal or a breach of trust in the conduct of the enterprise’s business (Anti-bribery policy, Governance charter and byelaws). When the rents happen, the corruption almost occur, typically as a result of discretion from the public officials and government rules. The root cause of corruption is people who in the high society has greed and use their rights to control other people or things to get more benefits.

In the past 50 years, the increase of international trade and investment is bound up with bribery which as a typical aspect of corruption. The cross-border business transactions has a large growth and unites with very different clients and behavior concerning bribery. People in order to get more benefit even use a variety of bribes in the form of corruption caused many disadvantages to society. This report will explain when the bribery and corruption is most likely to occur, the extent of bribery and corruption in different countries, aassess regulations in the UK and the US and their effectiveness and the bad influence from bribery and corruption.

A World Bank survey shows that 3600 companies in 69 countries revealed that 40% of those companies paid bribes to facilitate international business (Kaikatiet, 2005). The World Bank estimates that about $80 billion annually goes to corrupt government officials (Erickson, 2006). The level of bribery as a function in international business transactions. Not only the demand for such bribes in different place, but also the supply, or multinational corporations and their representatives are willing to supply bribes. The recipient of the bribe as the demand side, with the ones who give bribes represents the supply side. The supply side can initiate by a bribery deal, large local business firms and multinational corporations from industrialized countries. In particular, the officials in poor countries will find to resist hardly. In demand-side could be influenced by the critical economic conditions, institutional characteristics, and cultural values in transnational bribery in the country. In other worlds, a corrupt transaction involves both a supply and a demand side, like one side need a payer of a bribe and other side receive of the bribe.