3 ms·

I think you've missed one of the big points of the article, which is that Unaoil was the vehicle by which western companies introduced totally new levels of cor

I think you've missed one of the big points of the article, which is that Unaoil was the vehicle by which western companies introduced totally new levels of corruption into developing economies. They'd start the bribees (is that a word?) out small with minor stuff, and then they'd move on to full-blown bribery. In other words, one of the big points of the piece is that the idea that "these countries are just that way and you have to pay to play" is actually not true across the board, and that in cases where the country wasn't that way, Unaoil and their clients made it that way.

joshjkim 11y ago
ah yes - that is right. I attempted to say something like this when I mentioned western corp's ability to "overpay vs. the local bribery market" and all that, though I admit I didn't flush it very well out. here's a try: this is the natural result of massive western corps having access to economies that rely on bribery wide-scale, and what sucks is that, due to the western companies massive resources relative to the local economy, the bribery gets much further out of hand and continues longer vs. if the local economy had remained isolated.