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Yes, they do. They all do. You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that. The attempt to deploy western culture globally has failed
by qikInNdOutReply 3y ago
Yes, they do. They all do. You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that.
The attempt to deploy western culture globally has failed miserably, generating jobs who exist merley to errect a veneer of compliance.
Behind the thin layer of paint, the old culture and world continus happily on unphased by the hysterics. And it was always painfully obvious for those in the know.
For example there was a law in many arab countries, that you could not do buisness with israel and do buisness with them. Yet, when you opened company location maps, there they were, side by side, right next to the company "morals & mission statements" tab.
The obvious answer, bribes in broad daylight.
Now, as the western exported "cultural revolution" winds down in obvious failure, all that veneer fades away and the ugly old world reappears as if it was never gone.
Very soon, the workers with confiscated passports might as well be called slaves again. Its a sad, depressing state of affairs, but then it was for the non deluded befor this point in time too.
- fryry 3y agoOn the last point, I must be missing something obvious, but why don't those workers who have their passports taken report them lost/stolen and get a new one from their embassy?
- walrus01 3y agoBecause their job is tied to company owned by the citizen of the host country who employs them (their visa sponsor), and they're probably sending money back home to India, Pakistan or Bangladesh to support a family of eight people. You report that and cause a legal fuss with your employers, you not only don't get paid your previous month of work, you get deported and banned from the UAE or Qatar or Saudi Arabia for life.
- EduardoBautista 3y agoIt is illegal to confiscate an employee's passport in the UAE. If it happens, it doesn't make it legal.
- walrus01 3y agoShockingly enough a lot of things are illegal in the UAE and yet they're extremely commonplace.
- cryptonym 3y agohow ironic to say that in a post about illegal bribes
- andy_ppp 3y agoThe police in UAE are not there to help Indian people get their passports returned... and I suspect it would be incredibly dangerous to start complaining to them; your only reason to be there is to work, cheaply and shut up. You are a second class citizen and it’s unbelievably naive to start sticking your head above your station. You’ll be telling them they should start a union next!
- eru 3y agoWestern expats might be second class citizens in the UAE, with some luck. As a worker from India in the UAE, you are far treated far below a second class citizen, sadly.
- fryry 3y agoSo we have an individual that has travelled overseas to earn more money than he would be able to make at home, to better support his family. That is not a slave and calling it slavery cheapens actual slavery IMO. Now, having said that, the conditions are appalling and the employers do many unscrupulous and illegal things. But it is a voluntary arrangement unlike slavery.
- rippercushions 3y agoThe workers have often had to pay huge fees to brokers to score the job in the first place, often including taking out large loans that must be paid back with the job's income. On arrival, the worker realizes that everything they have been told is a lie. Their passport is confiscated and they are told that, if they try to run away to their embassy etc, goons will go to their family to extort the money owed for the loans by any means necessary, including torture and death. Would you still call this a "voluntary arrangement"?
- fryry 3y agoNo, especially the element of having goons back home to coerce the family sounds like actually slavery. I double check these days. Westerners try to make charity cases out of people from the developing world that are just trying to make a buck like we all do.
- eru 3y ago> Would you still call this a "voluntary arrangement"? Perhaps not for the first guy to ever fall for this. But existing workers are still communicating with the folks back home, so prospective new workers now what to expect and what to believe and not to believe. I agree that they aren't treated well; but we can't ignore that the situation back home is often even worse.
- rippercushions 3y agoThere are a lot of poor villages in Pakistan or Nepal, a lot of brokers, a lot of different lies to tell and a lot of suckers born every minute. And, of course, there's the odd village boy who beats the odds, strikes it rich (often by getting into a position where he can exploit others, eg as a labor broker), builds a big-ass house and becomes inspiration for others to follow in his footsteps.
- walrus01 3y ago> Behind the thin layer of paint, the old culture and world continus happily on unphased by the hysterics For instance: I've always thought it was really funny when westerners adopted the belief that Benazir Bhutto was some enlightened champion of democracy and progress while remaining blissfully ignorant of the historical position of vast wealth and power her family occupies in Sindh.
- bilqis 3y agoInside “democratic” countries, they are just bribing via legal means - see lobbying.
- qikInNdOutReply 3y agoYes. Sadly yes. But its not spread societywide. You do not bribe your way out of law enforcement etc. You do not have that society wide tax on just "breathing" - yet. There is also not yet, the worst kind of corruption, were incompetence in education gets through and enshrined to entrench other corrupt incompetence and finally destroys the mechanism to dislodge incompetence. Were a visit to the doctor might kill you, because they all got their diploma because they know the same family and never spent a day awake and sober in university. And the health minister is from that family. And the whole anti-corruption self-repair mechanism is dysfunct, cause its married to that familys cousin.
- bilqis 3y agoWell, maybe you don’t bribe directly by handing money over to an LEO. But I would say there is still tons of corruption that is based on influence, soft skills, knowing right people, donations to specific charities/political parties.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sebzim4500 3y ago>You do not bribe your way out of law enforcement etc. Don't you? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_pardoned_or_granted_clemency_by_the_president_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_pardoned_or_gra...
- codersfocus 3y agoIn the US at least, FOPs (social organizations / quasi union most police belong to) sell “donor cards” that specifically can be shown to grant favors similar to those one would be eligible in bribable countries.
- 3y ago
- mrweasel 3y agoMany years ago (15+ years ago), I worked for a company that wanted to sell some software product to China. Now, you can't legally use bribes where I am, "the EU says NO". What you can do is hire a Chinese consulting company, they will invoice you a surprisringly high amount for their services and take some of that money and use it to grease the wheels of the Chinese bureaucracy. At least at that point in time, it was basically required to win any sort of contract on that level in China. Microsoft using bribes in Africa, the Middle East or parts of Asia isn't a Microsoft problem, it a problem that those specific countries need to deal with. Microsoft would most likely have made their sales anyway, if bribes hadn't been a thing, it would just be slightly cheaper to do so, so I don't think management at Microsoft cares one way or the other.
- qikInNdOutReply 3y agoCompany "fasttracked" worker visas to china, are basically olympic sport visas etc. reassigned for a bribe.
- ngcazz 3y agoIt's absolutely a Microsoft problem that they don't take a moral stand on bribing.
- lynx23 3y agoMorale in a for-profit company is a virtual concept, it simply does not exist in reality. Claiming it does is likely delusionary or an attempt to hide the truth.
- pulse7 3y agoYou are implying that running a for-profit company is immoral. Of course you can run a for-profit company in moral and ethical way!
- usrusr 3y agoThen it's a for-profit-and-some-other-things. And when there is more than one owner those other things better be defined in a legally binding way or else.
- pulse7 3y agoYes, they do. But not everyone does it! Better not to do business at all than to be part of bribing!
- npteljes 3y agoAfter growing to a certain size, you just don't not do business. Because if you don't to some businesses, your competitors will, and then they'll outgrow you and force you out of the market. I'm not siding with Microsoft here or any other business, just stating that this is how things are. I mean, of course, there could be many other ways, but this carries the least risk for the business.
- ratg13 3y agoHonestly, most of them do it.. not even because they want to, but because it's expected on the other end. I've been in contract negotiations where the purchase of industrial equipment is contingent upon prostitutes and trips to DisneyWorld. Of course we don't want to pay for these things, but if you don't, they just give the contract to someone who will.
- Guthur 3y agoAs opposed to the legal bribery in democracy, it turns into an oligarchy, it always does. This is known to be true in the past and observable truth in the present.
- lynx23 3y agoSorry, but democracy is not automaticcally a guarantee that there is no corruption. I can tell, because I am living in a supposedly democratic country which has gained quite a number of points in the corruption-index recently...
- qikInNdOutReply 3y agoThere is the ability of the population to organize and vote out and and all corrupt influence. Usually the citzenry is kept down via media and culture, but as several revolutions have shown, the old culture can get thrown out hard and fast, if the population has enough.
- lynx23 3y agoI believe the time of revolutions is actually gone. We've reached a point where the comfort we're enjoying in the west is baasically preventing revolutionary change. Because even though there might be things you dont like about the system you are in, overall, with social security, a health care system that mostly works (sorry USA, I am not talking about you, death penalty and all) vmost people prefer the status quo over whatever revolution you might imagine.
- layer8 3y agoYou’re undermining your point by calling it “supposedly”. You’re otherwise not wrong, though.
- marginalia_nu 3y agoWell no true Scotsman and so on. Even in old and established democracies, there's usually a large gap between what is said of the democracy, and what the democracy actually is and does.
- lynx23 3y agoThat was my cynism. Democracy seems to be used as a wildcard to say "we are the good people" awfully lot recently, which gets my attention.
- HopenHeyHi 3y ago[flagged]
- aww_dang 3y agoDoesn't democracy simply institutionalize corruption? Where is the incentive for honesty or long term thinking for politicians or political candidates? The politician's primary concern is to win the next election. Promises of any sort can be fielded to win this battle. Ideally his promises should motivate voters to support his campaign. After the election, excuses can be made. The opposition offers an easy scapegoat for not delivering upon previous promises. While in office, the politician has every incentive to milk his position for all it is worth. He doesn't personally have a stake in the country's budget. The politician is driven to drive funds towards his donors. His only time preference is to make it happen before his term expires. Long term results of policies or contracts are besides the point. After spending considerable time in 3rd world countries, my takeaway is that corruption in the developed world is simply more expensive. Yes, you can legally lobby for your company to receive gov. contracts. The difference is that you need to pay expensive lawyers to execute the process. You can't just simply throw a few hundred dollars around or ask your brother-in-law. There's a right way to lobby in the west and a wrong way, which is tabooed as corruption. The end result is much the same. The difference is often partisan perception.
- eru 3y ago> You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that. Old British-ruled Hong Kong arguably had rule of law and no democracy.
- _8j50 3y ago[flagged]
- xbmcuser 3y agoWestern Countries promote and protect corruption in the rest of the world. Where does the corruption money go? Where do the corrupt people and their families live after they are removed from power for whatever reason?
- eynsham 3y agoHK (pre~2020) had and Singapore has rule of law.
- Laaas 3y ago> Yes, they do. They all do. You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that. Contrary to common belief, corruption does not have much to do with democracy. There are many non-democratic countries without corruption, and many democratic countries with corruption (and the inverse too for both). The relation is that, currently, a high standard of living leads both to less corruption and to more democracy.