Corruption

Author(s):  
Mark Philp

Corruption denotes decay or perversion. The term implies that there is a natural or normal standard of functioning or conduct from which the corrupt state of affairs or action deviates. When we talk of a person becoming corrupt, we mean not just that they have broken a rule, but that the basic norms of ethical conduct no longer have any force for them. Corruption strikes at the root of a thing. Political corruption involves the decay or perversion of political rule. Broadly, this occurs when a group or individual subverts a society’s publicly endorsed practices for conciliating conflicts and pursuing the common good so as to gain illegitimate advantage for their interests in the political process. The precise specification of the nature and dynamics of corruption is inherently controversial. Classical accounts associate it with a collapse of civic virtue and the eventual destruction of the state. Modern theories focus more narrowly on the misuse of public office for private gain.

2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 110-127
Author(s):  
Abdoulaye Sounaye

Unexpectedly, one of the marking features of democratization in Niger has been the rise of a variety of Islamic discourses. They focus on the separation between religion and the state and, more precisely, the way it is manifested through the French model of laïcité, which democratization has adopted in Niger. For many Muslim actors, laïcité amounts to a marginalization of Islamic values and a negation of Islam. This article present three voices: the Collaborators, the Moderates, and the Despisers. Each represents a trend that seeks to influence the state’s political and ideological makeup. Although the ulama in general remain critical vis-à-vis the state’s political and institutional transformation, not all of them reject the principle of the separation between religion and state. The Collaborators suggest cooperation between the religious authority and the political one, the Moderates insist on the necessity for governance to accommodate the people’s will and visions, and the Despisers reject the underpinning liberalism that voids religious authority and demand a total re-Islamization. I argue that what is at stake here is less the separation between state and religion than the modality of this separation and its impact on religious authority. The targets, tones, and justifications of the discourses I explore are evidence of the limitations of a democratization project grounded in laïcité. Thus in place of a secular democratization, they propose a conservative democracy based on Islam and its demands for the realization of the common good.


2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 110-127
Author(s):  
Abdoulaye Sounaye

Unexpectedly, one of the marking features of democratization in Niger has been the rise of a variety of Islamic discourses. They focus on the separation between religion and the state and, more precisely, the way it is manifested through the French model of laïcité, which democratization has adopted in Niger. For many Muslim actors, laïcité amounts to a marginalization of Islamic values and a negation of Islam. This article present three voices: the Collaborators, the Moderates, and the Despisers. Each represents a trend that seeks to influence the state’s political and ideological makeup. Although the ulama in general remain critical vis-à-vis the state’s political and institutional transformation, not all of them reject the principle of the separation between religion and state. The Collaborators suggest cooperation between the religious authority and the political one, the Moderates insist on the necessity for governance to accommodate the people’s will and visions, and the Despisers reject the underpinning liberalism that voids religious authority and demand a total re-Islamization. I argue that what is at stake here is less the separation between state and religion than the modality of this separation and its impact on religious authority. The targets, tones, and justifications of the discourses I explore are evidence of the limitations of a democratization project grounded in laïcité. Thus in place of a secular democratization, they propose a conservative democracy based on Islam and its demands for the realization of the common good.


1944 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles E. Merriam

The ends of government may be stated as follows: (1) external security, (2) internal order, (3) justice, (4) general welfare, and (5) freedom.To the state, which is the name usually applied to independent political associations, these ends are accorded on the basis of observation and reflection. They may be summed up under the term the “common weal,” or the common good. This assumes that there is a community, made up of human personalities, that there are purposes, values, and interests in common, that there is a commonly accepted organization for carrying out these common purposes.It cannot be said that these functions are the property or responsibility of the state alone. They are shared by other agencies of human society, and without their coöperation the political society can do little. The state provides a broad framework within which other societies and persons may operate more effectively, and undertakes common functions which it can more conveniently carry on, than other associations.


Author(s):  
Georg Menz

Despite the state being such a central actor in establishing and policing the rules of the game of any given political economy, its role is often neglected. In this chapter, we briefly review relevant state theories and explore changes to the nature and appearance of the capitalist state. The awesome increase in the political fire power of the financial service sector has unfortunately led to regulatory capture. The state can no longer be considered a neutral umpire, being heavily influenced by the prerogatives of major banking institutions. This state of affairs corrupts the hopes that liberals place in the self-policing powers of the marketplace and reflects certain fears on the political left regarding the pernicious effects of ‘financialization’.


2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-41
Author(s):  
William J. Novak ◽  
Stephen W. Sawyer ◽  
James T. Sparrow

Pierre Bourdieu began his posthumously published lectures “On the State” by highlighting the three dominant traditions that have framed most thinking about the state in Western social science and modern social theory. On the one hand, he highlighted what he termed the “initial definition” of the state as a “neutral site” designed to regulate conflict and “serve the common good.” Bourdieu traced this essentially classical liberal conception of the state back to the pioneering political treatises of Thomas Hobbes and John Locke.1 In direct response to this “optimistic functionalism,” Bourdieu noted the rise of a critical and more “pessimistic” alternative—something of a diametric opposite.


Author(s):  
Michał Strzelecki

The contemporary state crisis is a derivative of complex economic and social processes. His indicators include not only the visible increase in the intensity of political conflicts (both on a micro and macro scale), the revival and development of separatist tendencies, and the weakening of the role of the state as the basic instrument of organizing collective life. It is also increasing fragmentation of the political scene, the development of particularisms, weakening and progressive dysfunctionality of existing political institutions, increasing economic rivalry and the collapse of the generally accepted axiological system, which is accompanied by increasingly clear questioning of the idea of the common good and progressing pragmatism and egoism. An important element is therefore the disappearance of civic awareness and activity. The intensification of these disturbing tendencies is certainly not supported by the modern education system, whose hallmarks are commercialization and economization, withdrawal of the state and professionalization.


2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Tawanda Zinyama ◽  
Joseph Tinarwo

Public administration is carried out through the public service. Public administration is an instrument of the State which is expected to implement the policy decisions made from the political and legislative processes. The rationale of this article is to assess the working relationships between ministers and permanent secretaries in the Government of National Unity in Zimbabwe. The success of the Minister depends to a large degree on the ability and goodwill of a permanent secretary who often has a very different personal or professional background and whom the minster did not appoint. Here lies the vitality of the permanent secretary institution. If a Minister decides to ignore the advice of the permanent secretary, he/she may risk of making serious errors. The permanent secretary is the key link between the democratic process and the public service. This article observed that the mere fact that the permanent secretary carries out the political, economic and social interests and functions of the state from which he/she derives his/her authority and power; and to which he/she is accountable,  no permanent secretary is apolitical and neutral to the ideological predisposition of the elected Ministers. The interaction between the two is a political process. Contemporary administrator requires complex team-work and the synthesis of diverse contributions and view-points.


Author(s):  
Jorge Núñez Grijalva

In all areas of the legal world there are higher aspirations, which represent legal values to be protected, like the justice, the common good and legal security stand out. The present work was proposed to analyze if the Ecuadorian Legislator, in its process of construction and promulgation of the criminal law regulating against the unfair competition, incorporated these three values into it. Regrettably, the results show an apparent absence of the three legal values in criminal law, leaving legal operators at a disadvantage in view of the need to control this type of crime and society, awaiting compliance. Through an exercise of legal hermeneutics, the study starts from a real problem in the Ecuadorian legal system of the criminal law against of the unfair competition, which demands to be discussed in the search for the State to take the necessary measures to solve this problem.


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