Bribery  

is define as the giving or offering of a bribe, which means giving or paying

someone with something of value in exchange for a specific favorable outcome. Bribery is an
offer, promise, or giving of any undue pecuniary or other advantage, whether directly of
through intermediaries, to a foreign public official, for that official or for a third party, in
order that the official act or refrain from acting in relation to the performance of official
duties, in order to obtain or retain business or other improper advantage (OECD Convention
on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Official in International Business Transactions,
1997). Bribery is corrupt for two reasons: (1) it involves a public official using his office to
gain advantages from citizens; and (2) it often distorts the underlying official action.
Bribery is typically illegal and dishonest under almost every country in the world and
it’s considered a criminal offense. It may be a naive question to ask why this is happening.
People bribe because of personal reasons and motivations – they want an unfair advantage
over the others like paying lower taxes, to get an appointment or promotion, to avoid fine or
penalty or to get something done quickly. Bribery can also be a result of systems that don’t
work well and create bad incentives – lack of opportunities, lack of transparency, weak
enforcement, bad incentive and attitudes or circumstances that make average people disregard
the law such as poverty.
Many people accept bribery as inevitable and unavoidable. Others condone it, even
going so far as to say that nothing should be done about it; that it’s a form of gift giving.
Others say that it actually is useful, because at least you get what you pay for. People often
say it is everywhere, it always existed, it is vague and culturally determined, eliminating
bribery will require whole change in attitudes and values, and bribery is not harmful rather it
is the grease that moves the economic engine.
According to Raghunandan (2014), people typically pay bribes for some specific
reasons. (1) Need for speed. This results in payment of speed money to fast track
applications. This in turn incentivizes offices to slow down procedures deliberately, so that
they can collect fast tracking payments. (2) Convenience. Closely related to speed money.
People pay because they are too busy to go to an office and find it convenient to outsource
corruption to an agent for an overall service charge. This happens in cases where processes
are convoluted, long drawn out and multi-step. (3) Fear, nervousness and relief. Many people
have a dread of going to government offices and fear that they will be harmed if they do not
pay bribes. In many cases, the fear is totally unjustified, but still sadly persists. People also
pay bribes out of relief. Therefore, one time transactions in peoples' life, like buying a flat or
getting a car, are more bribe prone than others. People consider bribing for registration as
something like a tip paid out of happiness and relief at the completion of the transaction. (4)
Ignorance and unwillingness to learn. People who are otherwise savvy, do not go to websites,
or do their homework enough to understand a procedure beforehand. (5) Misinformation by
middlemen and touts. Closely related to ignorance and unwillingness to learn. Ignorant
people are vulnerable to being cheated by corrupt officials and their touts who mislead them
by mystifying processes. (6) Persuasion by peers and elders. Closely related to ignorance and
unwillingness to learn. Bribing behavior, and the notion that unless one pays a bribe nothing
can be secured, is passed on from generation to generation and fortified through peer
discussions. (7) Fear of justified, unjustified or excessive punishment. This covers payments
such as bribes paid to the police to look the other way when there is a clear violation of the
law. In the absence of the bribe, the bribe payer is vulnerable to punishment. (8) Faced with
the denial of an essential service from a corrupt monopoly. For example, people are cornered
and pay bribes for restoration of electricity and water connections, because if they do not pay,
they are subject to high levels of inconvenience. With respect to the above reasons, one can
expect that at least the bribe payers could be dissatisfied with the act of paying a bribe. (9)
Mutual benefit. This typically happens in bribing to lower tax rates. For example, bribing to
accept under-valued properties for registration or to reduce property tax rates. In such cases,
both the bribe giver and the bribe taker benefit and the government suffers. Typically, for
such cases, there are no complainants. (10) Avoiding business loss or getting unwarranted
windfall profits. This is a strong justification for the supply side of private sector corruption.
Businesses do not mind paying bribes because of two reasons. First, if they do not pay, they
suffer business loss. Second, whatever they pay can be passed on to the consumer through an
enhanced selling price.
Bribery pays certain costs and consequences. It adds to the cost of doing business
without adding corresponding value. Instead of the full contract amount going towards the
delivery of the product or service, only a portion is productively employed compromising
quality.
When high profile leaders are involved in bribery and corruption, their image are
damaged. The message is not only that unethical and illegal behavior is acceptable, but also
that the pursuit of personal gain takes precedence over service delivery. This risks creating an
unethical culture among employees (or citizens) where such “lowest common denominator”
behavior predominates.
Bribery also puts a country’s reputation at risk. A poor ethical reputation brings with
it many potential negative results, such as reduced foreign investment, decreased tourism and
the loss of our top talent to other countries.
Understanding reasons why there is bribery and its consequences is important in
finding cures for it subsequently.