Corruption through the lenses of Social Justice and Peace

Corruption and peace have always been linked together, suggesting that the former often
bloom in the absence of the latter. This, later on, becomes the basis of the presence of social
justice within a community. More often than not, violence, which is the opposite of peace, comes
along with the presence of corruption, particularly in developing countries, like the Philippines
(Jensen & Hapal, 2018). Depicting the same dilemma, the case of “Wakanda Forever” centers on
the battle between choosing violence to end corruption or tolerating corruption to trample
violence. Indeed, the issue lies within the concept of how corruption must be addressed, far
beyond the conventional ways that only result in regression. With this, it is imperative to note
prolonged corruption has the tendency to influence factors that would either propagate or
diminish violence, hence the light for social justice.

Delving deeper, the case entails the situation of a “peace negotiator” who has the right to
decide whether the grant of equal national power would pose fairness among the members of the
community. Hence, the problem lies within the weight of peace and corruption in the sense that it
is unclear for the negotiator to decide whether peace is more important than social justice or the
other way around. The weight of the two concepts involved further makes the decision-making
harder for the person concerned, for the sole reason that both solutions would have sacrifices that
are detrimental to the people and that the only difference is that the other is long-term while the
other is short-term.

Applying the concept of applied ethics with regard to peace, social justice, and
corruption, the proposed solution focuses on prioritizing the eradication of corruption rather than
addressing it later. Specifically, the solution encompasses choosing positive over negative peace
and actually focusing on both political and electoral reform to ensure that corrupt families would
not have the chance to have the seat of power. Taking, for example, the idea of positive peace,
Mische (2019) states that it happens only when the root causes are abolished within a
community. On the other hand, negative peace only erases the presence of physical violence,
hence a surface-level concept of peace (Osofisan & Keen, 2019). While this solution could
potentially cause the families to fight further, giving them the chance to be elected would also
pose relatively high results of the same occurrence. Due to their influence, they may utilize this
power to do fearmongering and impose various beliefs on people. Translating this to practice,
given, for instance, an influential family in the Philippines, it is only safe to assume that moving
forward with an election has the possibility of resulting in further violence as well. As they are in
dire greed overpower, these families are likely to pose violence and further cause divisions
within the community, thus making choosing peace lose its very essence.

On the other hand, ensuring that the elections would be fair despite the presence of hints
of violence within the community would not only cause positive peace to prosper but also result
in a long-term solution. In theory, positive peace gives room for building mechanisms that can
meet the requirements of the whole community and resolve conflicts in an amicable manner
(Herath, 2016). From this, it is only safe to say that positive peace would bring more good to the
community rather than the prioritization of negative peace, which is very likely to be temporary
given the presence of corruption. As a result, this solution gives emphasis to the importance of
preventive measures for corruption rather than eradicating it later. One specific example
substantiating this is a scenario where a corrupt family gets elected. Say, for instance, that they
already have the power. In comparison, people may try to slowly regain peace and prioritize the
eradication of corruption, the power that the family can influence how corruption is handled.
Like in the Philippines, as much as legislators and professionals try to erase the trails of
corruption in the country, it is impeded by external factors that are controlled by the family that
has been elected. In this manner, it is safe to assume that the same scenario would be witnessed
in Wakanda.

In the instance that this solution does not work, one viable option is to give the power of
decision-making to the people. Needless to say, the people are human agencies that affect the
collective condition of a political atmosphere (Thomason, 2020). Anchored on this theory, there
is no doubt that the voice of the public would also matter and can give further options with
regard to the case. To further explain, this alternative solution takes into consideration the
involvement of the people of Wakanda and not just the judgment of the “peace negotiator.”
Meanwhile, this could not work in the case that the people are then again influenced by the
power and fear as a result of the ongoing violence in the community.
 Nonetheless, this boils down to the fact that the absence of eradication would
eventually result in positive peace and social justice, thus posing the idea that long-term
solutions are more efficient. In the case of Wakanda, it would be best for the peace negotiator to
let violence manifest, considering that one way or another, it would always be present as theories
suggest that it is impossible to abolish within a social setting. Additionally, only prolonging the
power that the family has could potentially poison the minds of the people, which will just lead
to the same results, thus deeming them as nonsensical. Truth be told, regarding corruption as a
driving force that would affect how social justice and peace manifests in a community would
allow us to avoid its cyclical roots.
References

Herath, O. (2016). A critical analysis of Positive and Negative Peace.

Jensen, S., & Hapal, K. (2018). Police violence and corruption in the Philippines: violent
exchange and the war on drugs. Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs, 37(2), 39-62.

Mische, P. M. (2019). The earth as peace teacher. In Peace Culture and Society (pp. 133-146).
Routledge.

Osofisan, W., & Keen, S. (2019). Community-level conflict prevention and peace building in
DRC and Somalia. Forced Migration Review, (62), 75-78.

Thomason, K. K. (2020). Emotion, Reason and Action in Kant by Maria Borges. Journal of the
History of Philosophy, 58(2), 411-412.