Classifying corruption into one of the sections of the problems is a tough task. It is an economic problem, no doubt, but it is also a social problem. Since the time frame of the corruption has been so long and spanning across decades, corruption has been seen as a way of life and something mandatory in order to get something done.

Several factors also exacerabated the situation of corruption in Arab countries, especially the poorer ones.

Firstly, the lack of economic development can be blamed for corruption. Bureaucrats and other government officials are not paid well enough, putting them at a position to ask for bribes and use it as an income source. The lack of resources is a reason why corruption is so endemic.

Secondly, the economies in many of these countries are state-run economies. So there is a lot of bureaucracy and nepotism practised in these areas. You need to pay a bribe in order to get a job and you take bribes in order to recover the costs. There are many such avenues which force you to either give a bribe or take a bribe. And considering the fact that there are very few jobs in such economies, the scope for corruption is much higher.

Thirdly, the type of government in power is responsible for corruption. The rulers in most of these areas were or remain autocratic rulers. They and their ministers squander away money and use it for their personal gain. Since they don’t allow any dissent, they don’t bring in any mechanisms that could prevent corruption. Doing so would bring their looting of the country to a halt. Even if they somehow did bring in mechanisms, they would make sure that it was made in such a way that it wouldn’t affect them at all and such a mechanism is useless.

Fighting corruption, therefore, becomes one of the most important objectives and goals in order to solve the present crisis in the middle east.

When we do consider the fact that many of these evil regimes are now toppling, it is a very good opportunity to fight corruption. With elections coming around the corner in many countries and the drafting of new constitutions in few other, an opportunitiy has presented itself and it needs to be used to benefit the country in the long term.

First of all, all the former regime leaders who have been indulging in corruption needs to be tried in court for corruption charges and all the squandered money needs to be brought back. This will ensure a sense of justice within the people and it will give a message to people that corruption will get caught ultimately and crime doesn’t pay.

Secondly, legislation needs to be introduced to define corruption and set appropriate punishments for the same. The legislation needs to be strong and needs to be applicable for a long time to come. The long-term goals of fighting corruption needs to be taken into consideration when drafting the legislation

Thirdly, in all these countries, an independent vigilance body for corruption needs to be instituted. Nobody should be spared from the purview of this body. Its composition should be well scrutinized and the body itself should be responsible to the parliament and the people.

Fourthly, mechanisms to fight corruption need to be studied all around the world and then implemented in their new constitutions or added to their existing constitutions. Mechanisms like right to information, Government Accountability Offices and other mechanisms need to be instituted in order to fight corruption. This will ensure that corruption is controlled to a large extent.

Lastly, the government must ensure sound economic development and revise the salaries of the bureaucrats and other government officials in order to prevent them from taking bribes and do their job honestly. The mismatch between resources and people need to be bridged in order to combat corruption effectively.

But in order to do all this, there is a very important component without which all the above mentioned measures becomes absolutely ineffective and that is the will of the people. But as demonstrated by the protests and their will to make their lives better for themselves, it is clear that they want to do away with corruption and live dignified lives.

Copyright © 2011 Ashwath Komath

The Inherent Problems

There are, however, both perennial and insoluble problems with the political proposition of anarchy. Any true power, anarchic force(s), that would be really powerful enough to come to fully overthrow any truly despotic regime must be either 1.) at least equal to or 2.) greater than the corrupt regime to be eliminated by the finalized revolution or revolt attempted.

But, the forever, inherent problematic and resulting irony always integrally and, thus, very necessarily involved is that such a posited actual power must then either 1.) come to functionally act as or 2.) be the logically resulting replacement for the regime that was so eliminated, for power, inclusive of political power, naturally abhors a vacuum.

Chaos, logically ever consequent upon the creation of anarchy, cannot last as a condition forever. [Napoleon's overthrow, for instance, of the Directory was merely meant to establish his dictatorship. Anarchism, needless to say, did not become an option.]
It is, thus, the ever present and irrefutable and undeniable conundrum of Anarchism if ever really put to the empirical test of events and men in the real world of action, not purely speculative contemplation or theoretical suppositions. Thus, Anarchism, the total negation of any government, in the real world would, consequently, both definitely contradict and, moreover, totally refute Anarchism in its simply ideological contentions. The absolute propositions, defined by the above cited and repeated numbers 1 and 2, have never, in fact, been overcome by any historical examples to the contrary, only by many utopian speculations of simply assumed possibilities having never had any solid correlation on this all-too-real earth.

Mere Regimes versus True Governments

While anarchy may seem to promise a great deal of freedom and liberty usually unknown under the rule of governments or regimes, this is the constant confusion of liberty with mere license as thoughts of libertarian fulfillment degrade surely into vile libertine excess gone mad; decadent minds that cannot raise their sights much above that of a whorehouse, as history has repeatedly demonstrated, again and again, infallibly, are not likely to love true liberty more than their mortal lusts or sensate carnality.

While all governments are regimes not all regimes, as Hannah Arendt had explained, are necessarily governments merely because they can kill their opponents, etc. Governments must always have a basis of some kind of true support as to their actual existing authority that, consequently, establishes their then valid power and right to exist; regimes are, thus, only systems of mere force simply existing for themselves, for the power holders, and against any opposition; they do not, in fact, so exist by rightful authority and any power resultantly exercised is, by definition, all wrongful and totally illegitimate; and, revolutions are, of course, one recommended remedy for this political illness.

All regimes can, therefore, be rightfully subject to being overthrown; and, when governments turn, repeatedly, toward the unlawful expedients applied to by mere regimes, they too, eventually, deserve to be destroyed and replaced by rightful authority and power to be held by a future government. And, not everything that is called law needs to be taken to be truly legal and lawful if done against the true teachings of classical Natural Law. There can be, therefore, legitimate revolutions against intolerable regimes and (formerly legally established) governments.

Further than this, St. Thomas Aquinas and others had correctly taught the legitimacy of exercising a necessary tyrannicide in proper defense of law, justice, the people, and the maintenance of needed right order in society and the polity. However, not all so-called revolutions are necessarily truly revolutionary in terms of actually supplying liberty and justice and right order to a country’s people; thus, Arendt had correctly denied the label of revolution to what happened in Russia in 1917 and France in 1789; but, she did recognize accurately that the American Revolution had, in fact, succeeded where the Russian and French occurrences totally and miserably failed.

This is because they merely continued the inherent, tyrannical, despotic tendencies of the government or regime that they had merely replaced with a then renewed and, of course, much worse despotisms. The American Revolution is the true model for all actual revolution, meaning where the government resulting is to only represent and be owned by the people and not as with the certainly authoritarian or totalitarian regime as to how it owns the people. Thus, anarchy need not be the only or solely assumed answer to tyranny, corruption, injustice, and oppression.

Dreamland: Anarchism Revealed

Anarchism, therefore, must ever remain just an ideological fairyland abstraction to delight the simple beliefs of, perhaps, supposed cultural anarchists, anarcho-capitalists, and other such silly folk who wish to fondly live in a (chaotic) land of dreams. In short, it is neither intellectually nor practically viable or credible, which, in some ways, is still very much regrettable.

North Korea

North Korea is a country that has been described by journalists as being an information black hole. Also known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (or DPRK), the country was formed in the aftermath of World War II, when the north was held under Soviet occupation and the south under the occupation of other allied countries. As a result of this occupation, North Korea has deceloped into a Soviet-style socialist regime contrasting with the Western-style republic of South Korea. Ben Anderson, a reporter for the BBC, said the country was strange to the point of being surreal and described it as a “Stalinist theme park”. The country’s political system is extreme and has been described as a ‘personality cult’ of the Eternal president: Kim Il-sung, who founded the country, and who continues to be president despite his death in 1994. The country is a dictatorship run by the president’s son Kim Jong Il. Every aspect of the media is controlled, propaganda is rife, and even history is portrayed differently within the borders of North Korea. According to a report from the committee to protect journalists, “North Korea has no independent journalists, and all radio and television receivers sold in the country are locked to government-specified frequencies. “

Equatorial Guinea

Equatorial Guinea is one of the smallest countries in continental Africa. Its President, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, has been in power since 1979. The 1982 constitution of Equatorial Guinea gave Obiang extensive powers, which he uses to maintain tight hold on the country. The country is oil rich, and of the country’s £370 million revenue a large portion is confiscated by the president. Meanwhile most of the 500,000 subjects are living below the poverty line, often less than a dollar a day. The media is subject to heavy self-censorship, and there are laws in place banning criticism of public figures. The state-owned media and radio stations are controlled by the president’s son.

Burma

Burma, officially known as the Union of Myanmar, is governed by a strict military dictatorship (a military junta) headed by Senior General Than Shwe, who holds the not only the post of “Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council” but also “Commander in Chief of the Defense Services” and Minister of Defence. In 1989 the junta passed the “Adaptation of Expressions Law” that officially changed the English version of the country’s name from Burma to Myanmar, though many do not recognize the authority of the dictatorship to effect changes upon the country’s name.

The ‘Campaign for Human Rights and Democracy in Burma’, (the only national organisation in the UK dedicated to campaigning for human rights and democracy in Burma.) describes the country as being, “ruled by one of the most brutal military dictatorships in the world; a dictatorship charged by the United Nations with a ‘crime against humanity’ for its systematic abuses of human rights, and condemned internationally for refusing to transfer power to the legally elected Government of the country – the party led by Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.”

According to the committee to protect journalists, “The junta owns all daily newspapers and radio, along with the country’s three television channels. Media dare not hint at, let alone report on, antigovernment sentiments.”