Political Corruption

Corruption has become an issue of major political and economic significance over the years . Corruption is , in its simplest terms the misuse of public power for private profit . However , the definition of corruption varies from person to person . Corruption does not always mean the same thing or has the same impact or motivation . According to the Global Corruption Report (2004 ) Political corruption is the abuse of entrusted power by political leaders for private gain , with the objective of increasing power and wealth (Transparency International 2004 , pg .11 ) Politicians often apply the term

corruption to the abuse of public powers it describes a pattern of behaviour that can be found in almost every area of life

Corruption scandals have brought the governments to collapse in both major industrial countries and developing countries . Through theoretical research , it is recognized that corruption can occur where rents exists (Mauro , 1996 ) Since the ultimate source of rent-seeking behavior is the accessibility of rents , corruption is likely to occur where restrictions and government intervention lead to the presence of such excessive profits . Some examples include trade restrictions , industrial policies price controls , multiple exchange rate practices and foreign exchange allocation schemes . Some rents may arise in the absence of government intervention , as in the case of natural resources , such as oil , whose supply is limited by nature and whose extraction cost is far lower than its market price . One would expect that corruption is more likely to take place when civil servants are paid very low wages and often must resort to collecting bribes in to feed their families (Mauro 1996 ) All the causes of corruption unavoidably have consequences for the whole society . A major consequence of corruption is the reduction of economic growth , which also results from the lowering of private investment , lowering incentives to invest for both domestic and foreign entrepreneurs , political instability and weak legislative and judicial systems (Mauro , Paolo , 1998

The main focus of this is to explain the corruption in Sri Lanka and determine the roots of political corruption in that third world country . Corruption appears to be commonplace in Sri Lanka because of the ethnic conflict , the ineffective law enforcement , the overall poverty of this third world country

Ethnic conflict is a major factor that has caused and will cause corruption in Sri Lanka . The ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka is an ongoing conflict between the majority HYPERLINK "http /en .wikipedia .org /wiki /Sinhalese " \o "Sinhalese " Sinhalese and minority HYPERLINK "http /en .wikipedia .org /wiki /Sri_Lankan_Tamil " \o "Sri Lankan Tamil " Sri Lankan Tamils . The Sinhalese and Tamils , each has their own ethnicity , language , culture , customs and religion . The ethnic conflict between the two groups started after the year of 1920 During this time , the Sinhalese outnumber the Tamils six to one , which scared Tamil politicians in regards to universal-suffrage (DeVotta Neil , 2002 ) Since in the early days the Tamils were more in favour by the British , Sinhalese community fought for power since they are the majority of the country...