Reflection Paper - Assignment Example

Effects of corruption Introduction It is the desire of every citizen of the world to have the state of economy improve, which will impact positively to their living standard. However their desire has been faced with enormous challenges that impede an economy from growing. Corruption has turned the world to be a “man-eat-man” society. Corruption can be in form bribe, kickbacks, extortion, nepotism and embezzlement. Mahatma Gandhi once said that “the world has enough for us but because of greed it has never been enough”.

According to (Fraser, 2007) the origin of corruption in our society is based covetousness among the citizens.Effects of corruptionCorruption has lead to the failure of democracy and good governance in the states that have been hit by this catastrophic. For example in Zimbabwe citizens just hear the word democracy but they haven’t yet experienced it. President Mugabe has used his political power to influence the election so as to favor him to continue be the president. This is an infringement to the rights of the voting citizens who are forced now to be led by a person they haven’t chosen.

Since corruption influenced the electioneering process, definitely the governance will not be to the standard. This is because the president has to do a favor to those who supported his candidature and helped in rigging. According to (Fraser, 2007) this favors comes in form of appointment of public offices. The efficiency in the government to dispense service now become a tall order, since the one appointed is chasing his objective of gathering more wealth from the public.It has been noted that most cash got from illegal activities are not banked in the local banks but rather they are moved to other foreign banks.

For instance in Nigeria between 1960 to 1999 their leaders had swiss bank accounts and within that period more than $400 had been moved from national treasury without being accounted for (Fraser, 2007). This clearly shows that the leaders have no interest of the people whom they serve. That large amount of fund being moved in an economy creates a financial deficit leads to inflation.Industrialization has brought with it benefits and tragedy too. The problem comes in with management of the waste products.

Most companies in Africa receive political backing maybe because they financed the election campaign of the leader who is current in office. The company will use that on their advantage to fail to manage its waste products at the expense of citizens simply because a certain leader will protect them through thick and thin politically. This has caused the state of environment in Africa to degrade even turning back investors.Corruption widens the gap between the rich and the poor in our society.

The rich are most likely to benefit from corruption if they seek a service from either government or any party whereas the poor who is struggling with the escalating cost of living cannot afford to bribe for the service. Therefore the rich will use it on his advantage and continue being rich and the poor moving to the opposite direction. The society becomes imbalance disadvantaging the poor, who tries now to fit into the society by committing crimes such as trafficking of drug and human and robbery.

Conclusion For countries to develop especially in Africa then corruption ought to be fought with all possible weapons starting with formulation of policies by the government. Also it is upon citizens to initiate change by first denouncing greediness.Fraser, G. (2007). Towards a common understanding of corruption in Africa. International Journal of African Renaissance Studies - Multi-, Inter- and Transdisciplinarity, 239-249