Ultimately, corruption is wrong. It is that simple. But if we are discussing the minefield of ethics and morality in the modern world, we must describe why it is wrong. Here we get into a field that goes back to Socrates, flows through the rise of the world’s religions and cultures and is currently in the area of human rights. The Ancient Greek word was phthora meaning the gradual decay of something that was once good. We retain this meaning when it is used to describe food.
Old Testament (Micah 7:3): “Both their hands are skilled in doing evil; the official and the judge ask for bribes, the powerful dictate what they desire— they all conspire together.”
“ושוחד לא תקח כי השוחד יעור פקחים ויסלף דברי צדיקם”
Torah Exodus 23:8: “And you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the clear-sighted and subverts the cause of those who are in the right.”
குறள் 284: களவின்கண் கன்றிய காதல் விளைவின்கண் வீயா விழுமம் தரும். The Tirukkuṟaḷ, Kura 204: The lust inveterate of fraudful gain, Yields as its fruit undying pain.
وَإِذَا تَوَلَّىٰ سَعَىٰ فِي الْأَرْضِ لِيُفْسِدَ فِيهَا وَيُهْلِكَ الْحَرْثَ وَالنَّسْلَ وَاللَّهُ لَا يُحِبُّ الْفَسَادَ
Koran Surah Al-Baqarah (2:205): “And when he goes away, he strives throughout the land to cause corruption therein and destroy crops and animals. And Allah does not like corruption.”
Bible 1 Corinthians 15:33: “Do not be deceived: ‘Bad company corrupts good character.'”
“Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” Hanlon’s razor
“As a fundamental threat to the rule of law, corruption hollows out institutions, corrodes public trust, and fuels popular cynicism toward effective, accountable governance.” P4 United States Strategy on Countering Corruption (2021) The Whitehouse, Washington, United-States-Strategy-on-Countering-Corruption 2021.pdf
Cui Bono? Who benefits? Lucius Cassius
QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES? is who will guard the guards themselves? Who will watch the watchmen? Decimus Junius Juvenalis
“let us turn on the lights as, in the dark, the cockroaches scurry around” Zulu saying
“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.” attributed to Groucho Marx
265. If a herdsman, to whose care cattle or sheep have been entrusted, be guilty of fraud and make false returns of the natural increase, or sell them for money, then shall he be convicted and pay the owner ten times the loss The Code of Hammurabi https://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/hamframe.asp,
“He’s the beast whose poison none escapes. He breathes and soon the whole world falls into fever” Dante describes the Geryon or fraud. With the face of a honest man and the tail of a scorpion. Geryon is their guide to the last circle of Hell, Malebolge, the ditch of fraud, before they reach Inferno.
Arthashastra by Kautilya: “Just as it is impossible not to taste the honey or the poison that finds itself at the tip of the tongue, so it is impossible for a government servant not to eat up, at least, a bit of the king’s revenue.”