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Bernard Bwoni
THE extent of the corruption plague in Zimbabwe is not only breathtaking, but depressing, disheartening and disappointing even to the most patriotic. It would be interesting to find out the amount, in billions, this self-serving scourge has cost the country so far. The problem with corruption and letting corrupt practices go unpunished and without reproach is that it erodes the trust people have in those in power and drains the much-needed resources to revive the ailing Zimbabwean economy. The problem is that we are targeting only the physical symptoms of corruption and leaving out the real root of the evil which is immorality.
It is the simple things that matter to people and so it is the simplest of gestures that endears leaderships to the electorate. The electorate is an unforgiving bunch and their frustrated outcries must never be ignored. All elected officials must give precedence to an unswerving commitment to corrupt-free practices and making things simple for those who voted them into power. There must be a political commitment and a bona fide will to rooting out corruption and that is the only starting point. The sluggish response to the recent sleaze and salary scandals was not at all reassuring and reflective of that will and commitment to eradicating corruption but the fact that it is being exposed is a positive starting point which must be genuine and gimmick-free.
Corruption is individually rational but socially inefficient and untenable. In Zimbabwe things are not going to change overnight because too many people have benefitted from corruption and its intended or unintended outcomes and fight they will to preserve the gains. A $37,000 per month salary is worth preserving and so are millions of dollars obtained from corrupt practices. It is not only those in positions of authority who have benefited but a great many ordinary citizens of this great country have fallen prey to the corruption snare.
Self-control is critical in every facet of our lives as it regulates our behaviours to lower negative outcomes. Self-control predicts positive outcomes and a lack of self-control predicts negative outcomes. Some researchers have argued that high IQ populations have less corruption than those with low IQ and I think that is just trying to excuse an immorality. It is more about morals, that inner deep-rooted willingness to do the morally acceptable and what is right and that has nothing to do with intelligence. Poverty combined with a lack of morals and self-control is a corruption-thick brew with both individual and nation-destroying consequences. In Zimbabwe it seems the corrupt ones are in fact the “intelligent ones”, the CEOs and the executives while the poverty-stricken “unintelligent” ordinary citizens eke out a destitute but honest and corrupt-free living as evidenced by the recent salary scandals.
Corruption is inexcusable whichever way you look at it or whichever form it manifests itself. However all efforts to root out corruption have been proving futile. Psychologists have pointed to delay discounting as an important indicator of self-control. There is an interesting research paper by Shamosh and Gray entitled Delay discounting and intelligence: A meta-analysis which defines delay discounting as a tendency to prefer smaller, sooner rewards to larger, later rewards. Delay discounting requires an individual to make choices between two rewards that vary in both amount and delay with receipt. An example would be “Would you prefer to receive $500 now or $1,500 in the next 28 days?” Individuals who tend to prefer the smaller of the two rewards are considered to demonstrate greater delay discounting.
Thus the greater delay discounting reflects lower levels of self-control or a preference for the immediate rewards.
Corruption is indicative of a lack of self-control, an uncontrollable desire for immediacy in terms of rewards. How can one justify a salary of $230,000 per month in a country like Zimbabwe, surely? I am not for one second suggesting the CEO is corrupt in this instance as this salary might have been agreed by a board but any individual with a moral compass or a degree of self-control would stop and reflect on the obscenity of what he or she was earning while others were going months on end unpaid. Any individual with a level of self-control would want national growth as opposed individual gratification, surely?
There is a recent EU report which indicated that corruption has cost the European Union economy 120 billion euros annually and efforts to tackle the practices have proved just as difficult as elsewhere in the world. What is interesting to note from the EU corruption is the divide of the problem, with the well-off countries such as the UK, the Scandinavian countries, German and other affluent west European nations having less of the problem whereas the PIGS of the EU have seen a surge in corrupt practices as their economies continue to struggle.
PIGS refers to the struggling countries in the EU and stands for Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain. Thus poverty can arguably be seen as an integral indicator of corruption. There is a negative and immediate relationship between corruption and lack of control and this seems directly linked to poverty in the EU instance. As these nations’ economies continue to decline corruption has also increased. Individual tendencies to prefer smaller, sooner rewards to larger, later rewards are associated with lack of self-control which regulates our behaviours.
People are rational but then rationality is a matter of choice and the alternatives which society and nature offers individuals. Society is governed by a code of ethics and morals and every man and woman lives by these standards. An intelligent man and a poor man are equally governed by the same code of ethics that define each and every society. Each and every individual is responsible for his or her actions and answerable to their respective societies. Trying to justify corruption and corrupt practices is not only offensive but unethical.
Corruption has nothing to do with poverty or intelligence or lack of it, but just a lack of morals and self-control. It is pointless to target the physical symptoms of corruption alone without addressing the morality and the psychological issues of self-control because corruption will just manifest itself in even more clever and enhanced forms. All corruption fighting bodies are already compromised by virtue of being manned by man. Every man is corruptible. The only way to tackle corruption is to address morality first!
Bernard Bwoni can be contacted on [email protected]/ <mailto:[email protected]/> http://www.bernardbwoni.blogspot.co.uk
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