Are Poor Countries Really Corrupt?

February 3, 2014 in Daily Bulletin

Jason Hickel argued that it’s not poor countries that are corrupt; it is the rich:

  • The United Kingdom’s upper house of parliament is filled not by elected politicians but by appointment and tradition.
  • The LIBOR scandal showed that London’s banks were rigging the global financial system to make $100 billion in profits.
  • Institutions such as the IMF and The World Bank give effective veto power to rich countries – even though they represent a minority of the world’s population.
  • If any of this had been true of developing countries they would be decried as corrupt. Yet rich countries aren’t.
  • In fact corruption is responsible for only about 3% of the amount of public money that is lost in developing countries.

Read more of the argument here.

Source: Al Jazeera