2011 Corruption Index

Meh, Scandinavia rules.

VivaStPauli wrote:

RedOranje wrote:

VivaStPauli wrote:The sad thing about the ranking: What do all the "clean countries" have in common?

Exactly, nobody lives there. iE tiny population.

No one lives in the US?

Place 24 just has to be a disappointment for the country that fancies it the home of the free.

My point is that alle the top 10 nations are either tiny, like Singapore, or have very little inhabitants, like Australia, meaning apparently as soon as the number of people to be managed gets high enough, tons of them start falling through the cracks.

And then, not being corrupt doesn't mean justice. Singapores laws are quite oppressive, and sometimes not very fair, but the officials sure as hell aren't bending them to dish out personal favors.

Yes, in that context place 24 is probably impressive with over 300 million inhabitants, just like place 14 should be impressive for Germany with over 80 million citizens. But the aim for the Western Democracies should clearly be to form the top 10 by themselves, considering their ambition.

But, well, I guess money talks.

Germany is a democracy, the united states is a republic. Please dont lump us together.

Germany not republic? .

Republic is a meaningless word. The word itself is derived from res publica, which literally means "the public thing". Hardly specific. In modern use, it basically means "not a monarchy". Case in point: The people's republic of China.

On topic:


Argentina has the HDI of the worst OECD country and the corruption of the best African country

Although I wonder if corruption is one of the determinants of HDI, which I suspect it is, then the relationship observed is not that surprising at all.

BarrileteCosmico wrote:Republic is a meaningless word. The word itself is derived from res publica, which literally means "the public thing". Hardly specific. In modern use, it basically means "not a monarchy". Case in point: The people's republic of China.

On topic:


Argentina has the HDI of the worst OECD country and the corruption of the best African country

Although I wonder if corruption is one of the determinants of HDI, which I suspect it is, then the relationship observed is not that surprising at all.

Alf, Germany is called BRD= Bundesrepublik Deutschland. The Bundes- part means federative state structure. Germany has 16 states ( Bundesländer) , each of them have differences in law just like in USA but not ridiculiously diverse
USA is structured federative as well but each state has more freedom in legislative than in Germany, for example

VivaStPauli wrote:Forget it, he's high or something.

Republics are democracies. And both the US as well as Germany are federal republics with a democratic constitution.

He is dead right

BarrileteCosmico wrote:Republic is a meaningless word. The word itself is derived from res publica, which literally means "the public thing". Hardly specific. In modern use, it basically means "not a monarchy". Case in point: The people's republic of China.

On topic:


Argentina has the HDI of the worst OECD country and the corruption of the best African country

Although I wonder if corruption is one of the determinants of HDI, which I suspect it is, then the relationship observed is not that surprising at all.

depends where you are from, in the states political terms have a different meaning than other places in the world as we have had a very different track since independence.

In the united states a republic means giving more rights to the individual such as the right to bear arms, to protect himself from the state itself. Also in the united states it is much much harder to change the constitution or amend it, if im right the german basic law has been amended on average every single year (not the rights part but the one about political checks and balances). Also in germany the state has much more power in granting someone citizenship, while in the united states if you are simply a naturally born person there then its a done deal and the state cant do anything about it (unless you want to amend the constitution which is near impossible). In europe the state and tradition is seen and the giver of rights, while in the united states we believe that the creator of this universe gave us these rights which the states only duty is to protect.

In the US sovereignty is in me, the self interested individual. In europe sovereignty is in the group.

For example just look at how differently our trials are done, in germany the judge has much more power while in the US the jury has almost all power. More over 11 people in the jury cannot override the minority position of 1 juror, it has to be unanimous.

Im sorry but we are not the same. The current US is based on libertarian ideals and god given rights, germany's basic law is about prohibiting the rise of something similar to the nazi party.

wth india should be top of thel ist

I dont care about the corruption, but how pathetic is our HDI...

We could learn a thing or two from Argentina.

kiranr wrote:
I dont care about the corruption, but how pathetic is our HDI...

We could learn a thing or two from Argentina.

i know, literacy is improving but it needs to get up there,plus boy girl ratio is shockin..

diptiman wrote:

kiranr wrote:
I dont care about the corruption, but how pathetic is our HDI...

We could learn a thing or two from Argentina.

i know, literacy is improving but it needs to get up there,plus boy girl ratio is shockin..

Boy girl ratio is so bad, that it has led to the some very unpleasant developments in UP. Check out marriage problems there.

Its all due to our caste system, the divisive power of which, the politicians employ with impunity. As long as everyone votes based on one's caste, there will never be a political agenda for improving our HDI.

Hoping it improves soon.

kiranr wrote:

diptiman wrote:

kiranr wrote:
I dont care about the corruption, but how pathetic is our HDI...

We could learn a thing or two from Argentina.

i know, literacy is improving but it needs to get up there,plus boy girl ratio is shockin..

Boy girl ratio is so bad, that it has led to the some very unpleasant developments in UP. Check out marriage problems there.

Its all due to our caste system, the divisive power of which, the politicians employ with impunity. As long as everyone votes based on one's caste, there will never be a political agenda for improving our HDI.

Hoping it improves soon.

plus the traditional dowry system because of which parents prefer to have boy children..

and not only caste,religion, gothras and what not.. there are divisions in everything and a representative for each division which divides the society into further sub parts..

people are hanged by their own parents for marrying into different gothras in areas like haryana and children sold for food in orissa.. its very well to look at backward islamic laws showing injustice to women but things like thes happening in a country which prides itself on secular existence for thousands of years is really shocking
i mean how do parties like the rss even exist when their sole purpose is to create a hindu state.. wtf

diptiman wrote:
plus the traditional dowry system because of which parents prefer to have boy children..

and not only caste,religion, gothras and what not.. there are divisions in everything and a representative for each division which divides the society into further sub parts..

people are hanged by their own parents for marrying into different gothras in areas like haryana and children sold for food in orissa.. its very well to look at backward islamic laws showing injustice to women but things like thes happening in a country which prides itself on secular existence for thousands of years is really shocking
i mean how do parties like the rss even exist when their sole purpose is to create a hindu state.. wtf

More than the religious issues, the caste issues are the biggest obstacle to progress here.

I, personally, know people whose parents have threatened suicide if they marry someone from a lower caste. As long as people keep thinking like this, we are going to remain in the left-bottom corner of that chart. No doubt about it.

China should be ranked in the bottom ten. The Western World has no idea how bad corruption in China is.

You wanna start a business? Gotta bribe your local official in order for that to occur.

Wanna get into the party? You gotta outbribe all competing hopefuls.

Wanna get a promotion? Bribe your superior.

Don't wanna go to jail? Bribe the cops.

Right now, all the officials that are getting thrown into jail for corruption are born from plebeian families. The only people getting away with it are those whose families were heavily involved with the Communist Party during the Revolution of 1949. In essence, the elite few don't want the rest to have their privilege to corrupt.

The saddest thing about corruption in China is that it's a double whammy. Not only does the population lose their tax money, but, the quality of EVERYTHING decreases because of it.

The age of technocratic leaders in China is over (not that the figurehead leaders mattered anyway). The next president, Xi Jiping, comes from a family that was extremely important for the Communists during the revolution.

China has well and truly become a militaristic aristocratic totalitarian oligarchy.

most scandinavian countries are clean.... bow

kiranr wrote:
More than the religious issues, the caste issues are the biggest obstacle to progress here.

I, personally, know people whose parents have threatened suicide if they marry someone from a lower caste. As long as people keep thinking like this, we are going to remain in the left-bottom corner of that chart. No doubt about it.

Yep.More than anything else Caste system is our biggest challenge.Regardless of whatever measures taken its still blatantly prevalent in most of rural areas.

The good thing education opportunities bought by recent economic growth has uplifted huge no. people from these villages.