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by ManFromUranus 4025 days ago
What if that system also fosters corruption and nepotism? Need to hire somebody for a job? family first (you owe them remember?), tender a contract (family first) the list goes on. You are a public servant, someone comes to your office to get you to do the job that you were hired to do, but they're not your family, you don't owe them anything... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_India

Yeah that system is better because it fosters closer family ties.
3 comments
Lawtonfogle 4025 days ago
And the opposite does not? It makes calling in the debt owed much more discrete, which means the corruption is more conscious, but the transactional nature would foster corruption among those who are of higher power instead of those who are family.

In the culture grandparent comment describe, if someone comes into my office, any favoritism will be based on their being close to my family.

In a culture without that, if someone comes into my office, any favoritism will be based on their ability to offer me favoritism.

If anything, our system is worse because favoritism among the powerful is a worse problem that favoritism among families and friends.

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ManFromUranus 4025 days ago
>In a culture without that, if someone comes into my office, any favoritism will be based on their ability to offer me favoritism

So your first point is: one hand washes the other. I will show favoritism to people who can be of some benefit to me. Sounds like merit based favoritism. So for example could I show favoritism to a guy that works really hard? Is that corruption? Or I show favoritism to a guy who can invest in my company because his family has money? Is that corruption? (probably more so than the first example but I'm not sure).

The second point favoritism among the powerful is worse than the familial sort, because of your first point.

If anything it seems that the opposite is true because according to your logic the favoritism here is more merit based.

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Lawtonfogle 4024 days ago
Power isn't based on merit and even if it were, the damage from corruption is not dependant upon how deserved/merit based the corruption is.
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sumedh 4025 days ago
What if that system also fosters corruption and nepotism?

It actually does. Just look at the well known public companies in India (Reliance, Infosys, Wipro and many others). You will always see the son or some other relative of the chairman/CEO directly gets hired as a VP or a director.

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novaleaf 4025 days ago
a bit too snarky of a comment, but interesting tie in to corruption! I didn't think about that, but it does seem plausible.
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