Daily Times

It is common knowledge that corruption exists and, in some countries, is flourishing with the support of the politicians, bureaucrats, and judiciary. Many articles are being and have been published in well-known journals and newspapers’ op-eds about corruption. Most publications suggest ways to overcome corruption, and the World Bank, United Nations, and other organizations have conducted many fora to find and suggest solutions on how to overcome it. Ayoola (2009) stated,” Our lack of social and economic development, as well as political instability, is attributed to corruption. Corruption is a scourge worse than any disease one can imagine. It is an agent of mass destruction, destroying the lives of people, the future of our youths, and the values of our society.” Despite its destruction, corruption exists and will continue. One wonders whether there is a solution to this social disease, which is destroying societies and creating misery for many citizens.

Despite the many suggested solutions (which are always ignored), one wonders whether religion provides some help in either reducing or eliminating corruption. Religion may play a helpful role in controlling corruption, as it can affect social attitude. Armstrong (2007) has stated, “All the major world religions attempt to define humans’ relationship with a sole or dominant deity, but also served as sources of institutions used in managing early societies. Thus, they all address the issue of honesty.”

According to Beets (2007), “two apparent assumptions underlie attempts to enlist the support of religious leaders and groups in the fight against corruption. The first is that ‘faithful adherents to religion will refrain from corruption because of the inherent theft, dishonesty, illegality, and mistreatment of others [it implies]. The second related assumption is that those who are not faithful adherents of religions are more likely to engage in corruption because of an absence of religious guidance.'”

Logically, people are supposed to learn their moral and ethical bounds from their religion. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that there are links between religion and corruption. That is, religious people will be more moral and ethical, and, hopefully, even those who are guided by their culture may still be influenced by religion.

Some studies show a positive, definable relationship between morality and religion. A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis concluded that “A belief in hell tends to mean less corruption and less corruption tends to mean a higher per capita income…Combining these two stories…suggests that, all else being equal, the more religious a country, the less corruption it will have, and the higher its per capita income will be” (Nussbaum, 2006).

Belief in religion is not always based on what a sacred book teaches, but what society believes religion is. That is, morality, ethics, and behavior are learned by observing what is practiced and followed in social structures rather than knowing what is in the sacred books of various religions

Sommer, Bloomb, and Arikanc (2013) found a positive effect of religious freedom on reducing corruption depending upon the strength of the level of democracy in a country. That is, how much the individual internalizes democratic values and how much the public supports the democratic norms promoting good governance. In a democracy, being morally virtuous would mean avoiding corruption. At least as far as corruption is concerned, the effects of religion on politics are conditional on the institutional framework in place. Religion, as such, does not have the power to purge the political system of corruption. Yet, with the appropriate institutional platform, religion may be instrumental in the eradication of corruption.

We might assume that religious societies will prevent people from corruption as all religions teach that theft, dishonesty, illegality, and mistreatment of others are sins. On the other hand, we also might assume that those who are not faithfully religious will likely engage in corruption. Thus, one should expect that religions should play a positive role in the behavior of society. Unfortunately, a religion that requires fairness and honesty of its entire followers does not mean that it may reduce corruption due to the bigger influence of social structures existing in a society, i.e., secularization.

Some blame secularization for decay in moral values. Ter Voert et al. (1994) concluded, “The decline of religion and the decline of an ‘absolutist’ perspective on moral values go hand in hand. Secularization has led to a moral breakdown, and interaction is based on self-interest rather than on any more charitable notions.” Mark Twain (cited in Hauk and Saez-Martin, 2002) is claimed to have stated, “…; Why Catholics are Catholics; why Presbyterians are Presbyterians; why Baptists are Baptists; why Mormons are Mormons; why thieves are thieves; why monarchists are monarchists; why Republicans are Republicans and Democrats, Democrats. We know that it is a matter of birth, association, and sympathy, not reasoning and examination; that hardly a man in the world has an opinion on morals, politics, or religion that he has got otherwise than through his association and sympathies.” Thus, people’s moral, politics, or religion is based on what they get by association, sympathies, or birth and has nothing to do with religion.

Belief in religion is not always based on what a sacred book teaches, but what society believes religion is. That is, morality, ethics, and behavior are learned by observing what is practiced and followed in social structures rather than knowing what is in the sacred books of various religions. As a result, if corruption is socially acceptable and condoned, everyone will accept and follow the practice regardless of sacred books teaching against immorality. Therefore, society’s ethical and moral standpoints determine individuals’ moral and ethical standards. As such, an activity someone may consider corrupt could be perfectly acceptable in another person’s mind. Migdal (2001) points out, “What may be easily labeled as corruption or criminality, such as nepotism or smuggling, can also be looked at, for instance, as a morality favoring kinship ties over meritocracy or one expressing the right of movement of people and goods across the boundaries arbitrarily imposed by state law.” That is, people in a social structure, not a real religion, determine what is moral or immoral. For anyone to pin their hope that practicing real religion would stop corruption is failing to understand that no society is guided by religion. That is, the majority of people do not know their religion. If they do, then all the religious standards are modified to fit the social standard of the society and not the other way around.

Subhi-Ibrahim and Rukmana’s suggest that religions emphasize not only rituals but also doctrines. Worshipers try to attempt the ritual dimension and the doctrinal one. They suggest that religious doctrines are to serve ‘the essence of religion’ with its social-ethical dimension. That is, the structure of religious doctrines is God-centered, while the social-ethical messages tend to be less explicit. Religion emphasizes moral standards that should condemn corruption, but in actuality, it does not always work. That is, corrupt religious people often do not see they are violating the teachings of their religion.

Some believe that corruption is rooted in human nature. It is believed that seeing pervasive political, moral, and economic corruption in the ancient Hebrew world was what the Prophet Isaiah lamented (Agada, 2015):

[W]e have turned away from God. We have made it hard for others. We have thought and spoken lying words from the heart. What is right and fair is turned back. What is right and good stands far away. Truth has fallen in the street, and what is right cannot come in (Isaiah 59: 13-14 Holy Bible).

Confucius was said to have been so frustrated with the rampant political corruption that he withdrew into a private life of studies and ethical meditation to find a solution (Roth, 2005). According to Agada (2015), “He (Confucius) was convinced that corruption is born of moral anomie, the absence of clearly defined corruption was manifested in man at creation to the point that God the Creator regretted ever creating man. Thus, he developed his concept of the junzi, the superior or cultivated man. The nobility of the latter is validated not by his claims to royalty, by the capacity to tailor conduct to the higher dictates of ethics.”

The writer is Ph.D. (USA), Professor Emeritus (USA)