Corruption is defined as the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. It is one of the biggest global issues, ahead of poverty, unemployment, increasing cost of food and energy, climate change, and terrorism. Corruption is the big enemy of the economy, hampers economic development, weakens democracy, and exacerbates inequality, poverty, social divisions, and the environmental crisis.
Analyzing the effects of corruption, first of all, attention should be paid to the fact that it violates human rights and freedoms. It violates the rights of the public such as getting basic services from public and private offices. This practice compromises equality in society. People working in the public and private sectors are putting their rights and lives in risky situations. Corrupt officials do not offer equal services to the public, which creates a sense of inequality in the public. They offer more interest to their close ones. This behavior leads them to violate the rule of law. This violates the provisions of equality and justice.
Secondly, due to the corrupt system civil disobedience increases. People do not respect the rule of law. They violate the rules and regulations of the public and private sectors, which ultimately leads the social system to a wild where no one respects the law. Due to corruption, not only rule of law is compromised but it also hits the performance of the public and private sectors. They do not perform their functions rightly, which decreases the overall development of society.
Thirdly, corruption impacts mainly poverty and unemployment. The more unskilled people are hired in the sectors, the more corruption increases, which leads to poor performance and the overall capacity of hiring personnel of any sector decreases. As there is less capacity for hiring people, people get unemployed, and due to this more people go below the poverty line. Poverty leads people to do anything to fulfill their needs, which ultimately violates discipline in society. Moreover, it increases illiteracy, which reduces awareness in the public. Due to this, the rich grow richer day by day and the poor grow poorer.
The worst of all effects is moral instability. Due to corrupt behavior, the overall societal moral instability increases. People lose their ethical stability, which leads them to do unethical behaviors. They do not consider unethical happenings as bad activities. This results in low respect for ethical values, and due to this, violation of any law is considered to be normal in such societies. Even people feel proud to break the law and disturb the discipline. This disobedience is considered to be bravery in such a society. This behavior worsens societal values day by day. Lastly, people get lose their characters, and a gap is created in society, which we call now the class system.
Corruption is a serious problem in modern society, given all its negative effects, which must be eliminated.