The
favoured form of saying 'Farewell' or 'Goodbye' here in Hamburg is
'Choos'. Or Tschüß, as they write it locally.
This seems to be northern German in both origin and usage. My
favourite theory (of several) is that it's a corruption of the
Spanish 'Adiós' and arrived from the Netherlands – as 'Atjũs' -
when these were under Spanish control.
No
new corruption scandals in Spain today, which is a welcome break. The
on-line petition encouraging Sr Rajoy to stand down – endorsed,
needless to say, by the leader of the Opposition – has now got
almost 800,000 signatures. And surveys suggest 60% of Rajoy's own voters
don't believe his protestations of complete innocence.
Before
the latest scandal of company-funded slush funds broke, I'd been
drafting a post on the subject of corruption, to which this was the
opening paragraph:- So,
is Spain a corrupt country? Well, to the extent that there's a degree
of corruption in every country – even Norway and New Zealand –
the answer to this has to be a (pretty useless) Yes. More relevantly,
how much corruption is there and what part does it play in everyday
life? Do palms have to be routinely greased and, if you're in
business, do you have to pay 'commissions' to government ministers to
get your tender accepted or your product licensed? Can you bribe
policemen or court officials? Judges even?
I mention this now because El
Mundo
today carried an article asking – and answering - the same
question. And here's a translation of it:-
Are
We a Corrupt Country?
Pablo
Pardo
The
question is why this corruption occurs in Spain. IMHO: it's because
we are a corrupt country. Americans like guns. And use them.
Asians are extremely hierarchical. The Spanish tend to interpret
rules 'flexibly'. Each country has its own thing.
Let's
face it. Spain is a country where people don't want to be on a fixed
contract because they are collecting unemployment benefit. It is a
country where no one took to the streets in the face of the
tremendous injustice of two labour markets, one protected (so far)
and one fully liberalised. It is a country where companies have
temporary workers doing the jobs of bosses.
It
is the country of sinecures, of cushy jobs (among whose beneficiaries
prominently figures Esperanza Aguirre, an official on leave for more
than two decades). It is a country where we all know there isn't
really 26% unemployment, because many people work in the informal
economy. And in turn many people work in the informal economy
because there are so many obstacles to participating in the legal
economy that the latter is more profitable.
In
Spain many people have said that the right wing don't not steal when
they are in power because they were rich before, implying that we
only conceive enrichment as theft either in the government or in the
private sector.
Rajoy
was appointed by his predecessor. Rubalcaba was appointed by his
predecessor, who gained power in a surprise attack on a political
conclave (also called 'Congress'). If a Spanish president had to go
through the uncertainties, the savage struggle and effort of a
primary U.S. Policy, no one would enter politics here.
Spain
is a country of collective responsibility, which, at the end of the
day, is a perfect system for ensuring no one takes responsibility. It
is a country that distrusts effort. A pretty cacique-minded country
in which "He who snuggles up to a good tree, has good shade
to shelter in", in which "It's more valuable to fall into
grace than to be gracious yourself", where "He who needs to
work has little and earns little and “He who works honourably
becomes a hunchback","He who who got rich by working, lived
poor and died rich", and finally “Work kills the donkey but
not the master."
Every
law has a loophole
According
to the classification of the Dutch sociologist Geert Hofstede, Spain
is a country hostile to capitalism. We are hierarchical, which means
that ideas don't flow and that the bosses don't know what their
subordinates are doing, and vice versa (in Spain many still think
that to explain or accept questions is a humiliation). We don't
value individual success. We don't tolerate uncertainty (hence we
want to be civil servants). And we try to avoid individual
responsibility. "Hey, you don't know who you're talking to"
is the favourite phrase of the late-payers in communities of
neighbours.
This
attitude, in my opinion, holds the explanation. Spain has been until
recently a rural country, ruled by caciques and very poor. Not
getting along with the Señor was dangerous. And for getting along
with the Señor the important thing was not to be effective.
Moreover, being outside the scope of the Señor's patronage, was to
guarantee ruin.
Max
Weber identified three forms of legitimacy: traditional, charismatic
and bureaucratic. The traditional tends to be heredity and revolves
more around the person than the office held. The charismatic is not
hereditary, but here personality was the key. The bureaucratic,
finally, centres on the position and the rules governing it. In
Spain, although we are evolving, I think we still have a system
largely based on the legitimacy of traditional authority.
When traditional authority systems experience sudden economic
growth and democratisation, they can become more corrupt. Last year,
James C. Schopf published an article in the 'Asian Journal of Social
Science' entitled 'From One Graft To Costly Corruption Webs: Shifting
Corruption and Democratisation Webs in Korea'. His idea is simple: in
a corrupt society, democracy increases corruption, because it
multiplies the power centres involved in the sale of
favours. In this sense, Spain has experienced an explosion of centres
of political and business power, and most of our major companies have
been raised on the teats of the state.
The
result, simply, is corruption. After all, "I'm not going to be
the only fool who doesn't steal."
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