bribery

bribery, the act of promising, giving, receiving, or agreeing to receive money or some other item of value with the corrupt aim of influencing a public official in the discharge of his official duties. When money has been offered or promised in exchange for a corrupt act, the official involved need not actually accomplish that act for the offense of bribery to be complete. The crime is typically punishable as a felony.

Although bribery originally involved interference with judges, its definition has since been expanded to include actions by all sorts of government officials, from the local to the national level, and to cover all public employees. Special provisions also have been enacted in various jurisdictions to punish the bribing of voters, jurors, witnesses, and other lay participants in official proceedings. Some codes also penalize bribery in designated classes of private or commercial transactions (e.g., bribery of labour-union officials by employers).

As to the nature of the money or favour given or received, the main issue in drafting laws against bribery has been whether to limit the crime to cases in which money or property is the inducement or to extend it to cases in which any benefit or advantage is conferred or promised, as most statutes now do. Practical limitations on the interpretation of such broad language are inevitable, however, because the principle, if applied fully, would criminalize most legislative and executive compromises. One limitation on any charge of bribery is that some element of “corrupt purpose” must be implied or proved, which means that in the absence of a complete statutory prohibition on the granting of favours to a public official, a gift is not a bribe unless there has been some intent to influence the official behaviour of the recipient. Thus, giving a gift or tip to a civil servant out of general friendship or gratitude and without an intent to influence his official behaviour is not punishable as bribery, though it may be prohibited under other legislation limiting corrupt practices. One recurring difficulty in examining cases of public corruption is discovering which of the parties involved took the initiative in the transaction—i.e., whether the payment was offered to a public official in order to influence his official behaviour (bribery) or demanded by him in exchange for special consideration or services (extortion).

In addition to violating legal and moral codes, bribery poses serious problems for economic development and international trade. The price of bribes must be factored into some international transactions, and corporations often find themselves in the difficult position of having to violate anticorruption laws in their own countries as the price of doing business in other parts of the world.