By ANDRE FRANCISCO
The U.S. Department of Commerce announced a new training opportunity for young U.S business men and women to learn valuable management skills. The training program is a two-week, all-expense paid trip to Russia.
The International Trade Administration (ITA) is running the program. In 1998 the ITA created the Good Governance Program to promote a “level playing field for U.S. companies in emerging markets” by "promoting transparency through business ethics and anti-corruption."
With a program that promotes anti-corruption, it seems strange that the ITA is sending U.S. business men and women for a “management training exchange program” to “gain practical experience” by working in a country that is consistently listed as one of the most corrupt.
Russia received a score of 2.1 on the 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index from Transparency International, giving them a rank of 154 out of 178 countries. Russia received the same score as Tajikistan and Cambodia and a lower score than Yemen, Iran, and Haiti. The United States received a score of 7.1 and a rank of 22.
In addition, the 2008 Bribe Payers Index from Transparency International listed Russia dead last of the 22 countries in the index. The report went on to say:
About half of the respondents reported that companies from Russia often bribe high-level politicians and political parties and engage in bribery of low-level public officials, while somewhat fewer considered it common practice for Russian companies to use personal and familiar relationships to win public contracts.
Twice as many survey respondents reported the prevalence of high-level bribes in Russia than in any other country in the index. Just what kind of bribes are we talking about?
“The average bribe paid in Russia to a government or corporate official rose to 293,000 rubles ($10,573),” according to a 2011 Bloomberg article. That article also noted that Russians paid 164 billion rubles ($5.7 billion) in 2010 for small, every-day bribes.
Additionally, “In PricewaterhouseCoopers’ 2009 Global Economic Crime Survey, Russia was in last place with 71 percent of respondents having reported experiencing economic crime, of which bribery and corruption were a major component,” according to the Heritage Foundation.
President Dmitry Medvedev has been making an effort to curb corruption, but even he has characterized the progress as “extremely modest.”
Andre Francisco is a POGO communications associate.
Image via Flickr user adam79.
I am totally taken aback by this Department of Commerce ITA’s Special American Business Internship Training Program (SABIT) which has been assisting U.S. companies active in or entering emerging markets training "opportunity". I read the announcement in the 4 August 2011 Federal Register. Unbelievable! So we are training our young business types who are selected "based on their fit with Russian host organizations, ability to utilize the knowledge gained during the program to further U.S.-Russian business development, and overall quality of the application submitted" for a 2 week, all expenses paid (except for Russian visa costs) session so we can buy more Russian goods and services. We already have to hitch a ride with the Russians if we want manned satalite services and who knows how much more. But what do we make in this counry? Basically nothing since jobs are exported to foreign countries. If this is an example of government spending and creating jobs to get our economy back on track, no wonder the US is in trouble. But we could take advantage of our cracker-jack business executives (not politicians or liberal educators in our colleges and universities) in this country that could be mentors to our young busiess people? Or am I wrong?
Posted by: Suz | Aug 22, 2011 at 10:45 AM
HOLY SMOKESCREEN!
The interactions with Russian political intrigue and corruption has been on an "exchange" basis since the 1940s (at least). We owe our "occult" operations and secret internal government format to collaborations and "mutual respect" and our deeply flawed National Security system owes a great deal to the formations of KGB secret strategic operations and apparatus that followed (The "Double Dulles" history of OUR State Department and the CIA one my say, mixing double dealing, double crossing and political double indemnity into one pseudo-military cold war adventure exploit. Of course no one really can follow any of its "intelligence" or developments as a "secrets community" with highly questionably "financed" opportunities after the match making "cold war" and Red scare days were over... but what the hay...: it all becomes American Interests at the end of the day.
Of course when Russia "capitulated" to the realities of realism in a capitalized globe, we sent "experts" to make sure they did it right. That scenario shows more about our system than anything we claim to reveal in academic pandering, but that's how we end up reinventing the wheel of fortune ! The Russians failed so well at creating a democratic market political economy, that it seems that we have been copying their stylistic black ops politics ever since.
So now we are officially sending our "Commerce" leadership over to find out how to suppress the masses Russian style AY? Well God Bless America, they sure know how to capture operational know how; and when they don't...well they go to the Russians for the short cut and the stealthy way to wealth producing corruption.
But please: ...None Dare call it "REASON"
Posted by: Bruce E. Woych | Aug 20, 2011 at 11:12 AM