There are, it seems to me, many situations in which an explicit exchange of A for B is punished by the law or by societal disapproval or both, but an implicit exchange is tolerated. I'll just mention two. My real point here is the second of them, which is a simplified version of something that has been in the news recently.
1: Prostitution. A john pays a hooker, the hooker provides sex. It is all very transactional. I understand that undercover cops posing as prostitutes are told to wait for an 'explicit offer of cash' before they can make the bust. [News you can use!]
On the other hand, if we see an elderly and wealthy man in the company of his stripper girlfriend 50 years or more younger, we generally figure that the A-for-B exchange is implicit, and not so immediately transactional. Like Anna Nicole Smith and J. Howard Marshall. We may shrug at the gold-digger/sugar-daddy connection, we may give it an indulgent chuckle. We don't call the police, nor do we generally shun them as bad people.
2. Bribery. The US prohibits US based companies from bribing foreign officials for contracts. I cannot, as a representative of XYZ Telecommunications Inc., lawfully give a truckload of cash to an official of the People's Republic of China in return for a concession that will make XYZ many many more truckloads of cash. Even if the law of the PRC allows that, the law of the US forbids it of companies that also do business here.
On the other hand, is it the same thing if, say, I offer the son or daughter of the same official, with the same concession-granting authority, a much prized internship with XYZ? And some time shortly thereafter, without any explicit quid pro quo, the proud father of one of our interns grants us the telecomm concession? Is that more like J. Howard Marshall than like the criminal john?
I view both the prostitution and bribery points differently from Christopher. As for prostitution, the hooker-john situation is different from the gold digger-sugar daddy connection.The h-j connection is a single private transaction, although it may be repeated, whereas the gd-sd connection constitutes a long-term if not lifetime (however short that may be) public relationship. The h-j connection is analogous to a one-night stand after a bar pickup, whereas the gd-sd connection is analogous to or may be a marriage. I believe that the government has no business sticking its laws into either, but I can understand why society might disapprove of the h-j connection but not the gd-sd connection. Of course, the h-j connection and the gd-sd connection are on a continuum. A john may become such a regular customer of a particular hooker that he invites her to move into his house, from which she might or might not continue to ply her trade. At what point does it become a gd-sh connection? Nevertheless, the two types of connections, in their traditional practice, are different.
ReplyDeleteThe bribery-internship connection is more a matter of proof. The internship may have been granted without even an implicit quid pro quo, although perhaps XYZ hoped that it would cause PRC to look upon it favorably. If there was an implicit quid pro quo, then it is a bribe, just as if there had been an explicit quid pro quo. The problem for the government is in proving an implicit quid pro quo. Perhaps a pattern of contracts going to companies who shortly before gave internships to children of Chinese officials would help prove the quid pro quo.
I add that h-j connections, at least after the initial one, may be motivated in part by fondness or even love. And ordinary marriages (not gd-sd ones) may be motivated in part by one party's need for the financial security of the other. Of course, prior to the 20th century, that was often a major motivation. The conflict in many of Anthony Trollope's novels revolves around parents attempting to force their daughter to marry a rich man she doesn't love and her wishing to marry a poor man she does love.
ReplyDeleteThe parenthetical in my second comment should read "not just gd-sd ones)."
ReplyDeleteAnd just about every Bollywood movie I've seen involves much the same conflict.
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