Bribery and Extortion: Undermining Business, Governments, and Security (Praeger Security International) [Hardcover]

Alexandra Addison Wrage (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 30, 2007 | ISBN-10: 0275996492 | ISBN-13: 978-0275996499

Bribery plays a significant role in international criminal activity. Terrorists pay bribes. Money-launderers pay bribes. Those who traffic in people, narcotics, and illegal arms pay bribes. People pay immigration officers not to ask, customs officials not to inspect, and police officers not to investigate. Bribes follow patterns that are not at all mysterious to the officials, salesmen, and citizens who seek them and pay them. Using a series of international cases, Wrage examines bribery, peeling back the mystique and ambiguity and exposing the very simple transactions that lie beneath. She shows how these seemingly everyday transactions can affect security, democratization, and human aid. Examples from around the world help to illustrate the nature of the problem and efforts at combating it.

Bribery plays a significant role in international criminal activity. Terrorists pay bribes. Money-launderers pay bribes. Those who traffic in people, narcotics, and illegal arms pay bribes. People pay immigration officers not to ask, customs officials not to inspect, and police officers not to investigate. At corporate headquarters in the United States, it can be easy to dismiss modest bribes in distant countries as an unfortunate cost of doing business. Bribes follow patterns that are not at all mysterious to the officials, salesmen, and citizens who seek them and pay them. Using a series of international cases, Wrage examines bribery, peeling back the mystique and ambiguity and exposing the very simple transactions that lie beneath. She shows how these seemingly everyday transactions can affect security, democratization, and human aid around the globe.

Bribery and Extortion presents a clear picture of the world of bribery and the havoc it can wreak on whole populations. Wrage covers commercial bribery, administrative and service-based bribery, and extortion. She considers bribery and extortion at both high levels of government and lower levels on the street. Examples from around the world help to illustrate the nature of the problem and efforts at combating it. The book concludes with practical suggestions and an assessment of current efforts to stem the tide of bribery and restore transparency to everyday transactions in all realms.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The book presents a clear picture of the world of bribery and the havoc it can wreak on whole populations in some instances. Commercial bribery, administrative and service-based bribery, and extortion are covered, both at high levels of government and lower levels on the street. Examples from around the world help to illustrate the nature of the problem and efforts at combating it. The book concludes with practical suggestions and an assessment of current efforts to stem the tide of bribery and restore transparency to everyday transactions in all realms."

–

wishlistlibmon.blogspot.com

"Wrage, an international attorney, analyzes the practices of bribery and extortion in this volume aimed at businesspeople, employees of nongovernmental organizations, editorial writers, government officials, undergraduates, journalists, and others. She describes the broad impact of bribery and uses stories told to her personally as well as those in the media. She concentrates on public sector (government) bribery and international instances, its dimensions and types; the effects of small bribes; gifts, favors, and hospitality; the effects on governments; companies that pay government officials; internationally-known instances, such as the Olympics scandal and the UN Oil-for-Food Program; and suppression methods."

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SciTech Book News

"Wrage documents numerous horror stories, drawing on published sources and on her own experiences with TRACE, an antibribery nongovernmental organization. There is a sophisticated discussion of the transition from customary gift giving to modern bribery….The author sees exposure as the best antidote--making transactions with foreign or domestic public money as transparent as possible and raising the salience of bribery on the international agenda."

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Foreign Affairs

Review

"In this book, Alexandra Wrage writes compellingly and effectively about the corrosive impact of bribery on public trust, the rule of law, and society as a whole. This book is an important one and reminds us all how we must continue to strive in the long global fight against bribery and extortion. International markets are undermined by corruption, and citizens around the world suffer directly and indirectly from its costs. This book challenges society to do more."

(

Brackett Denniston,^LSenior Vice President and General Counsel, General Electric Co.

)

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Praeger (September 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0275996492
• ISBN-13: 978-0275996499
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,651,968 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A moving and important work on cross-border corruption, October 1, 2007

By 

William F. Steinman "Partner, Powell Goldstei... (Washington, DC United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bribery and Extortion: Undermining Business, Governments, and Security (Praeger Security International) (Hardcover)

Alexandra Wrage's work on cross-border bribery and corruption comes at a pivotal time. Nations around the globe are joining together to form international compacts to combat the bribery of government officials. The United Nations has adopted an anti-corruption convention that compels its members to adopt national laws to prevent corruption. Enforcement agencies vigorously prosecute multinational corporations that use bribery to pervert free competition to their own benefit. The World Bank now denies lucrative development contracts from companies that have corrupted foreign officials. The tide of global sentiment appears finally to be turning against the corruption of foreign officials and the distortion of the free market, and Alexandra Wrage has been at the forefront of that fight for more than a decade. For this reason alone, her book is important, informative, and timely.

Alexandra Wrage's book addresses what I describe as the sordid underbelly of international business - companies that seek to win business from foreign governments by bribing influential officials, and foreign officials who abuse their positions and extort business and private citizens in the performance of their duties. Wrage is the president and founder of TRACE International, a non-profit organization dedicated to combating these distorting practices. TRACE interacts with many constituencies, from corporations conducting international business, local sales representatives, consultants and distributors who promote products in their home jurisdictions, government officials and NGOs. In her unique position, Wrage has become something of a sounding board - or perhaps therapist - for those who have personally faced bribing corporations and corrupt local officials. She has collected more than a decade's worth of anecdotes in "Bribery and Extortion." As a someone who has practiced law in the anti-corruption field for fourteen years, I thought I had seen or heard it all, and still found myself sitting, mouth agape, as I read Wrage's book. The tales will shock, produce outrage and evoke sadness. But while Wrage acknowledges that the topic is serious and its impact devastating, she seeks to capture the absurdity of those seeking to do wrong by setting a light-hearted and wry tone. To the extent that a book on such a weighty topic can be delightful and funny, it is this one.

Wrage's work, however, is not simply a collection of humorous, absurd and wretched tales. Rather, Wrage introduces a systematic way of talking about the twin problems of bribery and extortion. She provides order and categorization to the patterns of criminal behavior and to its corrosive effects. In this way, Wrage's book serves as a guidepost to those of us who combat corruption - compliance officers, counsel, government officials and NGOs. Knowing and understanding the many forms that the doppelganger of corruption can take is perhaps the most valuable tool to fighting it.

I highly recommend Wrage's book This is a must-read for businesspersons, lawyers, scholars, students and anyone interested in cross-border business and it's challenging dark side.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bribery Is Flourishing and the Players Are Surprisingly Reputable., September 29, 2009

By 

R. A. Barricklow "Scaramouche" (Las Vegas NV USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bribery and Extortion: Undermining Business, Governments, and Security (Praeger Security International) (Hardcover)

Although I suspected there was more to meet the eye in organizations like those under the umbrella of the United Nations, The World Bank(it self), The Olympics, Save The Children - I hadn't got the real skinny on it - until now. No one gets a pass, unless of course, the price is right!
Corrupt officials at all levels set up obstacles, from small road blocks to major deal-breaking demands - it is at the highest levels of nations & multi-national corporations(executives & board members) - if you can imagine it.../it's there.
Successful bribe-takers give rise to rings of criminality around themselves as they influence family members and their cronies/who inturn create their subsequent circles/ that inturn ripple out into the vast pound of globalization/taking with them whatever means necessary to counter oppostion. It has sadly become/a World Of Do-It-Yourself Cliff Notes in International Kleptocracy, A Virtual World of: "Good Job Browns".
The corporatization of governments have resulted in the institutionalization of corruption. The doctored accounts, the public-misrepresentations, and illegal transactions have become a common place of corporate behavoir, a privitized swine-flu spreading worldwide. Even the world system of public health today is like a chain w/every link for sale.
Governments collect revenues that are supposed to be devoted to the public good, and the most straightforward way for corruption to undermine the legitimacy of a governing regime today involves the public resources being depleted directly by theft - THINK BAILOUT!
Corruption is taking direct aim at the democratic processes and institutions themselves, substituting the will of the bribe-paying for the will of the people.
Get the down and dirty on what is going on in you & your children's world of today. To be forwarned is to be forarmed.
Read all about it!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!!