Critically evaluate the proposition that states are the worst Essay

Critically evaluate the proposition that states are the worst perpetrators of terror ( criminology) - Essay Example State crime is treated as a response or a consequence to the incidence of threats to national security, insurgent violence or a phenomenon that is endemic to the transitional and the third world countries (Ross 2000, p3). State crime is infiltrative and is committed in varying degrees by all countries in the world. The state is considered as the initiator rather than the target or the mediator of the crime. Despite the fact that the private institutions hold more forcible power, the state still holds the special legal authority to compel to do something (Ross 2000, p3). State crimes include homicide, sexual assault, crimes of violence, serious assaults, torture, kidnapping, embezzlement, bribery, all forms of corruption and economic crime. The magnitude of such crimes is sometimes very big and ordinary words like murder become inadequate and they are replaced by terms like genocide. Some of the most serious crimes in the world are committed by the state. This paper will critically evaluate state crimes in light of its seriousness in various occasions. Corruption can be described as the abuse of the public office for personal gain and the abuse of the public power for personal benefit. The World Bank defines corruption as the abuse of the public office for personal or private gain. The Transparency international defines corruption as the abuse of delegated for personal or private gain. Corruption is a form of behaviour that deviates from the official duties of the public role (Stachowicz-Stanusch 2010, p132). Corruption can be either be passive or active and this is dependent on the person to whom it is being requested or the person who has the power of decision making. Corruption can be private among certain individuals. Public corruption happens in the public sphere of government administration and politics (Stachowicz-Stanusch 2010, p132). Some examples of corruption include collusion, bribery, fraud, embezzlement of public funds, theft, abuse of

Democracy in Ukraine Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Democracy in Ukraine - Essay Example not stealing from the state coffers and protecting favored oligarchs, but actually representing the people who elected them. For most people, this is a first taste of real self- determination" (Paton) In other democracies (such as the United States) are the chances of voter fraud minimized by the old established checks and balances " the vote fraud in (circa 2004) November's Ukrainian election, which denied Yuschenko his victory, was no different than the vote fraud in the United States election that same month, which denied John Kerry his victory; in both cases, there was a major discrepancy between exit polls and the official count. The exit polls in the United States were off by less than 2%. This discrepancy can largely be explained by exit pollsters acknowledged over sampling of women voters, new rules that limit nonvoters proximity to polling places, and the apparent high level of interview cooperation by Kerry supporters than by Bush advocates. The difference between exit polls and the official count in the Ukraine, by contrast, was more than 14%, and considerable evidence suggests that the Kiev government tampered with the results. For example in the Donestk region, officials claimed that Yushchenko won by less than 3% of the vote. International observers, also reported widespread intimidation of election monitors, ballot stuffing, multiple voting, and government pressuring of voters" (Zunes). In the United States the concept of free and fair elections may in some situations be viewed only as the ideal, but the electorate and the candidates have a target to aim for,... The Ukrainian media is state controlled and its primary thrust leading up to the election was the promotion of pro-government candidates. Once the government learned who the opposition candidates were, government controlled thugs went about the business of disrupting opposition campaign activity and were also engaged in act of violence. â€Å"Mykota Shkribliak, a leading opposition politician was murdered in 2002, and journalists who reported on corruption or criticized government policies were subjected to particularly serious harassment and violence. The judiciary in the Ukraine is notoriously inefficient and subject to corruption. It is clear that emerging or newdemocracies are beset with a number of the same common problems. In Czechoslovakia, Petr Cibulka is a five time political prisoner and has done time in the toughest communist prison camps in Czechoslovakia repeatedly between 1979 and 1989, he was jailed and in 1979 he conducted a 31-day hunger strike. In 1991 Cibulka began publishing his paper, Uncensored News, which took a hard line opposition stand against the official information blockade organized by the communists through their â€Å"soft† control of the mass media. In 1992 Mr. Cibulka acquired and published data fromsecret police files, including the names of 200,000 communist spies and collaborators.In April 2005 Mr. Cibulka was interviewed concerning his experiences and perceptions about the current state of democracy in Czechoslovakia. One of the questions posed to him was.