Lesson Fifteen Bribery
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Lesson Fifteen Bribery--- An Inevitable Evil?OutlineI.(Paras.1-2) Business ethics are included in the syllabuses for business majors.(1)The problem of ethics is important for their future career.(2)Bribery had become a serious problem in the commercial world.(3)In their future career they are likely to bribe for their business interests.II.(Paras.3-4) Bribery seemed to have become a fact of commercial life.(1)Manufacturers think it is worthwhile to bribe buyers if they can make huge profits.(2)More than 300 U.S. companies admitted having made questionable payments.III.(Paras.5-10) Bribery can be divided into three broad categories.(1)(Paras.5-6) The first category involves big sums of money.(a)Big money is paid for political purposes.(b)Large payments are made to obtain major contracts or arms sales.(2)(Para.7) Another category includes payments made to secure quicker approval of projectsor to speed up procedure.(3)(Paras.8-10) Still another kind of payment is made to facilitate the passage of a businessdeal.(a)It is made to get a tender put on a contract list.(b)It is made to secure an import license for equipment.(c)It is made to customs officials to clear cargoes.IV.(Paras.11-13) It is difficult to ban bribery in all its forms.(1)The ICC favors a code of conduct to ban bribery.(2)But ICC members disagree on how to enforce the code.(3)Bribery seems unlikely to be eliminated in the near future.1. Students taking business courses sometimes wonder why their courses include the topic of business ethics.ethics: (pl.) moral principles that control or influence a person’s behaviorsbusiness ethics: moral rules or principles governing the behavior or people involved in the business of selling and buying, which include fair play in conducting business, not operatingdishonest practices, such as swindles, fraud, briberysyllabus: a list of the topics, books, etc. that students should study in a particular subject at school or college2. … bribery in its various forms is increasing / becoming more and more common in many countries; insome this type of corruption has been the typical pattern of behavior for hundreds of years.3. …you want to sell your company’s soft-drinks in a foreign country for the first time because you thinkin future these drinks will sell very well though at the present they may not be popular.Break into: to become involved in a new business activityEg. Some foreign companies are trying to break into the Chinese market.一些外国公司想方设法打进中国市场。
Potential (for): the possibility of sth happening or being developed or usedThe new product has a great potential for sales (could be sold in large quantities).这种新产品将来可能会卖得很俏。
4. (If you promise to pay this official a large sum of money) …you will probably also manage to getthings done smoothly without “bureaucratic delays”, to use his own words.bureaucratic delay: a situation in which you have to wait because of unreasonable complicated official rules and processes before you can get sth done or approved. For example, if you wantto get permission from government officials to do something, you have to go througha lot of complicated processes and are likely to wait for a long time before you get it.5. The British car manufacturer was said to have used a “slush fund” and other dishonest ways of doing business. These include paying their business partners (agents or buyers) commissions of more than the normal rate, offering them higher discount rates and depositing money into numbered, i.e. secret accounts in Swiss banks.slush fund: a fund used to make illegal or questionable payments/ a sum of money kept for illegal purposes, esp. in politics. Slush is literally melting, often dirty snowquestionable practices: dishonest ways of doing thingsagent: a person whose job is to act for, or manage the affairs of other people in businesscommission: an amount of money that is paid to sb for selling goods and which increases with the amount of goods.padded commissions: commissions that are higher than the normal amount/ratediscount: a reduction in the cost of goods that you offer agents or buyersnumbered bank account: a bank account that is given a special number and not the name of the depositor 6. “Look, in the business world, we’re faced with a lot of complicated deals, so we have to use whatever means to gain profits. ”/ “In the business world, the competition is very fierce.”Wheel and deal: (usually used in the progressive tenses--- wheeling and dealing) to do a lot of complicated deals in business or politics, often in a dishonest way.7. It is worthwhile to bribe some of our buyers with a few million so as to secure contracts worth £1,000 million.grease sb’s palm: (old-fashioned, informal) to give sb money in a secret or dishonest way in order to persuade them to do sth for your benefit; to pay bribesCf. oil the wheels: (informal) to make things go more smoothly, esp. in business, sometimes by offering people illegal gifts or money8. It is not difficult to see that bribery and other dishonest payments are becoming more and more widespread. In fact, bribery has become something we have to face and accept in business activities. 9. The first type of bribery involves large amounts of money paid for political reasons, i.e., to a candidatewho is running for political office or for obtaining major contracts.10. The U.S. conglomerate ITT, for example, once gave a U.S. presidential candidate a lot of money when it was in danger of being prosecuted for breaking the U.S. anti-trust law.conglomerate: a large corporation formed by different firms/ companies joining togetherunder investigation: being investigatedeg. The case is still under investigation.Anti-trust law: an American law intended to prevent companies form monopolizing certain products and unfairly controlling prices 发托拉斯法11. One type / form of bribery in the second category includes large payments made to important and influential people such as ruling families or their close advisers in order to get contracts involving large amounts of money.ruling family: the family that has control over a country, e.g., a king in a kingdom, Sheik in some Arab countries12. In a court case, a witness said that in selling weapons to Iran, a Britain company paid £1 million tosomeone who helped it make the sale of tanks to that country.deal: an agreement, esp. in business, on certain terms for buying or doing 交易to make/conclude/finalize a deal with sb 与某人做成一笔交易clinch a deal: to conclude a deal successfully13. Other countries have also tried to make foreign companies offer political parties financial support.put pressure on sb: to force or try to persuade sb to do 向某人施加压力eg. The international community is putting pressure on both sides to stop fighting.国际社会向双方施加压力使他们停火。