Personal gain has always been one of driving factors behind the actions of people. But recently, I have seen this emerge in the form of corruption, men and women who use their positions of powers and connections to receive greater personal benefit, more often than not through illegal means. Coming from Chicago, a city whose corruptness is noted in its nickname of the Windy City, corrupt leaders have come and gone. Let us look into a few examples of men to understand their motivation for corruption.
A primal example is that of former Governor Rod Blagojevich. Initially arrested in 2008, he was convicted of committing 17 crimes, eleven of which came from his attempt to sell the newly opened Senate seat. From what we can understand here is that Blagojevich's motivation stemmed from wealth. He found that his greater success and prosperity lied in achieving greater wealth. Alas, the means by which he attempted this was wrong. Money and wealth have always attracted men and women to act in different ways in order to achieve them. This case is not very different.
Another factor is simply power. This can be seen looking at the Chicago political machine that used to exist. A domination of politics in Chicago, leaders such as Richard Daley led this machine to control almost all of the state's function, effectively "ruling" Chicago. Working under the spoils system, almost deliberate corruption, Daley was able to live, "govern" and run Chicago for over twenty years. Corruption here, lies the pure power that Daley held. Chicago was his pawn, and he ran it completely. To have that significant of power must have been so desirable, enough to take the necessary measures to reach that power.
While the list of factors may go on, I feel these two of money/wealth and power are often the backbone behind corrupt leaders. Our society has become very focused on those with wealth, turning it into a unsatiable ideal that many will try to achieve. This is followed closely by the respect, influence, and power that can either lead to wealth or has come by way of wealth. Both of these ideals have become focuses in our society, ideals large enough to fuel corruption everywhere. Is it a product of our own fascination with what can wealth do? Or what those in power can do? Is this something we change? A complex question that only time can answer. Alas, we must simply content ourselves in understanding that what we have come to love, wealth and power, can often motivate us to act corrupt and tread a path that often does not end well.
This may be a stretch, but do you think these crimes that you've cited are a reflection of society at large? Today in social studies class we discussed "happiness" as a qualitative measure. One student cited a North Korea survey that claimed the United States was the least happy country in the world. While this certainly holds political bias, in some ways it seems our Western society has been caught up in the pursuit of wealth and power and "happiness" has no end. Greed is a self-catalyzing phenomena. The more money and power we get (in the Western world), the more we want. Eventually it catches up to us, and people like Rod Blagojevich take it too far and have to face the consequences of their actions.
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