Annotated Bibliography

TITLE

Value Profile and Corruption Propensity:

Correlates among Employees in Two Types
of Government Agencies

By

Proserpina Domingo Tapales, Virgilio G. Enriquez and Oliver

S. Trinidad

Source: Public Service Values and Selected Areas

II Overview of the Article

This study aims to determine the relationship between the

value profile of government employees being a product of his
culture and corruption propensity and the effect of the types of
government agencies that they work for.

III Highlights:

Corruption is defined as morally degenerating act

characterized by improper conduct among officials (Merriam-
Webster 1997). In public administration these are results in the
inefficient provision of services. More generally, corruption erodes
the institutional capacity of government as procedures are
disregarded, resources are siphoned off, and public offices are
bought and sold. At the same time, corruption undermines the
legitimacy of government and such democratic values as trust
and tolerance. (Wikipedia 2010) It is a cultural stigma that
apparently prevails to underdeveloped countries; an enormously
creeping disease which is deeply entrenched within the confines
of the bureaucracy; a voracious predator that continuously
devour the morality of those who involved themselves on such
wicked practice which is primarily motivated by greed of power
and extreme cravings for material wealth. It may even
sometimes borne out of culture and tradition of the society as a
consequence of kinship, “utang na loob” and patronage, social
affiliations, racism or ethnicity and moral upbringing. This hinders
primarily the economic development of our country.

Close family ties

In our own culture, close family ties has been an old

age tradition and has always been recognized as the
core value of families in the Philippines (Sen. Santiago,
14th Congress of the Phil. Page 1). It has been the
norm in our society that primarily one has to give
more account on the welfare of his own family in all
his advocacies. When said tradition extended towards
the system of the bureaucracy there creates the bias,
such in a case of a person in authority who possessed
the extreme capacity and discretion to decide over a
matter within his jurisdiction. He is compelled to
extend favor towards her kin of any relation than any
other else due to traditional practice on obligation
towards kinship, which is absolutely prejudicial to
others for his being impartial to see the perspective in
its broader sense. To enumerate few of these interests
are the following: access to opportunities for
employment, access to win out public biddings, access
on business protection and advancement etc.

Utang na loob

“Utang na loob” in its real sense is an unsolicited

manifestation of generosity tendered for the welfare of
others which does not imposed repayment on the part
of the beneficiary. However, it has been misused and
abused and often misconstrued. "THERE IS NO SUCH
THING AS A FREE LUNCH". Somebody is bound to pay,
Always (Aguilar 2004). In the case of processing claims
for example by a certain individual to a particular
agency wherein first she has to file for her claim,
process the documents, Their freedom to decide
according to what their conscience dictates has been
robbed from them in exchange for that opportunity
that would sustain their daily existence.

Social Afilliations

As we enter public offices for some specific

purposes, It is a common encounter to have those with
acquaintances or those with endorsement letters are
the ones being prioritized and obtained special
attention. And worst they often crack in to the queue.
While majority of the people had to arrive early, wait
on a very long line, follow tedious procedures and
sometimes a need to overcome heat and hunger
because of the volume of people coming with the
same objective.

Racism or ethnicity

This is prevalent on some government offices

especially during recruitment of personnel. It is
apparent that when an executive officer belongs to a
certain race or group, we expect his staff to be of
same origin. In the PNP it has been the prevailing
culture of some commissioned officers to give account
to applicants of their similar race. That is being
attributed to the cultural norm wherein if two people
belong to the same race the higher tendency for them
to predict the character traits of each other, that they
are moved by the same frequency which is
detrimental to others who possessed higher potential
and qualifications standards for that coveted position.

Moral Upbringing

It is another element causing corrupt practices. It

is believed that the breeding possessed by the parents
are being passed onto their children and that the
character traits obtained in childhood are being
carried to adulthood. A well behaved person is the
product of well bred family and healthy relation. When
a child is exposed with corrupt practices of his parents
during formative years, he will develop a wrong notion
that such wicked practices are generally acceptable to
the social norms of the society since it is being
committed by both his parents or anyone of them
whom he consider his own role model. At that event
there is higher tendency for him to imitate them or
follow same act because of that misconception that
what old people are doing especially his own parents
are morally accepted in the social norms.
 According to the Wikipedia forms of corruption vary, but
include bribery, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, patronage, graft,
and embezzlement. (Wikipedia, 2010).

Historical and Cultural Dimension

Corruption in the Philippines took its vast extension in

various ways such as: loss of government revenue, education,
infrastructure, environment, government debt and poverty,
political patronage, crime, high cost of doing business and loss of
investor confidence. (Aguilar, 2004) It is correlated with history
and culture, giving an account to the three different colonizers
which are the Spaniards, the Americans and the Japanese. These
different epoch of colonization indeed created a breakthrough to
the values and traits of every native Filipino even up to this
modern era.

It was during the Spanish colonization that corruption began

as a centralized government was implemented and introduced
bureaucratic institutions which turned out abusive and totally
neglected the rights of the native Filipinos for their own account.
Said institution conforms to that of Roman law tradition which
was characterized to be of high standard contradicting the
customary practice of the Filipinos. It therefore created a conflict
between the bureaucratic administration and the Filipino citizen,
thus, corruption emanated therefrom. Considering the Spanish
colonization in the country the degree of influence was apparent
and the practice of corruption took its advancement and became
widespread. We have to be grateful to the Americans for upon
they took over our country civil service system was introduced
with its objective to give dynamics to the bureaucratic system to
enhance the delivery of service more effectively. It did not
however directly addressed the needs and welfare of the Filipinos
for a fact that said system was a prototype and mere adoption
from the then existing civil service system in the United States
which purely contained the country’s norms, ideals and
aspirations which was distinctively far from that of the
Philippines. But the fact that Americans initiated some kind of
regulatory agency in the Philippine government structure is a big
thing for our bureaucratic growth though it manifested
vulnerability for being not compatible in the country’s cultural
norms and aspirations and even referred to as impertinent due to
the great distinction between the country of its origin and the
Philippines being its supposed co-pilot country. This served as the
basis for the Filipino who drafted a constitution in 1935 for their
own Commonwealth government whereby strengthened the civil
service law through many innovations (Tapales, et. al. 877). The
Japanese period projected a more severe situation of corruption
in the government which has been carried out in today’s practice
of some erring government officials.

All three (3) colonizers attributed to the culture and moral

values of a modern Filipino.

IV Discussion Notes

During the Martial Law regime indicates rampant corruption

in different forms with the presence of two terms which were
cited by the author to be significant elements in corruption when
combined, namely: “propensity” and “propinquity” (Tapales, et.al
876. Propensity defines as an often intense natural inclination or
preference (Webster, 1997) and propinquity means the proximity
over an area of focus. A bureaucrat has more of a tendency to
commit an act of corruption if he has the inclination doing it and
he is usually exposed on a specific kind of temptation that when
he fell on it that is the start of a spoil system in the
administrative framework of the government.

According to study corruption varies according to the type

of agencies, one that is corruption prone and others less so
(Tapales, et.al 876). They are classified as the following, revenue
raising agency and a regulatory agency.

The author missed to include in her investigation that of the

Philippine National Police which does not fall on either of the two
categories of government agencies. It consists of several units
designed with their own distinct function with the sole objective
of ensuring public safety and internal security towards the whole
citizenry. However, there are cases wherein the trust they are
supposed to obtained from the people are being tarnished due to
rampant corruption committed by some of its non-commissioned
and commissioned officers in different forms and level. There are
reported cases wherein a police officer upon oath taking will ask
permission from his superior for a no show status except during
inspection and he will be giving a part of his salary in exchange
so that he can do business of his own personal interest. In this
aspect, his main purpose of entering the force is to obtain himself
a protection for his own business. He gain more advantage over
his business than that of his competitors because he has the
influence. Another form of corruption which apparently occurs is
that, some officers are using their power to manipulate transport
groups. They are to assign the latter a quota in exchange for their
exemption from any street or highway violations, franchise
exemption so that they can make use and profit from their
colorum vehicles for public utility transport, collecting “tong” to
those who enter their territory or area of jurisdiction, etc. Others
generate profits out of the sidewalk vendors by extorting a sum
of money in exchange for their freedom to stay and continue
their activities and not be arrested. Others make use of their
uniforms to intimidate the civilians, that they will take monopoly
on a particular area for their personal businesses and that no one
raise competition against them. Still several others make use of
their specific units to generate pecuniary or material profit such
as the processing on benefit claims of retirees and pensioners or
any other functions that involved money is what the hustlers in
uniform are eyeing to. There are even reported cases wherein a
particular unit in the PNP ordered claimants of death benefits or
respondents of administrative cases to provide appliances such
as aircon unit, television, refrigerator and even cellular phone for
their office use to reciprocate their initiative that have cause the
approval or immediate processing of their documents. This is a
blatant deception on the part of the victims since such appliance
units are not included in the inventory of the logistics office,
therefore, it will be acquired for personal use of said hustlers. In
cases which involved money it has been reported that a certain
police officer would give the claimant or respondents the number
of his ATM account wherein they are going to deposit the money
which so-called the “crying money” or the money demanded by
the that certain police officer as the payment of the services
which are supposed to be delivered freely to these poor
taxpayers.
V Lessons Learned

The two terms namely “propensity” and “propinquity” which

were given emphasis in the discussion of the conducted
investigation of this study are significant elements causing
corruption have created their niche in the bureaucracy that there
is a constrained in establishing innovative design to address this
problem in order to alleviate the moral values of government
employees to achieved a more effective bureaucratic
administration that will give rise to the socio-economic status of
the Philippines in the future.

The findings of the investigation conducted by Tapales et.

al. which grouped their variables into seven (7) categories such
as: 1) economic values, 2) moral values, 3) interpersonal values,
4) professional values, 5) social values, 6) political values and 7)
validity and adherence to cultural norms. Other factors were
considered in the study such as age, years in service, educational
attainment and sex.

The result of the investigation conducted ranked the ten

highest values and these are: 1) discipline, 2) adhering to cultural
norms, 3) inquisitiveness, 4) courtesy, 5) responsibility, 6) self-
respect, 7) spirituality, 8) involvement with others, 9) patience
and 10) sense of reality. These enumerated values are vital in an
honest and efficient performance of duty. The absence of all
these values creates skepticism on the moral values of a
government employee. These values should be inculcated to the
mind of every government employees regardless of their
demographic distinctions such as age, sex, civil status. etc. to
promote a far greater form of service to the Filipino citizen.
 Bibliography
Jun S. Aguilar, March 12 2004, Samar News.Com, Counting the
Cost of Corruption in the Philippines

The Merriam Webster Dictionary, Copyright 1997 by Merriam-

Webster, Incorporated

Wikipedia August 2, 2010 12:35 AM

Jun S. Aguilar, Samar news.com, 12:17 PM, August 2, 2010

Proserpina Domingo Tapales, Virgilio G. Enriquez and Oliver S.

Trinidad, Public Service Values and Selected Areas, Value Profile and
Corruption Propensity: Correlates among Employees in Two Types of
Government Agencies