We are looking for a book for our Matura exams that deals with ‘Corruption: The Venality of Man’. The book should be written in German and date from the 18th or 17th century.
Dear Lana
Three or four centuries ago, ‘corruption’ meant something different from what it means today, even though people used the same word back then. Originally, it referred to sexual relationships viewed in a negative light, derived from the Latin term ‘corrumpere’, which literally means ‘to defile’. The German equivalent, ‘Bestechung’, also had similar sexual connotations.
The evolution of the term in the 19th century
The modern meaning of corruption – namely that public officials are persuaded by monetary gifts to turn a blind eye to breaches of the law or to violate applicable regulations themselves – only developed in the 19th century. During this period, public officials in Europe began to receive sufficiently high state salaries to be financially independent of private contributions or gifts. Previously, part of their income had depended on their personal share of collected fees or fines.
Corruption in the Early Modern Period
Numerous writings on corruption in the Early Modern Period use different terms to describe the behaviour in question. In the Swiss Confederation, the term ‘trölen’ was commonly used to describe the (prohibited but practised) buying of votes in elections and referendums. From the late 15th century onwards, and particularly in the 16th century, payments made by outsiders to Swiss officials were often referred to as ‘pensions’ (literally: stipends, i.e. regular payments without any consideration in return) and were criticised. Popular unrest and protests, for example in the years 1487, 1513, 1515 and 1521, as well as the sermons of Reformers such as Huldrych Zwingli, were directed against the resulting economic and political dependencies on public officials. Not only the administrative and legal rules, but also the terms used to describe them changed over time.
Bibliography
- Groebner, Valentin. 2011. “Pensions”. In: Historical Dictionary of Switzerland. Online.
- Groebner, Valentin. 2000. Dangerous Gifts. Konstanz