ABSTRACT
Corruption may then be seen as just one of many ways a person can persuade someone who exercises public authority to act as he wishes—that is, as a kind of influence. Other sorts of influence, such as appealing to regulations, to ideology, or to equity, are quite legitimate means of persuasion so long as the power-holder acts within the rules. Seen as a process of informal political influence, then, corruption might be expected to flourish most in a period when the formal political system, for whatever reasons, is unable to cope with the scale or the nature of the demands being made on it. While a wide variety of groups may gain access to the political system through corruption, it is clearly those with substantial wealth who have the greatest capacity to bend government policy in their direction. Any set of political arrangement creates its own distinct pattern of access and influence.
