The Humankind's Scourge

Government Accountability and Transparency: Corruption 

Greetings! My name is Daniela Yúnez, I’m a 16 year old student from Barranquilla, Colombia and I’m currently studying at American School.

Ever since humanity emerged, our world has developed a big amount of pressing issues. From climate change to never ending wars, we have created all kinds of scenarios where our life is mostly at stake.

A very discouraging fact is that the majority of our problems concerning the whole world are caused only and mainly by us, humans. Every single thing we have engendered has had an upshot in our human life that end up in an issue that seems impossible to solve.

Throughout the years we have witnessed how climate change has aggravated significantly while affecting a large number of species, we have seen how a whole population can starve to death due to high rates of poverty, it is also well

known around the world how discrimination and violence are still a part of our society to this day; however, I truly believe that governments play a crucial role in every conflict today.

According to the UNODC (United Nations Office on Drugs

and Crime) corruption reduces a government's ability to provide basic resources and services for its citizens, which can lead up to the formation of more global issues. For instance, In Mexico, the brother of former President Carlos Salinas amassed US$ 120 million, as a result of corruption, an amount that the World Bank estimates could have covered the annual health care costs for more than 594,000 Mexican citizens.

As many efforts we, as citizens, try to engage into every day to make our world a better place to live in, but there is not going to be any change or progress if our governments insist on prioritizing their greed and their thirst for economic power.

Huge amounts of economic resources are wasted by various governments on weapons and armament for future conflicts,

when all of those resources could be used for the easing of issues such as climate change.

Corruption and political capture can also obstruct effective

climate policy, limiting the quality of inspections, design and implementation of policies, and monitoring their progress, among others.

Solving environmental problems depends, to a great extent, on the quality and strength of institutions, and the capacity of civil society to supervise. As the UN points out, it's important to understand that corruption can take place in both, the public and private sector, and even between them.

Corruption and climate change share a characteristic: both are most devastating for the poor and vulnerable people, as

they have less access and control of resources. For this reason, I strongly believe that it is urgent to strengthen institutions and create a more vigilant civil society. 

Thanks. 

By Daniela Yúnez, Step 10