Legal Environment of Business According

Legal Environment of Business

According to research into the Salt Lake City 2002 Winter Olympics scandal, the Salt Lake Organization Committee (SLOC) sent members to lobby members of the International Olympics Committee (IOC). Although this lobbying itself is not unethical, the SLOC practice of making strategic gifts to high profile members of the IOC does raise questions of ethics. For example, it is alleged that the SLOC gave IOC members scholarships, free medical care, guns and other luxury gifts, despite IOC rules limiting gifts to $150.00.

The Salt Lake City case provides an excellent example for the difference between lobbying and bribery. Lobbying is the act of trying to influence a government official's understanding and position of a public policy issue through the providing of information. Bribery, on the other hand, is the act of trying to influence another's behavior by the promising or giving of something of value in exchange for the targeted person's act.

Although lobbying is considered ethical, bribery, on the other hand, is not. Bribery is considered to be unethical because it essentially is nothing more than the buying of political power. In a democratic system, whose underlying foundation is a philosophy of independence and equal representation, giving somebody the power to buy political power or interest is unethical. For this reason, must governing boards have codes of ethics that specifically prohibit bribery.