Oxymoron in chief
So this is one of the funnier headlines I’ve seen in some time:
The President of Transparency International Chile Resigns After Being Named in the Panama Papers
Oops.
The head of global corruption watchdog Transparency International’s Chile branch resigned on Monday, after his name appeared in a data leak from a Panamanian law firm detailing thousands of offshore companies — now being dubbed the Panama Papers.
“Gonzalo Delaveau resigned as President of Transparency Chile, which has been accepted by the board of directors,” the agency said on Twitter.
Although Delaveau has not directly been accused of unlawful practices, Reuters reports that he was linked to at least five offshore firms by the leak.
See, “unlawful” is not the only issue here. Transparency is not solely a legal issue, and the problems with offshore corporations are not solely legal issues. The law doesn’t cover all of morality, to put it mildly.
It’s more depressing than amusing. Who guards the guards? Nobody, it seems.
Capitalism is amoral, appeals to the ethical standards of corporations are a waste of time. The only remedy is to make certain practices unlawful, not to rely on any ‘moral imperative’ and then to ensure the vigorous legal enforcement of regulations. That involves ‘lifting the corporate veil’ and putting people in jail.
Perhaps in principle, transparency is not solely a legal issue, in practice it can only be a legal issue.