Difference between revisions of "Pozornost', d'akovné, všimné (Slovakia)"

Some of these morally ambiguous practices are increasingly contested. For example, when an online discussion was initiated in 2015 on the web-portal modrykonik.sk by young mothers who had paid všimné, pozornosť or dakovné when giving birth, this was picked up on and reported on the agenda-setting portal SME. This was not just an acknowledgement of the importance of the issue, but also a contestation of the legal status of this social norm, and an investigation was launched by the Special Prosecutor’s Office (Burčík 2015; Gécziová 2015). The moral ambivalence of the issue was clearly reflected both in media reports and in online discussions, where journalists and bloggers drew attention to the ambiguity of the words ďakovné, pozornosť and všimné by putting them in quotation marks.  

Another focus of public discussion was the way in which the word pozornosť can cover illegal non-monetary privileges or rewards that may amount to bribery, such as membership of an exclusive club, privileged service at an airport, or a state award (Law Office Ružička Csekes s.r.o. 2013). Pozornosť was also used in a report on a corrupt Chinese general, who preferred to receive gold rather than a monetary bribe, leading to the headline, ‘Mercedes full of gold as pozornosť‘ (Sladkovská 2014).

Because of their elusive nature, the practices of personalisation implied by the use of ďakovné, pozornosť and všimné remain under-researched. On the one hand, they may imply only an enhanced quality of services that are in themselves legitimate. On the other hand, the personalisation of state services is generally viewed by the state as corruption. As long as one of the parties is willing to cooperate with the police, this type of minor crime is easy to prosecute; it also makes for popular newspaper reporting. But, while hundreds of minor or relatively minor corruption cases come before the Slovak courts every year, far fewer cases of large-scale corruption do so (Transparency International 2014b). Petty corruption also provides moral cover for more serious crimes by top politicians or influential businesspeople.  

Morally and practically, much depends on whether gifts are voluntary, expected or even extorted, and whether they are presented before or after a service, such as a medical operation. However, all cases of ďakovné, pozornosť and všimné seem to hinge on the need to personalise a relationship in order to secure preferential treatment. This suggests defects in the functioning of impersonal institutions, which in turn justifies personalisation to some extent. On the other hand, getting preferential treatment at the expense of others will always be morally dubious. In early 2015, the Slovak government abolished fast-track access to doctors on the grounds that it was prejudicial to the poor and to those who were prepared to wait patiently for treatment. Interviewed on television Dr Peter Lipták, a physician, admitted having received thousands of gifts from patients, including flowers and small amounts of money. He strongly denied that either could be considered a bribe. At the same time, he claimed that he needed these voluntary gifts in order to finance his medical practice (Turanský 2015). The case was widely discussed in the media and was investigated by the police. In the end, Lipták was not charged with either corruption or tax evasion. But his story illustrates how the informal practices examined here are evolving: they are being publicly discussed in the media, investigated and transformed into new legal and social norms that will help to transform such practices in the future.