So, they bribe to make it happen, thus feeding the corruption loop, and don't see any problem with that! Until they do. Then, they brag the "ikea generation" crap in newspapers.
A bribe-based economy has very high barriers of entry, especially when the main client in your industry is the state. Which means low competition which means... lots of bad things.
Example: Cell Phone service in the US. Actually, that's not the worst possible, but we are lagging the rest of the world.
But I'm saying that they feed the corruption. By paying bribes.
I thought this was quite insightful. No matter how bad the conditions, there will be companies willing to make a profit there. After all, the choices are enter the market and make some money, or don't enter the market and make none. And Russia is a _big_ market, therefore a potential profit hard to dismiss.
This all means the system there will not run out of fuel very soon. It is less productive though, but their natural resources will probably make up for it. The biggest loser is the population. I read recently in a study of happiness per country Russia is very near the bottom. But as long as there are enough money to move the wheels, the system will go on.
That is exactly something to be expected from a corporation. You don't expect corporations to take the moral high ground and heal Russia's political system at the expense of their own profits?
With respect to corruption there's bad news and good news. The bad news is that only Russian people can do something about it. The good news is that Russian people can do something about it.
Corruption is a fact of life in Russia--almost a natural law--and has always been. If you find this distasteful, then don't do business there. Ikea has known this from day one. Everyone who has ever dealt with Russia since the Iron Curtain was bound to find out on day one. This article is a move in a chess game, and both sides (in fact there is probably a handful of sides in this one) are on exactly the same ethical ground.
Interesting if you're interested in minutiae of Russian politics, but otherwise business as usual.
One thing was clear from that article that should be clear to everyone here: Russia is not a good place to do business these days. Your competitors are the government are the criminals.