評論
打印
Business
商業報道
Corporate transparency
公司透明化
Measuring mud
離析淤積物
How transparent are the world's biggest listed companies?
世界上最大的上市公司透明程度到底如何
Clear envelopes have yet to catch on
透明的信封，要流行還尚需時日
ARE you cheating on your spouse?
你正對自己的配偶不忠嗎？
If so, please stand up and declare it.
如果是這樣，請站起來承認。
Total silence? What virtuous readers The Economist has.
全都沉默？《經濟學人》的讀者是何其品德高尚啊。
Trying to measure corruption is a bit like surveying adultery.
嘗試去測量腐敗的程度就有一點像是調查婚外情。
Those who indulge in it are unlikely to admit it.
深陷其中的人們可不愿意主動承認。
So when surveying big companies, Transparency International, an anti-corruption watchdog, asks a different question:
于是調查大公司時，反腐敗監管機構透明國際問了個不一樣的問題：
how transparent are you?
你的透明程度如何？
Its latest survey, “Transparency in Corporate Reporting”, looks at the world's 105 biggest listed firms.
它的最新調查“企業報告中的透明度”涵蓋了世界上最大的105家上市公司。
It measures three things.
他衡量三方面情況。
First, a company's internal rules and procedures to prevent corruption.
首先是公司用于防范腐敗的內部條例、流程。
Second, the transparency of its organisational structure.
第二是組織構架的透明度。
Third, TI asks whether a firm publishes detailed financial information about its activities in every country where it operates,
第三，TI將詢問公司是否公布了每個它參與運營的國家中所做活動的詳細財務信息，
including how much it pays in taxes and royalties to each government.
比如向政府交了多少稅，交了多少版權費。
Most firms in the sample have strict rules barring bribery.
樣本中的大部分企業都有嚴格的條例杜絕行、受賄。
The average score on this count was 69%, up from 47% in 2009, the last time TI conducted a similar exercise.
這項標準的平均得分率從TI上次在2009年引導一個類似練習時的47%提到了現在的69%。
Many firms also disclose ample details about which holding company owns which subsidiary, and so forth.
許多企業還披露了哪家控股集團擁有哪家子公司等豐富的細節。
Of the 105 companies, 45 scored a perfect 100% for organisational transparency.
全部105家企業中，四十五家在企業透明度上的得分率都達到了完美的100%。
On the third measure, however, most firms remained tight-lipped.
但是在第三項指標上，許多企業都守口如瓶。
This does not mean they have done anything illegal.
這不表示他們就干過違法的事。
Suppose a mining firm pays 10m to a government for a licence to dig.
設想一個采礦業公司為了得到挖掘許可，向政府支付了1000萬美元。
The fee may be legitimate, but the government may wish to keep it secret, to make it easier to embezzle.
這項費用可能合法，但政府也可能希望在這件事上保密，讓侵吞變得更容易。
A company that is completely transparent may find it hard to win any more contracts from dodgy governments, which, alas, control a lot of the world's natural resources.
完全透明的公司也許會很難從樂于遮掩的政府那里贏得更多的合約，然而這些政府卻控制著全世界的自然資源。
Statoil, Norway's state-controlled oil-and-gas firm, was by far the best performer, yet it scored only 50% on this measure.
挪威的國家控股油氣企業挪威國家石油公司在這項指標上只得了50%。
More than a third of firms scored zero; the average was a meagre 4%.
三分之一以上的企業得分為零；平均得分率只有可憐的4%。
Campaigners have long complained that money from oil and minerals props up predatory governments, and lobbied firms to publish what they pay.
競選者一直在抱怨從石油和礦產得來的錢支持了掠奪成性的政府，并且游說企業公布出他們支付了的東西。
Big Western miners and drillers have taken heed: the top five on TI's list are all involved in natural resources.
西方大型挖掘與鉆井公司已經留意到TI列表上的前五名都和自然資源有關。
Many firms, however, are reluctant to answer probing questions from Western busybodies: Gazprom, Russia's state-owned gas giant, scores zero on the first and third measures.
但是許多公司不愿回答西方好事者提出的探查性問題：俄羅斯國有天然氣巨頭俄羅斯天燃氣公司就在第一和第三問題上得分為零。
TI's calculations are open to challenge.
這項評估受到了挑戰。
Do Amazon, Google and Berkshire Hathaway deserve to be ranked near the bottom?
亞馬遜，谷歌，伯克希爾·哈撒韋應該排在接近底部的位置嗎？
Probably not.
也許不是。
These firms may not disclose as much as TI would like,
這些企業公布的信息沒有TI期待的那樣多，
but they are not in businesses where one is ever asked to bribe a cabinet minister to win a mining concession.
但他們所處的商業環境也并不需要他們去賄賂內閣大臣以獲得采礦許可。
TI does a good job of focusing attention on a serious problem.
TI在聚焦重要問題方面做得不錯，
But like The Economist's adultery survey, its results should be taken with a handful of salt.
但就像經濟學人雜志的婚外情調查一樣，其結果只應受到謹慎的參考。
