For Bribing Officials, Chinese Give the Best
Shiho Fukada for The New York Times
Shoppers at a Gucci store in Beijing. Gifts to government officials are prohibited in China, but bribery laws are selectively enforced and sales of luxury goods spike in March during Communist Party meetings.
function getSharePasskey() { return 'ex=1394769600&en=f405ec96f922aa62&ei=5124';} function getShareURL() { return encodeURIComponent('http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/world/asia/14gifts.html'); } function getShareHeadline() { return encodeURIComponent('For Bribing Officials, Chinese Give the Best'); } function getShareDescription() { return encodeURIComponent('At annual Communist Party meetings, officials shower superiors with Gucci bags and Swiss watches.'); } function getShareKeywords() { return encodeURIComponent('Communism (Theory and Philosophy),Gifts,Bribery,Luxury Goods,China,National People's Congress (China)'); } function getShareSection() { return encodeURIComponent('world'); } function getShareSectionDisplay() { return encodeURIComponent('International / Asia Pacific'); } function getShareSubSection() { return encodeURIComponent('asia'); } function getShareByline() { return encodeURIComponent('By DAVID BARBOZA'); } function getSharePubdate() { return encodeURIComponent('March 14, 2009'); }
Published: March 13, 2009 BEIJING — Last week, a finely dressed Chinese man walked into Louis Vuitton’s flagship store here, seeking the perfect gift for that special someone: a senior government official.
“I tell you, he is at the top,” the man told the sales clerk, as his bodyguard stood nearby. “So what kind of handbag do you think is suitable for him?”
Purchases like this one are part of a two-week shopping spree every March, when up to 5,000 Communist Party delegates from China’s provinces and regions gather in the capital for two annual meetings: the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. Their mission is to assess the nation’s progress and debate public policy.
But while here, the delegates also seek to curry favor with their superiors, the nation’s top leaders, often by showering them with expensive gifts: Gucci handbags, Hermès scarves, Montblanc pens and $30,000 diamond-studded Swiss watches.
Though sales spike in March during the national congresses, executives of luxury goods companies say that lavishing government officials with such products is a year-round practice that reflects China’s culture of gift-giving and tradition of basing business decisions on personal relationships. They admit to having special accounts for government officials, their relatives and even their mistresses, often with code names like Dr. No and Miss K.
Luxury producers also keep profiles of their customers’ fashion tastes. Government officials, for example, favor Ermenegildo Zegna suits and Salvatore Ferragamo shoes, the executives say. They dislike gifts with big noticeable logos, lest the bribe be too obvious. And they mostly covet expensive watches, which are easily hidden and sometimes traded for cash.
The gifts are essentially bribes or kickbacks, and they are prohibited under Chinese law. But in China, legal experts say, bribery laws are selectively enforced, and party members in good standing are rarely investigated.
As a result, the practice of bribing government officials — by other government officials and, more commonly, by private businessmen — is so widespread that luxury goods producers have come to count on it as an increasingly important revenue source.
China is now the world’s fastest-growing luxury market, with an estimated $7.6 billion in sales last year, according to Bain & Company, a global consulting firm. And industry experts say gifts to government officials make up close to 50 percent of the country’s luxury sales.
When lower level government officials are the gift-givers, the purchases are usually made with state money, or are paid for by private entrepreneurs. “The government officials are not really buying it — they have modest incomes,” said Radha Chadha, co-author of “The Cult of the Luxury Brand” and an expert on luxury brands in Asia. “Somebody else does the buying and gifts the stuff to them.”
That is what is apparently happening in Beijing this month as party cadres and their friends search out brand names like Ferragamo, Dior and Cartier. Luxury companies celebrate these few weeks for the holiday-like boost in sales they provide.
But China publicly condemns such corruption. When asked whether such gift-giving takes place, Chinese officials offer strong denials.
“Where have you heard this crazy news?” said Jiang Hongbo, a media relations official working with delegates from Heilongjiang Province in northeast China.
Yang Zhi, a liaison official from the Xinjiang region in far western China, was more indignant. “Do you think it’s possible we are busy sending gifts and hobnobbing with officials during such serious meetings?” he said.
Publicly, big luxury brands are tight-lipped about the practice of gift-giving in China. Louis Vuitton declined to comment this week, as did Salvatore Ferragamo. Many other leading brands did not return phone calls.
Jonathan Seliger, managing director in China for Dunhill, was circumspect when asked about purchases intended for government officials. “Dunhill has always been a popular brand among Chinese businessmen and government officials,” he said.
Privately, however, marketing and sales executives and sales clerks at some of the leading brands offered a fascinating portrait of how bribery and corruption take place in China. Most of them insisted on anonymity because they did not want to offend their clients or jeopardize sales.
Usually, they said, the purchases are charged to the account or credit card of a private businessman. “When I first went to China I was fascinated because I always saw two guys going shopping,” Ms. Chadha said. “But later I found that one is doing the shopping, and the other is paying.”
According to sales and marketing managers, in most cases a private entrepreneur coordinates with a public official’s staff to set up accounts at luxury stores and sends the official, his family members and mistress code names to use for each store. If they shop at Louis Vuitton, for example, they need only give the code name and the purchases are charged to that account.
There are also middlemen who help buy the goods, whether the buyer is a government official buying for one of his superiors or a private businessmen seeking to influence an official.
Sales clerks at luxury stores quickly learn which products are popular with clients seeking to curry favor. “Jewelry is a favorite for people sending gifts to government officials,” said a clerk at the Jimmy Choo luxury shop in Beijing, who declined to be identified to protect his job.
Michael Ouyang, chief executive of the World Luxury Association China Office, said government officials “would rather wear luxury goods when playing golf.”
“They’ll be cautious at work,” he said.
With the public increasingly aware of government corruption, there has been talk of creating a national register to track the family assets of all government officials, in the hopes of weeding out bribe-taking relatives.
The problem is that officials in China appear to be addicted to European luxury brands.
In January, a land confiscation official in the southwestern city of Chongqing was sentenced to 13 years in prison for accepting kickbacks. The government confiscated 200 pairs of luxury shoes, 100 luxury suits and a luxury car.
At his sentencing in January, the official, Ding Meng, expressed no remorse about his expensive tastes.
He even scolded the prosecutor for her poor taste in fashion. “You’re a woman and you don’t even wear better luxury shoes than me,” he sniped. “Maybe you can spend $25 and buy a tube of shoe cream.”
加JingGuanBbs
京公网安备 11010802022788号
论坛法律顾问：王进律师
知识产权保护声明
免责及隐私声明
发帖
雷达卡
提升卡
置顶卡
沉默卡
变色卡
抢沙发
千斤顶
显身卡
