Nepotism is defined as the predilection or favoritism that public officials have with people belonging to their family nucleus or simply close to them for the granting of jobs to them, without taking into account the merits that other people have, simply see friendship or loyalty. According to experts in the field, in countries where merit is superimposed on friendship, nepotism is considered negative and in some places it is seen as corruption.
According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "Every person has the right of access, under conditions of equality, to public functions in his country." For this reason it is said that nepotism violates the right of people to have access to public work being deprived of the opportunity to compete fairly for public office.
A concept that tends to be confused with nepotism is favoritism, but despite the fact that they are quite similar, for favoritism to occur it is not necessary that the person being favored has any friendship or family relationship with the beneficiary. The etymological origin of this word is derived from the Latin language, specifically from "nepos" which means nephew. Although the use of the word nepotism was initially used to refer to the Pope's nephews, since they were under the guardianship of the Pope since he raised them as his own children, some of whom could be named as cardinal by the Pope himself, which is why the ecclesiastical authorities prohibited the investiture of any position to relatives.
Through the centuries there have been many signs of nepotism that have been observed, an example of this occurs during the time of the Roman Empire, when Pompey put Scipio in charge of two military units without him having any knowledge referring to the art of war or even the military field. The same happened in France during the mandate of Napoleon Bonaparte, since he granted him a large part of his family, positions in his government, naming his brother as the King of Spain.
