Conflict of interest

A Conflict of Interest is a situation in which someone, typically a lawyer or public official, has competing professional or personal interests that would make it difficult to fulfill their duties fairly.

More generally, it can be defined as any situation in which an individual is able to exploit their professional or official capacity in some way.

In cases of a conflict of interest, the conflicted individual is expected to recuse himself from the matter and not take part in, or influence in any way, the process. For example, judges are seen to recuse themselves from cases from time to time due to personal conflicts of interest.