Government anti-corruption strategies : a cross-cultural perspective

296 Pages·2015·6.16 MB·English

by  Lavena

GOVERNMENT
ANTI-CORRUPTION
STRATEGIES
A Cross-Cultural Perspective

GOVERNMENT
ANTI-CORRUPTION
STRATEGIES
A Cross-Cultural Perspective
Edited by
Yahong Zhang • Cecilia Lavena
CRC Press
Taylor & Francis Group
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Contents
Foreword .......................................................................................................vii
Editors ............................................................................................................ix
Contributors ...................................................................................................xi
Introduction: Corruption and Government Anti-Corruption Strategies .....xiii
1 Anti-Corruption Actions: Nongovernmental and
Intergovernmental Organizations ..........................................................1
BENJAMIN W. CRAMER
2 Anti-Corruption Practices in India ......................................................23
MEENA NAIR
3 The Whistleblowing Program as an Anti-Corruption Tool in China ....43
HUA XU, XUEJIAO ZHAO, QINGMING ZHANG, AND MINGLU XU
4 Lessons from China: Fighting Corruption in
the Construction Sector .....................................................................59
JIANGNAN ZHU AND YIPING WU
5 Anti-Corruption Lessons from Nepal ..................................................77
NARAYAN MANANDHAR
6 Evolution of Anti-Corruption Strategies in South Korea ...................103
KILKON KO AND SUE YEON CHO
7 Anti-Corruption Strategies in Singapore: Demystifying
the Singapore Model ..........................................................................123
WENXUAN YU
8 Fighting Corruption in Central and Eastern European Countries
through Transparency: Regulatory and Institutional Challenges .........139
BOGDANA NEAMTU AND DACIAN C. DRAGOS
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vi ◾ Contents
9 How a Resurgent Antigraft Bureau Helped Croatia Turn
a Corner on Corruption......................................................................167
GABRIEL KURIS
10 Anti-Corruption Strategies in the Gulf Cooperation
Council’s States: Lessons Learned and the Path Forward ..................187
MHAMED BIYGAUTANE
11 Combating Bribery of Foreign Officials: A Countercorruption
Strategy in Developed Countries .......................................................215
CINDY DAVIDS
12 What Can We Learn from Worldwide Anti-Corruption Practices? .....247
YAHONG ZHANG
Index ...........................................................................................................261
Foreword
Delivering good public policy is difficult at the best of times. There are always
disputes over appropriate aims and deliverables, budget constraints render d esirable
programs unaffordable, and implementation processes are hugely challenged, espe-
cially as personnel skills, program management, and suitable use of technology
determine how effectively things get done. But much of this pales into insignif-
icance when prevalent corruption distorts good public policy. Corruption costs
governments and businesses trillions of dollars every year; it adds substantially to
the costs of goods and services, but most importantly it damages policy objectives
and diminishes trust.
Research has documented examples of low-level officials who take a kickback
to overlook a violation, certify something that is not right, make something happen
quicker, or change a document to benefit a briber. We also know of cases where
groups of officials work together to divert money from programs, run crooked pro-
curement processes, or improperly sell things that are not theirs and pocket the
benefits. We know of corrupt organizations operating both domestically and inter-
nationally, which have thrived on fraud, bribery, improper allocation of contracts,
political and market manipulation, unauthorized secondary employment, failure to
declare conflicts of interest, and the cover-up of safety breaches.
While this book documents and analyzes corruption in nation-states, it is
important to remember that corruption occurs only if there are corrupt individu-
als, groups that conspire to undermine government programs, and organizations
that lack integrity, wherein corruption is not only condoned but also a part of the
fabric of organizational operation. In addition to all of these, there are occasions
when kleptocratic leaders corruptly control the institutions of the state and use the
treasury as their own personal bank account.
The impacts for policy are devastating. Corruption is prevalent all over. Corrupt
public policy decisions of health services result in fatalities; people are denied
access to clean water; illegal logging is prevalent in numerous developing countries;
administration of justice is compromised; educational opportunities are denied;
civil and military procurement are manipulated; roads are poorly constructed, often
going nowhere important; responses to natural disasters are appallingly corrupt;
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viii ◾ Foreword
and regulatory behavior in the extractive industries is corrupt. Also, moving onto
a different domain, corruption impacts national security.
When corruption becomes the norm in a society, the consequences are severe.
Apart from undermining citizens’ trust in government, it instills a general feeling
that vulnerable people cannot get justice. Also, corruption compromises services,
diminishes quality of life, retards human development, discourages investment,
distorts natural resource development, and damages the environment. It deprives
governments of sufficient tax revenue to do their job and leads to inefficient public
administration.
Careful study of corruption is important to understand its dynamics and fur-
ther to develop strategies to deal with it, as corruption affects countries or sectors
within countries. It is important to note that not all forms of corruption are the
same. It occurs in different forms in poor and rich countries, in countries that have
different types of natural resources, and in countries that have different economic
platforms. Corruption covers a wide spectrum of behaviors that range from bribery
and extortion, to misuse of information, to conflict of interest, and to nepotism
and cronyism. It is important to understand and to classify the behaviors so that
effective countermeasures that are relevant to the country and the situation can be
put in place.
The architecture of corruption control ranges from international treaties such
as the United Nations Convention against Corruption, to the building of integrity
within government agencies, to the development of compliance measures in orga-
nizations and programs, and to the inculcation of moral and ethical behavior as
the norm.
This book gives an excellent overview of the many faces of corruption in numer-
ous settings. It is written by scholars who are deeply familiar with the countries in
which they have done their research, and the book provides great examples and
offers solid insight into the different facets of corruption. All these materials can
be used to form part of a classification of corruption types and activities, and the
knowledge gained from this book can enhance public administration and deliver

better quality government outputs, thus enhancing the quality of life for all and
strengthening trust in the government.
Adam Graycar
Professor of Public Policy, RSSS
Director, Transnational Research Institute on Corruption
Australian National University Canberra, Australian Capital Territory
and Strategic Professor of Social and Policy Studies
Flinders University, Adelaide, South Australia
Editors
Dr. Yahong Zhang is an associate professor in the School of Public Affairs and
Administration, Rutgers University, Newark Campus, New Jersey. She is the direc-
tor of the Rutgers Institute on Anti-Corruption Studies, Newark, New Jersey. Her
research interests include politics–administration relationships, government per-
formance analysis, government transparency, citizen participation, and human
resources management in local government. Dr. Zhang is currently working on
an anti-corruption research project that consists of two phases: data collection of
public corruption cases at the individual and organizational levels and empiri-
cal examination of systematic factors that lead to public corruption. Dr. Zhang
has published articles in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Public
Administration Research and Theory, Public Administration Review, The American
Review of Public Administration, and Public Performance and Management Review.
Dr. Cecilia F. Lavena is an adjunct professor at the Department of Social Sciences,
Universidad de San Andrés, Victoria, Buenos Aires, Argentina. She is the direc-
tor of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at ADC (Association for Civil Rights,
“ADC”), a Buenos Aires-based, independent non-partisan NGO working to guar-
antee respect for civil and human rights in Argentina and Latin America. Dr. Lavena
worked on a project titled “Towards a Culture of Anti-Corruption Compliance in
Argentina: Reorienting Incentives through Collective Action” at the Center for
Anti-corruption Studies at the Department of Law, Universidad de San Andrés,
under the auspices of the Siemens Integrity Initiative. Dr. Lavena has published
articles in peer-reviewed journals, including Public Integrity and American Review
of Public Administration.
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