Category Archives: Guest Commentary

Guest Post: Why We Should Be Excited About SDG 16

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GAB is delighted to welcome back Daniel Dudis, Senior Policy Director at Transparency International-USA, who contributes the following guest post:

On September 25th, the United Nations adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs identify development priorities and set measurable targets for progress that are to be met by 2030. They also replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), adopted in 2000 and set to expire at the end of this year. The MDGs were aimed primarily at improving living conditions in developing countries, and focused on reducing extreme poverty and improving health, education, sanitation, and nutrition. Unfortunately, progress towards achieving the MDGs has been uneven at best. Notably absent from the MDGs were any commitments on improving governance or reducing corruption. Given that in most countries, government is the primary service provider for healthcare, education, and sanitation, and that government provides nutrition assistance and sets economic policy, the absence of any commitments to improve governance or reduce corruption was a notable blind spot. Honest, accountable, efficient government is the foundation upon which economic development and improved service delivery are built.

Happily, goal 16 of the SDGs fills this lacuna. Goal 16, which seeks to promote just, peaceful, and inclusive societies, includes (among other governance-related targets) significant reductions in illicit financial flows, progress on the recovery and return of stolen assets, and substantial reductions in corruption and bribery.

It is easy to be skeptical about the utility of ambitious international agreements such as the SDGs. Indeed, Matthew’s post last week, which criticized the Goal 16’s anticorruption targets on the grounds that they are ill-suited to quantitative measurement of progress, and Rick’s post yesterday, exemplify that view. Such skepticism, however, is misplaced. The inclusion of these targets in Goal 16 of the SDGs is an important step forward as it represents a clear endorsement by the community of nations that good governance and the fight against corruption are integral parts of the global development agenda. Continue reading →

Guest Post: Pro-Transparency Organizations Fail To Practice What They Preach

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Till Bruckner, freelance journalist and Advocacy Manager for Transparify (an initiative that rates the financial transparency of think tanks and advocacy groups), contributes the following guest post in a private capacity:

“Transparency” is the watchword of the international anticorruption movement, a fact perhaps best illustrated by Transparency International’s choice of name. And partly due to the efforts of TI and many other groups, the world has changed for the better: transparency has become the new norm. Yet many of the anticorruption groups themselves need to wake up to this reality, and become more transparent themselves. Indeed, those of us in the anticorruption community would do a lot better if we started to walk our transparency talk.

This fact was driven home to me in a recent exchange I had with Professor Peter Eigen, the living legend who helped found Transparency International, about his newest venture, the Fisheries Transparency Initiative (FiTI). FiTI aims to curb corruption in international fisheries, and if it works as planned, it could have a positive impact on many issues, including overfishing, food security, and public revenue in developing countries. Somewhat unconventionally, FiTI is financed by the government of Mauritania, whose controversial president, Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, first announced the initiative. (see my recent article in Foreign Policy for more background.) I asked Professor Eigen about Mauritania’s financial support for the FiTI; he explained that Mauritania was only sponsoring the initial conceptual phase of FiTI, and he persuasively argued that its government would have no undue influence, let alone control, over outcomes. I then asked Professor Eigen how much Mauritania was paying his organization (the Humboldt-Viadrina Governance Platform) in connection with its work on the FiTI project, but he told me he didn’t want to disclose the figure. He explained:

“This is a normal consulting arrangement of our not-for-profit organization with the [Mauritanian] government. We do not feel it would be proper for us to disclose details of contracts. If media or taxpayers want to find out how [the] Government spends its budget, they can ask the Government. This is for FiTI an unimportant side issue.”

Professor Eigen added two more points. First, his organization would at some later point account for the money on its website. Second, he himself would be working “pro bono.”

Summary: There’s no influence peddling; the use of taxpayer funds is a domestic issue; all money will be accounted for; and nobody is lining their pockets. So, everything is okay, right?

No, it’s not okay at all. Here’s why: Continue reading →

Guest Post: The Blagojevich Case and the Line Between Corruption and Horse-Trading

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Jennifer Rodgers and Jacob Watkins, respectively Executive Director and Program Coordinator for the Columbia University Center for the Advancement of Public Integrity (CAPI), contribute the following guest post:

Former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was recently back in the news, but this time for something he didn’t do wrong, when the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals vacated 5 of the 18 counts on which Blagojevich was convicted in 2011. The appellate court’s decision hinged upon the distinction between illegal corruption and legal (if distasteful) political horse-trading, an issue recently touched upon in the decision by the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit to uphold former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell’s public corruption convictions (which Matthew discussed here). The outcome of the Blagojevich appeal shows that under current U.S. law, whether or not a public official’s deal-making is illegal depends upon what exactly the official is bargaining for. Political horse-trading–exchanging one official act for another official act–is not a crime under U.S. federal law, but exchanging an official act for a private benefit is. The decision in the Blagojevich provides a useful opportunity for thinking more generally about how the law ought to draw that difficult line. Continue reading →

Guest Post: Fishing for the Right ACA Heads, and Keeping Them Safe

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Sofie Arjon Schütte, Senior Advisor at the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, contributes the following guest post, adapted from her recent U4 research paper, “The fish’s head: appointment and removal procedures for anti-corruption agency leadership”:

There has been much discussion on this blog (see here, here, and here) about the requirements for an effective, independent anticorruption agency (ACA). A number of factors are important, including (as emphasized in the Jakarta Statement) the ACA’s mandate, permanence, budget security, autonomy over financial and human resources, and internal and external accountability mechanisms, to name a few. But among the many important factors, the procedures for appointment and removal are particularly critical. As the saying goes, “a fish rots from the head down”: when the leadership of an organization is unethical or ineffective, these failings infect the entire organization. Undue external interference with an ACA is likely to target the head, and a co-opted or corrupted ACA head can do serious damage to the effectiveness and reputation of the ACA.

My research on the appointment and removal procedures for heads of 46 ACAs around the world has highlighted some of the important factors that can promote or undermine effective, ethical, and independent ACA leadership. Given different contexts, no specific set of procedures for appointments and removals can be considered ideal for all environments. Nevertheless, some general guidelines are possible: Continue reading →

Guest Post: The UK Should Fight Corruption Using “Unexplained Wealth Orders”

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Nick Maxwell, Head of Advocacy and Research at Transparency International-United Kingdom, contributes the following guest post:

UK Prime Minister David Cameron has made the fight against global corruption a high priority for his government, declaring that corruption is the cancer that is at the root of many of the world’s problems. But as much as we should applaud the UK’s efforts to support anticorruption measures and good governance abroad, it is equally important that the UK ensure that it is not a safe haven for the proceeds of corruption stolen throughout the world. Yet here the UK has fallen short: We have only seen limited asset restraint and recovery against the proceeds of corruption, especially against those currently associated to power. While estimates of total extent of the problem vary, it is generally agreed that large amounts of unexplained suspicious wealth enter the UK each year and are invested in the British financial system, in property, in luxury goods or in other areas of the economy. And despite the fact that UK law enforcement has the necessary expertise on this issue, the rate of asset recovery by UK agencies of the proceeds of grand corruption is undeniably very low compared to the scale of the problem.

Given the scale of the problem and the inadequacy of the government’s response to date, Transparency International’s UK chapter (TI-UK) established a taskforce of experts to review the legislation in place to deter grand corruption and recover stolen assets that have made their way into or through the UK. The results of the taskforce’s deliberations were published last month as a discussion paper entitled Empowering the UK to recover corrupt assets: New approaches to illicit enrichment and asset recovery; the paper sets out a new proposal for UK law enforcement: the use of an Unexplained Wealth Order (UWO), which would allow UK law enforcement to start proactively questioning suspicious unexplained wealth associated with foreign public officials, and to start civil recovery proceedings against the relevant assets.

Continue reading →

Guest Post: A “Guatemalan Spring”? — Not Yet.

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Alicia Robinson, a student at Harvard Law School, contributes the following guest post:

Guatemala has long been beset by persistent poverty, corruption, and a culture of impunity – an Unholy Trinity that has afflicted much of Central and South America. Moreover, Guatemala has the misfortune of being geographically located at the center of major drug trafficking routes to the North American and European markets, where the unrelenting demand has allowed organized crime to strengthen its hold over the country’s institutions of governance. Yet as Mathieu Tromme’s recent post on this blog highlighted, there are some encouraging signs of change. Most notably, the recent uncovering of a massive tax fraud orechestrated at the highest levels of the executive branch triggered protests that forced the resignation of the vice president – a major victory against impunity in the country.

However, despite this success, and the broad popular support for more action against corruption and impunity, Mr. Tromme may be overly optimistic when he characterizes this this event and the surrounding protests as the inception of a “Guatemalan Spring” that will bring an end to the era of impunity in Guatemala. Corruption still very much riddles every corner of Guatemalan society and the toughest part of the battle lies ahead. Continue reading →

Guest Post: Development Aid–A Blind Spot for EU Anticorruption Efforts

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GAB is pleased to welcome back Jesper Johnsøn, Senior Advisor at the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, who, along with his colleagues Nils Taxell and Thor Olav Iversen, contributes the following guest post:

A new study from the European Parliament entitled Cost of Corruption in Developing Countries – How Effectively is Aid Being Spent? shows that, despite an impressive track record of ambitious anticorruption reforms in countries working toward European Union membership, the EU’s overall anticorruption strategy marginalizes efforts to address corruption through development aid. The EU could spend aid more effectively, the report concludes, if it prioritized corruption control in developing countries. The analysis in the report suggests several measures that the EU should adopt to reduce corruption in its development aid programs:

Continue reading →

Guest Post: The United Nations, Post-Conflict Societies, and Whistleblower Protection — Understanding the Connections

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Ambassador Ugljesa Ugi Zvekic, Former Permanent Representative of the Republic of Serbia to the United Nations Senior Adviser and currently Adjunct Professor at LUISS School of Government in Rome, contributes the following guest post, which is based on research conducted by Ambassador Zvekic’s students Giorgio Sirtori, Alessandro Sabbini, and Alessandro Dowling:

Post-conflict countries are breeding grounds for corruption, due to the combination of weak (or non-existent) institutions, the chaos generated by both the previous conflict, the willingness of international interveners (and donors) to tolerate corruption as the price of stability. Indeed, of the sixteen ongoing international peacekeeping operations across the globe, almost all of these operations take place in some of the most corrupt areas of the world. While it is tempting to say that tackling corruption can and should be left to a later time, after basic needs have been met and basic rights have been guaranteed. But in fact our research, including case studies on international peacekeeping operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and Kosovo, reveals that corruption jeopardizes peacekeeping and state-building operations per se, and, consequently, it is vital to incorporate anticorruption efforts at the earliest stages of these kinds of operations.

Given the importance of anticorruption measures in state-building and peacekeeping operations, one issue that should be high up in the agenda of the United Nations is that of whistleblower protection. However, the UN’s own policy on internal whistleblowers has been disappointing, and jeopardizes the UN’s efforts to fight corruption and to promote accountability in post-conflict settings. Continue reading →

Reducing Corruption Risks in Public Works Construction: The Critical Role of Project Preparation

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Jill Wells, Senior Policy and Research Advisor, Engineers Against Poverty, contributes the following guest post:

With the creation of the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Global Infrastructure Facility, as much as an additional $1 trillion a year is likely to be invested in the construction of roads, power plants and other public works in the developing world over the next decade.  While this new investment could provide a welcome boost to economic growth and poverty alleviation, it could also be a curse.  Public works construction is regularly rated the most corrupt industry in Transparency International surveys, and if even a small percentage of this money is lost to corruption, the harm could be enormous.  The development community thus needs to step up efforts to help developing nations prevent corruption in the construction of public works.

To date, most prevention efforts have focused on the award of the contract to build the facility, but that decision is only one of many that must be taken in the process of selecting, preparing, and building new infrastructure.  A new report from the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre identifies the corruption risks at the pre-tender stage and explores how additional opportunities for corruption may arise at later stages of the project cycle when the initial selection and preparation process is compromised.   Continue reading →

Guest Post: The Characteristics of Corrupt Corporate Cultures

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Alison Taylor, the Director of Advisory Services for BSR (a global non-profit organization focused on sustainability) contributes the following guest post:

Despite all the investment in corporate anti-bribery compliance programs, supported by a lucrative consulting industry dominated by investigation companies and accounting and law firms, violations of anti-bribery laws, and firms’ own compliance policies, remains widespread. Why? The usual explanations focus on the external environment (“That’s just the way they do business over there”) or on “rogue employees,” but tend to neglect issues of “organizational culture”—how groups and teams behave when they might have a corruption problem. Yet organizational culture, structures, and incentives have been powerful factors in causing professionals to indulge in systemic corrupt practices.

But what, exactly, are the cultural drivers of corruption? What do a “culture of compliance” and its converse, a “culture of corruption,” actually look like? To find out I conducted in-depth, qualitative interviews with 23 experts on anti-corruption and corporate ethics. My questions were simple: What is the culture like in a corrupt organization? Can we generalize about leadership, decision-making, incentives, values, and behavior in corrupt organizations? Can we use these findings to understand the characteristics of an ethical culture?

The answers were revealing, and strikingly consistent in identifying the characteristics of organizational cultures prone to corruption. These traits, which I will summarize below, don’t guarantee that an organization will be corrupt — but the more of these characteristics are present, the more vulnerable an organization is. Continue reading →