Guest Post: Is It Worth Recognizing Integrity? Rethinking the Anticorruption Prize Ecosystem

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GAB welcomes this contribution by Blair Glencorse, Co-CEO of Accountability Lab and Co-Founder of Civic Strength Partners and  Shally Baloch, Junior Networks and Partnerships Officer at Accountability Lab. Follow the Lab on Linkedin.

Global corruption costs trillions of dollars a year. Global prizes for anticorruption total just $7.5m.

If you’ve been around the anticorruption field long enough, you’ve probably seen them: the fearless reporters who uncover procurement scandals, the whistleblowers who refuse to stay quiet, the community organizers who stand up to kleptocrats and, every now and then, the spotlight moments when someone hands them a prize and says, “Thank you for your courage.”

At Accountability Lab, we lovingly call this “naming and faming” and it has been part of our DNA for almost 15 years. And honestly? It matters. Awards help bust through cynicism, amplify role models, and remind the world that integrity is alive and kicking. They energize movements and validate the people doing some of the hardest work on the planet.

But here is the thing few people talk about: the anticorruption award ecosystem itself. Who is celebrated? Who isn’t?  And who sets the rules? Is the recognition ecosystem actually aligned with today’s corruption challenges? And crucially, is it investing at a scale that matches the global corruption crisis?

As anticorruption day approaches once again, we mapped more than 40 prizes connected to integrity, transparency, journalism, rule of law, and governance to understand the landscape. (List here.) What we found is both encouraging and deeply revealing.

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Links to Broadcast of Sessions of the 2nd Global Conference on Harnessing Data to Improve Corruption Measurement

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The conference is now in progress in New York. Links to broadcasts and complete program below.

Tuesday, 2 December
Morning Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k12/k1293vkug5
Afternoon Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1h/k1hxein4pi

Wednesday, 3 December
Morning Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1v/k1vqh17p0m
Afternoon Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1a/k1adqsg02k

Thursday, 4 December
Morning Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1s/k1suy8jmkw
Afternoon Sessions: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k15/k15wx12g4l

Conference Website
https://hdcmprogramme.my.canva.site/2-4-december-2025

Cuando la corrupción nos toca

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A session on corruption victims, Cuando la corrupción nos toca: participación de víctimas y organizaciones de la sociedad civil en la lucha contra la corrupción, will be held in connection with the 194th Period of Sessions of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. 

The session will examine how corruption directly impacts individuals and communities and will highlight the role that victims and civil society organizations can play in advancing justice and promoting comprehensive reparations. Featuring leading experts from across the Latin American region, the discussion will focus on the opportunities and challenges involved in participating in judicial processes related to corruption with human rights implications. 

The event will take place on November 19, 2025, in hybrid format in Spanish from the University of Miami. Register here.

The Failure to Limit the Corruption of Global Capital

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This past April I was fortunate enough to attend a wide-ranging discussion at the Stanford Business School of what the growing power of global capital and the declining trust in government institutions means for the future of capitalism and democracy.

Not surprisingly corruption emerged as a major theme.

Speakers examined everything from the failure of multinational corporations to enforce their own ethics codes to the rise of a profession devoted to helping corrupt officials hide stolen assets to the OCED’s failure to crack down on Italy’s breach of the Antibribery Convention.

A link to the conference papers is here. My summary of what was said about the transnational spread of corruption and measures to curb it, published on the ProMarket page of the University of Chicago’s Stigler Center, is here.

An extraordinary app, NotebookLM, converted the summary into a dialogue explaining the summary and exploring its implications.  It is here.( A physicist friend had raved about how NotebookLM made his technical papers understandable to lay audiences. I didn’t believe him until I heard the dialogue it created off the summary. I am astonished at the result.) 

Georgia at the Crossroads: The MEGOBARI Act As a Rule-of-Law Lifeline

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GAB welcomes this post by Giorgi Meladze, Associate Professor at Ilia State University School of Law in Tbilisi and an invited lecturer at European Humanities University; Konstantine Chakhunashvili, PhD Associate Professor at Caucasus University; and Nadia Asaad, journalist and researcher working with the Center for Applied Nonviolent Action and Strategies and a graduate student at the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po).

Once praised as a “Beacon of Democracy,” Georgia now faces mounting concerns over its slide towards authoritarian rule. Under the influence of oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili, the country’s ruling elite is consolidating power through corrupt, authoritarian practices. While the United States and several European Union member states have already responded with sanctions targeting key decision-makers and their associates, Washington lawmakers are now debating legislation supported by both Republicans and Democrats to ratchet up the pressure.

The Mobilizing and Enhancing Georgia’s Options for Building Accountability, Resilience, and Independence (the MEGOBARI Act) would require the President to impose new sanctions on Georgian leaders and anyone “engaged in significant acts of corruption or acts of violence or intimidation in relation to the blocking of Euro-Atlantic integration in Georgia.” It is an essential element in defending democracy and the rule of law in Georgia. which in turn will help prevent organized crime networks operating through and in Georgia from fueling Russia’s war machine and undermining Euro-Atlantic integration.

After a decade of state capture, cosmetic “reforms”, and the consolidation of informal power networks, all documented by the Basel Institute, a sanctions regime codified by MEGOBARI Act and calibrated to the Georgian context is no longer optional: it is critical to prevent Georgia’s antidemocratic leanings from infecting its neighbors.

This post documents the Georgian state’s slide into a “cartel-state” and explains how MEGOBARI and other measures by U.S. and EU can arrest it.

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Balancing Enforcement and Anticorruption Messaging: Lessons from an Anti-Vote Buying Project in Moldova

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GAB welcomes this timely and important Guest Post on vote buying by Corina Rebegea, Non-Resident Fellow at the Accountability Lab, and Katie Fox, Eurasia Deputy Regional Director at the National Democratic Institute (NDI).

A common concern in combating vote buying is the ineffectiveness of typical awareness campaigns (here). An NDI program in Moldova suggests a more successful strategy: combine robust law enforcement with tailored, empowering public messaging. Rather than relying on fear or blame, this approach centers on voter dignity and institutional integrity, offering valuable lessons for combating electoral corruption worldwide.

Although the evidence comes from a single country, the Moldovan experience offers several lessons to inform future efforts to prevent vote buying:

  • Negative messages tend to amplify distrust in elections, so the focus needs to shift from portraying elections as “stolen” to highlighting efforts to ensure their integrity.
  • Identifying trusted actors in society is essential for raising awareness of what constitutes electoral corruption and conveying deterrent messages. In Moldova, the police emerged as an increasingly trusted force, potentially due to their involvement in anti-vote buying investigations.
  • Messages that raise confidence and emphasize individual responsibility resonate better than those that blame or threaten citizens. Awareness-raising about the legal consequences will be well-received, but only among certain demographics, so an in-depth understanding of the different audiences is essential.
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Mexico’s Supreme Court Defines Compliance and Sets Corporate Standards

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GAB is pleased to publish this Guest Post by Carlos G. Guerrero-Orozco, a Mexican litigation attorney and partner at the law firm López Melih y Estrada in Mexico City.

Last month, the Mexican Supreme Court issued a landmark decision addressing corporate compliance programs in the context of a civil suit for damages. The decision brings Mexico closer to international practices, particularly those of the United States, where compliance frameworks have long been enforceable standards rather than aspirational corporate policies.

Case 11/2025 (here) decided by the Supreme Court, represents a milestone for compliance in Mexico’s private sector. It is the first time the Supreme Court has analyzed corporate conduct, defined compliance, and set corporate parameters for its enforcement.

What stands out in this case is the creativity of the underlying lawsuit. It marks the first time a third party has sought to enforce a company’s Code of Conduct and compliance program to claim civil liability.

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Civil Society Should Have a Role in Reviewing Compliance with UNCAC

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A critical if little noticed meeting on the fight against corruption took place in Vienna the first week in September (here). The Implementation Review Group of the Conference of States Parties to the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, a committee of all 191 parties to the Convention with responsibility for ensuring each party complies with its terms, discussed proposals for strengthening enforcement.

The Convention is the single most important initiative ever taken to curb corruption. Each party pledges not only to make bribery, embezzlement, and other corrupt acts a crime under their domestic law but to actively enforce these laws. Full compliance by all state parties would turn corruption from a pressing national and international priority to a subject of mainly historical interest.

That corruption is not yet the province of historians is because responsibility for ensuring states fully comply with the Convention has been left to their governments. Initially, each government simply reported how well it was meeting its treaty obligations. The review mechanism was later enlarged to include a neighboring state and second from outside the region. The expanded review is a cooperative process with the reviewed government holding a veto over the reviewers’ conclusions.

The reviews produced some progress (here), often thanks to behind the scenes cajoling by the UNODC, which provides technical support to the reviews. It hardly needs saying, however, that leaving it to a government to judge whether it is vigorously combatting corruption means full compliance with UNCAC remains a chimera.

It is for this reason that the UNCAC Coalition, a global network of almost 400 civil society organizations in over 120 countries, has been laser focused on including citizens in the assessment process. Its latest effort: a statement from UN human rights experts it coordinated. Addressed to the Implementation Review Group, the experts urge UNCAC States Parties to protect and expand civic space in national and global anti-corruption fora and strengthen the inclusiveness and transparency of the UNCAC review mechanism.

The signatories, their statement, and additional information on the review mechanism are in this letter by UNCAC Coalition Managing Director Mathias Huter.

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The Trump Administration’s Enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: Interim Report

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On February 10, President Trump ordered a pause in the enforcement of the FCPA. His executive order claimed that its enforcement damaged American businesses while “impeding United States’ foreign policy objectives.” The order directed Attorney General Pamela Bondi to stop enforcing the act for 180 days to provide time to assess current enforcement policy and update the Department’s enforcement guidelines.

During the pause, some cases proceeded as normal. One FCPA defendant was sentenced and trials in three cases remained at least provisionally on track (here).

Other cases were derailed. One against two former executives of Cognizant Technology Solutions was dismissed, and several FCPA practitioners reported investigations they were handling were halted.

No official data on the number of investigations or cases dropped has been released, but there are insider reports.

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Preserving the Independence of Anticorruption Institutions Under Pressure From War, Politics, and Populism: Lessons from the Ukraine Crisis

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On July 22 Ukraine’s parliament approved without debate or warning legislation sharply curbing the independence of Ukraine’s corruption fighting agencies. Nine days later it okayed a second bill largely repealing the curbs. In between were massive demonstrations by citizens protesting the July 22 law and threats by the European Union to cut financial support.

Ukraine’s Institute for Legislative Ideas today published a report offering lessons from these events. The think tank’s analysis explains who and what was behind the attempt to defang the nation’s anticorruption agency and special corruption prosecutor and how the sudden backtracking is likely to affect Ukraine’s fight against corruption. Along the way the report provides a careful legal analysis of the July 22 legislation, what the second bill repeals and what it leaves intact; the stated reason for the July 22 law (cleanse the agencies of “Russian influence”); the real reason for its passage (investigations were getting too close to those in power), and what civil society and international partners must do to ensure there is no further effort to undermine the fight.

Critical reading not only for those concerned about corruption in Ukraine but for those in other nations where a transnational coalition is working to keep the corruption fight on track.

The English text of the report is here.