FILSAFAT KORUPSI - Direktori File UPI

20) PATRICK GLYNN , STEPHEN J. KOBRIN AND M OISÉS NAÍM , The Globalization of Corruption, in
7-30 CORRUPTION AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY (Institute for International Economics, 1997).
21) See Samuel P. Huntington, P OLITICAL ORDER IN CHANGING SOCIETIES59-61 (Y ALE
UNIVERSITY PRESS , 1968).
22).See Nathaniel Leff, Economic Development through Bureaucratic Corruption, 3 AMERICAN
BEHAVIORAL SCIENTIST 8 (1964).
23). See Joseph S. Nye, Corruption and Political Development: a Cost-Benefit Analysis, 61 A
MERICAN POLITICAL S CIENCE REVIEW 417-427 (1967). 24 Assuming that, in poor countries, there
would be no other source of initial capital formation than corruption.
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3.2. Economic Theories of Corruption
Advancements in neoclassic economic theory during second half of last century were
instrumental to development of a more technical approach to corruption. The theory of
regulation argued that corruption would be a mechanism to impose bureaucratic barriers to other
competitors, reducing efficiency.25 This also led to the conclusion that officials must have
incentives to be honest 26). . Corruption would depend on the magnitude of possible benefits to
private parties under control of officials. The cost of corruption would be the probability of
being caught times the probability of being convicted times the punishment levied.
27). If costs are lower than benefits which the official can provide to a third party or himself, there is an
opportunity for corruption. Based on such approach, it would be reasonable to conclude that it is possible to
fight corruption by reducing power in the hands of public officials and by increasing penalties. As I
discussed above, the idea that transferring power from the executive power to the private sector
or independent agencies would reduce rent-seeking opportunities and corruption was common
during the economic transition in the 1990s. Also, such theory could justify the argument that
transferring power from the executive to Congress would reduce corruption because it would
disperse power and make it too expensive to bribe the majority of legislators. However, the
application of industrial organization theory to corruption analysis also demonstrated that
decentralizing power might be harmful because it makes corruption unpredictable.
28). Moreover, even under the economic theory of corruption, it is understood that ―the opportunities for
25). George Joseph Stigler. The citizen and the State: essays on regulation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1975.
26) Gary Becker and George J. Stigler. Law Enforcement, Malfeasance, and the Compensation of Enforcers, 3 J
OURNAL OF LEGAL S TUDIES , 1-19 (1974).
27).Susan Rose-Ackerman, The Political Economy of Corruption, in C ORRUPTION AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY
40 (Kimberly Ann Elliot, Ed., Institute for International Economics, 1997).
corruption remain high if bureaucrats and legislators can collude on a common strategy, despite
an institutionalized system of checks and balances.‖29. Also, increasing penalties might not be a
solution. Anti-corruption laws in Latin America had been widely used as weapons to delegitimize opposing
political groups or to destabilize governments, while also increasing perception of corruption instead of
reducing it.
3.3. Equity Theory of Corruption
Recently, anti-corruption efforts became a priority for multilateral organizations. Two
new approaches to the issue might have influenced this transformation of corruption from a
taboo subject into one of the most important development strategies. First, it was found that
perception of corruption reduces investment, once international investors would prefer to do
business in countries presenting lower risks. 30).
Second, it became clear that corruption has taxing effects on international investors, transferring part of the
investment return to local public officers without the counterpart of better public services. 31)
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