Political Corruption in America: A Search for Definitions ... - See also

Political Corruption in America: A Search for Definitions and a Theory, or If PoliticalCorruption Is in the Mainstream of American Politics Why Is it Not in the Mainstream ofAmerican Politics Research?Author(s): John G. Peters and Susan WelchSource: The American Political Science Review, Vol. 72, No. 3 (Sep., 1978), pp. 974-984Published by: American Political Science AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1955115 .Accessed: 19/12/2010 19:33Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unlessyou have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and youmay use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at .http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=apsa. .Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printedpage of such transmission.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.American Political Science Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access toThe American Political Science Review.http://www.jstor.org

Political Corruption in America:A Search for Definitions and a Theory, orIf Political Corruption Is in the Mainstream of American PoliticsWhy Is It Not in the Mainstream of American Politics Research?*JOHN G. PETERSSUSAN WELCHUniversity of Nebraska, LincolnLack of a clear definition of political corruption has limited its systematic study by analysts ofAmerican politics. This article offers a conceptual framework with which to view corruption. Acorrupt act is categorized by its four components: the donor, the favor, the public official and thepayoff. For each component, propositions about perceived corrupt and noncorrupt elements canbe formulated and tested. The usefulness of this scheme in analyzing attitudes about corruption isdemonstrated with data from state legislators. Finally, the article suggests some future researchpossibilities using this scheme to compare elites and public or other groupings in the politicalsystem.Though corruption has been an everpresentpart of American political life (cf. Tooqueville,1861), analysts of American politics have notstudied it systematically (for exceptions, seeGreenstein, 1964; Gardiner, 1970; Wolfinger,1972). This paper offers a conceptual schemewhich circumvents definitional problems thathave posed such a roadblock to the systematicstudy of corruption. We also provide someattitudinal data about corrupt acts gatheredfrom state senators across the U.S. and showhow our scheme contributes to the analysis ofthis data. Finally, some reasonable future researchdirections for the study of corruptionare briefly discussed.Definitions of Political CorruptionThe attention devoted to a serious examinationof corruption in America occurs largely atthose times when particularly venal acts havebeen exposed. Thus, the post-Watergate periodhas brought with it a renewed interest in thestudy of political corruption, especially amongpolitical scientists (cf. Rundquist et al., 1977;Scoble, 1973; Gardiner 1970, Berg et al.,1976). In all of these studies it becomesimmediately apparent that no matter what*The authors would like to thank Barry S. Rundquist,University of Illinois-Urbana, and Alan Booth,University of Nebraska-Lincoln for their helpful comments.This project was supported by a grant from theUniversity of Nebraska Research Council.974aspect of American politics is examined, thesystematic study of corruption is hampered bythe lack of an adequate definition. What maybe "corrupt" to one citizen, scholar, or publicofficial is "just politics" to another, or "indiscretion"to a third. Several definitions ofpolitical corruption have been proposed andgSeerallyf w be tsuiftd according to *wreecriteria: definitions based on legality, definitionsbased on the public interest, and definitionsbased on public opinion (Scott, 1972).The definition of political corruption basedon legalistic criteria assumes that political behavioris corrupt when it violates some formalstandard or rule of behavior set down by apolitical system for its public officials. Perhapsthe clearest statement of this definition hasbeen given by J. S. Nye when he stated that apolitical act is corrupt when it "deviates fromthe formal duties of a public role (elective orappointive) because of private-regarding (personal,close family, private clique) wealth orstatus gains: or violates rules against the exerciseof certain types of private-regarding influence"(Nye, 1967, p. 416). While such adefinition of corruption is useful to the researcherin that it is generally clear-cut and canbe operationalized, when the behavior in questionallegedly deviates from a legal norm orstandard which is not tied to a specific statuteor court ruling, this definition of politicalcorruption becomes less useful as the formalduties of office or the appropriate rules ofinfluence become ambiguous. Moreover, thisdefinition suffers from being simultaneouslytoo narrow and too broad in scope; all illegal

1978 Political Corruption in America 975acts are not necessarily corrupt and all corruptacts are not necessarily illegal.1Definitions of political corruption based onnotions of the public or common interestsignificantly broaden the range of behavior onemight investigate. Consider the definition proposedby Arnold Rogow and Harold Lasswell:"A corrupt act violates responsibility toward atleast one system of public or civic order and isin fact incompatible with (destructive of) anysuch system" (Rogow and Lasswell, 1966, pp.132-33). While this definition focuses ourattention on any act or set of acts whichthreaten to destroy a political system, theresearcher has the responsibility of determiningwhat the public or common interest is beforeassessing whether a particular act is corrupt.The possibility exists that a behavior may beproscribed by law as corrupt but be beneficialfor the common good, such as "fixing" thepapers of an illegal alien who contributed hislabor and skills to a rapidly expanding economy.Furthermore, this definition enables apolitician to justify almost any act by claimingthat it is in the public interest.A third approach to the definitional problemsuggests that a political act is corrupt when theweight of public opinion determines it so (see,for example, Rundquist and Hansen, 1976).This conception of political corruption harborsthe same limitations as the public interestfocus. Studies of public opinion have revealedthat on many issues public sentiments are eitherambiguous (significant portions of the publichold no opinion or hold those of low intensity)or are divided in their opinions. Additionally, adefinition of corruption based on public opinionmust consider the differences which mayexist between the public and political elites intheir assessment of appropriate standards ofpublic conduct.This approach to political corruption isprobably best illustrated in the work of ArnoldJ. Heidenheimer (1970). In his view the corruptnessof political acts is determined by theinteraction between the judgment of a particularact by the public and by political elitesor public officials. According to this scheme,behavior is judged particularly heinous or corruptif both public officials and the publicjudge it corrupt and both wish it restricted.This type of behavior is referred to as "black"corruption. An act such as "a public officialinvolved in heroin trafficking" would mostlBerg, Hahn, and Schmidhauser (1976, p. 170)discuss seminars being conducted for large campaigndonors on how to use the loopholes in the newcampaign fund laws.likely fit this category in that both groups findthe act reprehensible and would demandpunishment for the guilty public official. At theother end of the corruption spectrum might becategorized political acts judged corrupt byboth public officials and the people, but whichneither feel are severe enough to warrantsanction. Quite possibly such acts of "white" orpetty corruption as a city council memberfixing a parking ticket for a constituent fall intothis category. Between these two extremes ofcorruption acts lie the forms of behavior whichare the most difficult to define and detect, andconsequently are potentially most destructiveto a political system organized along democraticprinciples. Heidenheimer refers to thesepolitical acts as "gray corruption" when eitherpublic officials or the people want to see anaction punished, while the other group doesnot, or it may well be that one group is intenseabout the issue and the other ambivalent orunconcerned.2 Heidenheimer's work in thisarea, therefore, points to the existence of ascale or dimension of corruption that can beused to classify political behaviors according totheir degree of corruptness from "black" to"gray" to "white." It does not, however,account very well for those acts seen as corruptby only one group, nor does it seek to explainwhy some groups may see an act as corrupt butother groups see it as less corrupt. Althoughthis conception of political corruption is basedon the criterion of opinion (both public andelite), the assessment of a specific political actmay rest on violation of a legal norm or a threatto the public interest. In other words, definitionsof corruption are not mutually exclusive:elements of the public interest and publicopinion criteria are embedded in legal normswhich sanction certain political behaviors ascorrupt.Although the Heidenheimer scheme enablesus to classify politically corrupt acts in ageneral way, a more detailed scheme seemsrequired if we are to classify adequately the2Harry Scoble (1973) refers to the situation (graycorruption) where public officials tolerate a corruptact or practice and citizens are unaware or ignorant ofthe act but would condemn it if they knew about it as"systemic corruption." Moreover, this view of politicalcorruption is useful and important in that it leads toan emphasis on the basic defects and weaknesses in thepolitical system which may be responsible for corruption(see Berg, Hahn, and Schmidhauser, 1976).Therefore, rather than attributing such phenomena as"Watergate" to the weaknesses and foibles of individualpolitical actors, the "systemic view" of corruptionwould lead to a search for the sources of "Watergate"in the defects of the political process itself.

976 The American Political Science Review Vol. 72many variations of corrupt acts, and if we areto develop an explanation of why some acts arejudged corrupt and others not. We propose toanalyze potentially corrupt acts according tothe component elements apparently involvedwith every political act or exchange. We believethis process can meaningfully be partitionedinto the "public official" involved, the actual"favor" provided by the public official, the"payoff" gained by the public official, and the"donor" of the payoff and/or "recipient" ofthe "favor" act. Although at this early stage inthe development of a theory of political corruptionit would be too much to claim to beable to specify the exact nature of each of thesecomponents and its relation to the others, wedo believe that examining acts of politicalcorruption in this manner might hold the keyto a better understanding of why public officialsperceive some acts as corrupt and othersas "just politics," and why public officials andthe public may differ in their assessment.When discussing the subdimensions of eachcomponent of a potentially corrupt act, we willbe stating some propositions about what actswill be seen as corrupt. Those propositions willbe discussed in some detail later. When examininga "public official" involved in an alleged actof corruption, we are particularly interested inwhether the act was entered into in theperformance of the official's political duties.Presumably, an act which is considered malfeasance,misfeasance, or nonfeasance of publicduty is more corrupt than a behavior engaged inoutside of one's official political role. In otherwords, misusing one's political office for privategain is more objectionable than engaging inquestionable behavior outside of one's officialduties.3A second characteristic of the public officialthat seems to determine whether behavior is tobe judged corrupt is the political nature of thepublic official's role. If a public official is in ajudicial or other nonpolitical post, certain actsare more likely to be seen as corrupt than if thepublic official holds a political post. For example,judges have traditionally been held tohigher standards with regard to conflict-ofinterestsituations than legislators. With the newcongressional actions to regulate conflict ofinterest, it is possible that this situation may bechanging at the national level, however.The second component of a politically corruptact is the "donor" of the payoff or"recipient" of the political favor. It is most3The recent example of Congressman Allan Howe's(D-Utah) alleged solicitation of a prostitute might be agood example. He committed an illegal act, but itwould hardly be called the misuse of public office.This is not to say that the voters in his district judgedhim any less harshly. The other recent "congressionalsex scandal," that of Congressman Wayne Hayes, whoallegedly put Elizabeth Ray on the payroll onlybecause she was his mistress, more rightly fits into themisuse of public office category, and thus would bejudged more politically corrupt.Table 1. Components of a Potentially Corrupt Act and Some Salient CharacteristicsComponent More Corrupt Less CorruptPublic OfficialType of Position "Nonpolitical," i.e., the official Politicalis a judgeRole when Act Performed Public Role, i.e., act is done as Private Role, i.e., act is performed bypart of official's public duties public official acting as a privatecitizenDonor's Relation to Public Official Nonconstituent pays official Constituent pays officialPublic official pays selfFavor Rendered by Public OfficialType of Benefit Private PublicType of Recipient Nonconstituent ConstituentNature of Act Providing Nonroutine, i.e., official departs Routine, i.e., favor is performed asFavor from normal routine to provide routine part of jobfavorPayoffSize Large SmallTime when Benefits Accrueto Donor Short-range benefit Long-range benefitSubstance Specific GeneralRelation to Campaign Noncampaign Campaign

1978 Political Corruption in America 977important to determine if the "donor" is aconstituent, broadly defined, or a nonconstituent.If the donor is a constituent, then a"favor" given is more likely to be perceived asless corrupt than if the favor is rendered to anonconstituent. The reason is obvious: actswhich are performed under the rubric of"constituency service," no matter how questionable,have a certain legitimacy. Of twosimilar, potentially corrupt acts, the odds arethat the constituency-related act will be judgedless corrupt than the service rendered to thenonconstituent. Beard and Horn (1975) offertwo examples supporting this proposition. Inone case, members of Congress were askedabout the legitimacy of putting favorable articlesabout campaign donors in the CongressionalRecord, as a "thank you" to donors. Thiswas seen as more legitimate if the donor were aconstituent rather than a firm outside thedistrict. A second example involved acceptingrides to and from one's congressional district ona national firm's private plane. If the firm hadties to the constituency, accepting such favorswas seen as more legitimate than if the firm hadno such ties. Probably the most corrupt situationis when the donor is the public officialhimself. If the public official can directly enrichhimself by tapping the public till, he himself isthe donor. Examples of this include paddingthe expense account, using public funds forpersonal travel, using money allocated foroffice expenses for personal activities, and soon.Another characteristic to be considered iswhether the "donor" of the payoff (recipientof the "favor") is more than one privateindividual or firm. We argue that the singledonor will be perceived as making an actionmore corrupt than if the donor is a large groupof individuals or firms.A third component to consider is the "favor"provided by the public official. We cansurmise that the corruptness of the favor willvary in some ways as does the nature of thedonor. Private favors and nonconstituency favorswill be seen as more corrupt than thosewith large public benefit or those done for aconstituent.4 Finally, if the favor is done inroutine performance of duty rather than extraordinaryactivity, it is less likely to be seen ascorrupt. For example, a member of Congresswho makes a routine phone call to a federal4Even though the dimensions of "favor" are similarto those outlined for the "donor," there are somedifferences. For example, it is conceivable that aprivate donor might pay for a favor having publicbenefit.agency to check on a federal contract of a firmwhose officers supported the Congress memberin an election campaign is less likely to beviewed as performing a corrupt act than onewho makes threats or acts in a way that thefederal bureaucrat perceives as nonroutine.The fourth component of a potentiallycorrupt act, the "payoff" given to the publicofficial, is possibly the most important determinantof its perceived corruptness. The obviousfact to consider is, of course, the size of thepayoff. It should come as no surprise that thelarger the payoff, the greater the perceiveddegree of corruptness in the act, although as weshall see later on, just what is "large" can bedifficult to agree upon. The payoff can alsovary according to the long- versus short-rangenature of the benefit to the public official. Wewould assume that a short-range benefit wouldbe perceived as more corrupt than a payoff thatwill yield benefits at a much later date, becausethe long-range payoff is separated in time fromthe favor done. Consider, for instance, anofficial of a regulatory agency who takes alucrative position in a regulated corporationafter leaving government service. Presumablythe official looked with some benevolence onthe activities of the corporation while in publicoffice; if that official had been given animmediate tangible payoff, for example a giftof money, we think most people would chargecorruption. But the later payoff probably isseen by many as legitimate.5In a similar vein, the payoff can be distinguishedas to whether it is specific or general.If a payoff takes specific form, such as moneyor a service rendered, it will likely be perceivedas more corrupt than a general payoff, such asfuture electoral support or good will. Althoughthis is a rather special case of payoff, it is alsoimportant to determine if a gift is related to apolitical campaign. Payoffs in the form ofcampaign contributions have a legitimacy notrendered to other forms of material payoffs. A$1,000 cash donation to a campaign is perfectlyacceptable, while an equal amount offered as apersonal gift to a public official subjects thedonor and official to possible legal penalties.In Table 1, we have summarized the basiccomponents of a politically corrupt act, andindicated the dimensions in each componentwhich can vary according to perceived corruptness.In outlining these components and theirsalient characteristics, we have articulated a5President Carter, however, has extracted pledgesfrom his high-level appointees that they will not takejobs with firms doing business with or regulated bytheir agency for a period of two years.

978 The American Political Science Review Vol. 72large number of testable propositions about theconditions under which an act can and will beviewed as corrupt. We have only outlinedpropositions at the first level, i.e., dealing witheach subdimension singly, and have not definedpropositions dealing with more than one subdivisionat a time. Certainly an act having mostor all of the characteristics listed on the leftside is considered more corrupt than one havingonly characteristics on the right. Which componentsare most important in determining corruptnessis a researchable question not answeredhere. Yet taking a broader view, ourrudimentary scheme offers a conceptual frameworkfor analyzing and comparing potentiallycorrupt political acts. This framework allows usto circumvent the definitional problems surroundingthe meaning of "corruption."The Study DesignOur study was designed specifically to ascertaininformation on attitudes about corruptionheld by a large group of public officials. Wemailed questionnaires to all 978 state senatorsin 24 states.6 After three mailings, 441 senatorshad responded with completed questionnaires.7Response rate by state ranged from only 21percent in California to over 78 percent fromNorth Dakota. Generally, response rate wasslightly higher in the rural states than in theindustrialized ones.86AM1 of our mailings, sent in October, Decemberand January, 1975-76 were sent to the senators'home addresses, in order to minimize the possibilitythat the senator would delegate filling out the questionnaireto a staff member or legislative intern. Thestates surveyed were ALABAMA, California, Connecticut,Florida, Georgia, Illinois, IOWA, Kansas,Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, MICHIGAN, Minnesota,MISSOURI, Nevada, New Jersey, New York,NORTH DAKOTA, Oregon, PENNSYLVANIA,TEXAS, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Thesestates were picked randomly, with a few substitutionsto assure geographic dispersion (after our initialrandom selection, we had eight southern states but nostates from the industrial Middle West). Only some ofthe nonrespondents, those from the states listed incapital letters, were sent a third-wave questionnaire.7For a discussion of the rationale behind theshorter, third-wave questionnaire, see Welch and Peters(1977a).81n addition to California, only New York (25percent) had a response rate of less than 30 percent.Three more had response rates less than 40 percent:Massachusetts (30 percent), Illinois (32 percent), andMassachusetts (32 percent). On the other hand, eightstates had a response rate of more than 50 percent:North Dakota (78 percent), Utah (62 percent), Iowa(62 percent), Alabama (60 percent), Maine (58 per-The major focus of the questionnaire was aseries of items concerning ten actions by publicofficials that might or might not be consideredcorrupt. As sometimes happens, we have sincefound problems and lack of clarity in some ofthe items. These problems will be discussedlater. The items are as follows (in the orderlisted on the questionnaire):1. A presidential candidate who promises anambassadorship in exchange for campaigncontributions (AMBASSADOR);2. A member of Congress using seniority toobtain a weapons contract for a firm inhis or her district (WEAPONS).3. A public official using public funds forpersonal travel (TRAVEL);4. A secretary of defense who owns$50,000 in stock in a company withwhich the Defense Department has amillion-dollar contract (DEFENSESTOCK);5. A public official using influence to get afriend or relative admitted to law school(LAW SCHOOL);6. The driveway of the mayor's home beingpaved by the city crew (DRIVEWAY);7. A state assembly member while chairpersonof the public roads committee authorizingthe purchase of land s/he hadrecently acquired (LAND SALE);8. A judge with $50,000 worth of stock in acorporation hearing a case concerningthat firm (JUDGE);9. A legislator accepting a large campaigncontribution in return for voting "theright way" on a legislative bill (RIGHTWAY);10. A member of Congress who holds a largeamount of stock (about $50,000 worth)in Standard Oil of New Jersey working tomaintain the oil depletion allowance(OIL).We omitted items on which we felt therewould be near total consensus, either becausethey were so serious or because they were sotrivial: at one extreme, for example, a publicofficial engaging in heroin traffic, and at theother, a policeman taking a free cup of coffeefrom a local cafe. We asked several questionsabout each item, with five degrees of response.In this article we will examine responses to thecent), Kansas (53 percent), Wyoming (53 percent),and Oregon (53 percent).

1978 Political Corruption in America 979question as to whether the act was believed tobe corrupt or not.FindingsWe do not have enough items to exploresystematically a number of propositions thatcould be generated by our work, but we willuse these data in ways that indicate theusefulness of our scheme in analyzing corruption.We first ranked the items according to theproportion agreeing that the act was corrupt orvery corrupt (Table 3). In Table 2 we havesketched the most salient characteristics of eachact, according to our fourfold scheme; we havealso outlined the characteristics of a hypotheticalact in which a member of Congress in adistrict with a large percent of minority populationsvotes in favor of the civil rights act(CIVIL RIGHTS). In return, members of civilrights groups in the district support the memberof Congress in a reelection bid. We judge thatfew would see anything corrupt in this sequenceof events.The first conclusion from Table 3 is that theacts considered corrupt by most people havemany characteristics starred (where starredcharacteristics indicate more corrupt features,i.e., features on the left-hand side of Table 1).Clusters of stars are particularly apparent in the"payoff" boxes. Acts considered by few to becorrupt have few stars; CIVIL RIGHTS hasonly one. Those acts whose corruptness is mostdisputed have an intermediate number of characteristicsstarred. We can also immediately seethat any one attribute, in isolation, probablydoes not determine corruptness. For example,an act performed in one's public role may leadto corruption, but simply knowing that anofficial performed an act as part of a public roletells us nothing by itself. Unfortunately notenough information was given to classify fullysome of the acts on our four components.Greater specificity may have changed the publicofficials' responses, and would also have madethe pattern of classification clearer.Four acts were perceived as corrupt by over90 percent of our sample: RIGHT WAYDRIVEWAY, TRAVEL, and LAND SALE.While two of these acts involve minor sums ofmoney, all are illegal and all result in personalfinancial gain for the public official. In terms ofour four components we can say that three ofthe four acts are characterized by the merger ofthe donor and the public official role. That is,in the cases of DRIVEWAY, TRAVEL, andLAND SALE, the public official is in theposition of personally ensuring direct financialgain. Of our ten examples, these are the onlythree where such a merger is the case, and arethe instances of highest consensus. The fourthcase perceived as corrupt by over 90 percent isRIGHT WAY. Here the donor is not the publicofficial but an unspecified second party. However,the payoff is very direct and immediate,though in the context of a campaign contribution.We assume that if a campaign contributionwere not involved, almost all would have seenthe act as corrupt. RIGHT WAY might becompared with another example, OIL, wherethe payoff from voting a certain way is muchmore indirect and long-range (i.e., the possibleincrease in the value of the legislator's stock),and fewer see this type of payoff as corrupt. Insum, from these four examples, we infer thatthese illegal acts are judged highly corruptbecause of the merger of the donor and publicofficial role in three cases, and because of thedirect and monetary gain in exchange for a votein the fourth.At the other end of the continuum, less than40 percent of the sample found LAW SCHOOLand the WEAPONS examples corrupt. Theseacts might be characterized as rather minorforms of influence peddling. In both cases, thepayoff is indirect and long-range: good will thatperhaps increases the possibility of future campaignsupport. In both cases the donor ispresumably a constituent. The acts themselvesobviously are seen by most as routine kinds offavors that public officials try to do forconstituents, and thus only a minority areWilling to call the acts corrupt.Our fourfold typology also sheds some lighton why there is some ambiguity about theseacts. While the payoff is long-range, the donor aconstituent, it is implied that doing the favortakes the legislator outside the narrow performanceof legislative duty. While the questionis unfortunately silent about some aspects ofthe transaction, it can be presumed that thelegislator is calling the law school dean ormembers of the admissions committee in theone instance, and perhaps putting undue pressureon a bureaucrat in the other. These actswould be considered by some to be oversteppingthe normal scope of a legislator's activity,but by others as routinely trying to provide aconstituent service. Perhaps a clarification ofthe item would allow a better interpretation.The acts where there is the least consensusare conflict of interest activities: OIL, DE-FENSE STOCK, JUDGE, and AMBASSADOR.In each case, public officials are in the positionof furthering personal financial interests whilemaking a decision in their public role. In thecase of DEFENSE STOCK, OIL and JUDGE,public officials are in the position of performinga favor (i.e., casting a favorable vote orawarding a contract) for which the payoff is an

980 The American Political Science Review Vol. 72increase in the value of their own stock. Unlikethe DRIVEWAY, TRAVEL or LANDSALEinstances, legislators are not the sole donors,although they are in the position of being pastdonors. Public officials, by their acts, cannotconvert favors directly into payoffs. Otherevents might have an impact on the stock'svalue, regardless of a public official's favor.And, the payoff is much less direct than a cashgrant or immediate service rendered. The governmentcontract, the favorable court ruling,the increased oil depletion allowance may ormay not increase stockholders' dividends. Onthe other hand, the payoff is more tangiblethan the generalized "good will" engendered bythe WEAPONS or LAW SCHOOL acts.Other factors are also involved in comparingconflict-of-interest acts to the others previouslyTable 2. Characteristics of Ten Potentially Corrupt ActsAct Public Official Donor Favor PayoffDRIVEWAY Political, public role* Self* Private* Large (?)*Specific*Short-range*Noncampaign*TRAVEL Political, public role* Self* Private* Large*Specific*Short-range*Noncampaign*LAND SALE Political, public role* Self* Private* Large*Specific*Short-range*Noncampaign*RIGHT WAY Political, public role* Unclear ? Unclear ? Large*Specific*Short-range*CampaignJUDGE Nonpolitical,* public Unclear ? (in part)* Unclear Indeterminate sizerole* Self Potential Specific*Private*Long-rangeRoutine act NoncampaignAMBASSADOR Political, public role* Constituent Private* Large*Constituent Specific*Routine act Short-range*CampaignDEFENSE STOCK Political, public role* Unclear, in part self* Unclear Indeterminate size(?) ~~~~~~~~~~Potential Speciflc*Private * Long-rangeRoutineNoncampaign*OILPolitical, public role* Unclear, in part self* Unclear Indeterminate sizePotentialSpeciflc*Private * Long-rangeRoutineNoncampaign*WEAPONS Political, public role* Unclear, possibly Unclear, possibly SmallCONTRACT constituent nonroutine* NonspecificLong-rangeNoncampaignLAW SCHOOL Political, unclear Unclear, possibly Unclear, possibly Smallconstituent nonroutine* NonspecificLong-rangeNoncampaignCIVIL RIGHTS Political, public role* Constituent Routine SmallConstituent NonspecificPublicLong-rangePossibly campaign*More corrupt.

1978 Political Corruption in America 981discussed. The size of the payoff as well as itsimmediacy influences an official's perception ofcorruption. We cannot demonstrate that withour data, as all involve $50,000 worth of stock.Beard and Horn (1975), however, offer arelevant example. More Congress members believeit more corrupt for a legislator to cast avote for benefits to the savings and loanindustry when the legislator owns $100,000worth of stock rather than only $5000 (1975,p. 22). In our own data, several people indicatedthat if instead of owning $50,000 ofstock, the Secretary of Defense were a "major"stockholder, then the taint of corruption mightbe greater.Finally, in these four items we can see thatthe nature of the public office is also relevant.The conflict of interest involving a judge wasbelieved more odious than that involving eithera bureaucrat or a member of Congress. A judge,in a nonpolitical role, is held to higher standardsthan are legislators.The AMBASSADOR items differ from theOIL, DEFENSE and JUDGE acts. The payoff, acampaign donation, is much more immediate.The donor, however, is providing a campaigncontribution rather than funds to be usedsimply for personal enrichment. To us, theAMBASSADOR and RIGHT WAY cases seemparallel. In one case, the favor is a vote, inanother, an appointment. Why the former isseen as more corrupt is undoubtedly becausethe "spoils system" of appointment has aresidue of legitimacy that the practice of"voting for pay" has not.Our typology of corrupt acts helps explainwhy these conflict-of-interest behaviors areoften ambiguous. As the payoff becomes moreand more long-range, and the donor and favorsare constituency-oriented, it is easy to arguethat an act is not corrupt. Most public officialshope that all acts have some positive payoff forthem, principally reelection (Mayhew, 1975),and doing constituency-oriented favors is oneway to increase the probability of reelection.99Jack Anderson commented on this point in arecent "expose" of congressional misbehavior:"Favors are part of a politician's stock in trade. He isexpected to produce government jobs, public worksprojects, appointments to military academies andTable 3. Percent Agreeing Act Is CorruptPercent ofPercent ofRespondents Believing Respondents BelievingPercent of Most Public Officials Most of PublicRespondents Viewing Would Condemn Would CondemnThis Act as Corrupt This Act This ActDRIVEWAY 95.9 92.2 97.5TRAVEL 95.2 80.4 96.5LAND SALE 95.1 92.1 97.5RIGHT WAY 91.9 82.2 94.3JUDGE 78.8 82.3 91.0AMBASSADOR 71.1 44.5 81.2DEFENSE STOCK 58.3 62.1 84.4OIL 54.9 55.1 81.2WEAPONS CONTRACT 31.6 20.9 34.4LAW SCHOOL 23.7 15.5 35.9Table 4. Correlation Matrix of Perceived Corruption ItemsTRVL LDSL RTWY JUDG AMB DFST OIL WPNS LAWSDRIVEWAY .19 .28 -.28 .06 .12 .13 .02 .03 .09TRAVEL - .29 .35 .07 .15 .08 .10 .10 .10LAND SALE - .33 .16 .15 .16 .06 .08 .10RIGHT WAY - .16 .20 .14 .10 .14 .06JUDGE - .16.45 .31 .11 .20AMBASSADOR .19 .23 .15 .22DEFENSE STOCK - .46 .07 .18OIL .12 .12WEAPONS CONTRACT - L2 l

982 The American Political Science Review Vol. 72When the "favor" done for a constituentcoincides with personal enrichment, then thecharge of conflict of interest is relevant. Clearlyour sample is ambivalent and divided about thepropriety of these acts.In sum, the simple rank ordering of our tenexamples shows at one end of the continuum aclustering of acts that are clearly illegal orrepresent a direct financial gain, at the other,acts that are minor influence peddling, and inbetween a set of acts representing a variety ofconflict-of-interest situations. A Guttman scalingprocedure revealed that this set of acts wasunidimensional. They scaled in the same orderas discussed, and produced a coefficient ofreproducibility of .95, as shown in Table 4.1 0Our categorization of the components of acorrupt act aided in pinpointing some of thereasons for differential perceptions of the corruptnessof various acts. The nature of thefavor, the donor, the public official, and particularlythe payoff were all useful in analyzingthese perceptions. Acts most perceived as corrupttended to have different characteristicsfrom those few perceived as corrupt. And,where there was near-unanimity about thecorruptness of an act, more components of theact were regarded as corrupt than where therewere divided sentiments. Using only these tenacts, it could not be determined which (if any)components, or combinations of components,were crucial in influencing perceptions. Moreresearch on that point is necessary. We haveonly explored reasons why some acts areperceived as more corrupt than others; we havenot yet tried to analyze why there are intergroupdifferences in perception of corruption,particularly differences between elites and thepublic. I IDiscussionPolitical corruption has not been subjectedto the sort of rigorous analysis received byother phenomena in American politics. In largemeasure, the difficulty of defining "politicalcorruption" accounts for this neglect. Thepresent analysis develops a fourfold classificationscheme composed of what we consider theessential ingredients of every act of politicalcorruption. While this scheme is not a "theory,"it does offer a conceptual frameworkhelpful in comparing and analyzing potentiallycorrupt acts. In doing that it allows us to avoidthe definitional pitfalls which have stalematedthe study of corruption for so long. Theseproblems can be avoided because the componentsof our conceptual scheme allow one toanalyze acts classified as corrupt according toany of the corruption definitions describedearlier: the public opinion, public interest, andlegalistic definitions.The scheme, for instance, renders the "publicopinion" definition more usable by refiningit in such a way as to allow gradients ofcorruptness in an act and to assist in findingreasons why public officials and elites holdsimilar or divergent beliefs about a particularcorrupt act. This can be accomplished bysystematically varying each component of ourscheme over a wide variety of acts. The resultshould enable researchers to pinpoint differencesbetween elites and the mass public,and thus to infer why there are divergentareas-"gray areas of political corruption."Might it be because the two groups view the"payoff" differently: what is seen as small orpetty by public officials may be viewed as largeand serious to citizens? Or, does the divergencelie in the perception of what is extraordinary inthe act providing the favor? Many similarexplanations could be posited and tested.government contracts can be arranged within theconstraints of the law and ethics. But some legislatorsare not content to wait until election day to bask inthe gratitude of the voters."10This correlation matrix of the ten items partiallyconfirms the clustering into three groups though thecorrelation between the two influence-peddling itemsis very small.I We have no public opinion data to test hypothesesabout elite-mass differences. We do, however,have data on how our respondents think citizens feelabout these acts. While the rank ordering or legislators'perceptions of citizens beliefs of corrupt acts is similarto the respondents' belief that most citizens would seeevery conflict-of-interest act as corrupt (Table 3). Theonly acts the majority of our respondents believecitizens would not condemn are the WEAPONS andLAW SCHOOL acts. Unfortunately, these data do nottest our propositions. They are only suggestive. Therespondent's views of citizens reactions to thesepotentially corrupt acts also form an acceptableGuttman scale, with a CR of .94 and with no itemshaving more than 10 percent error.One study that surveyed public opinion aboutcorrupt acts was that of John Gardiner (1970), whoassessed the attitudes of citizens about politicalcorruption in their community. While he examinedtolerance of corruption as it related to several socioeconomicattributes, he did not compare public andelite attitudes. He did find, however, that moreeducated people were less tolerant of corruption thanthose with less education.

1978 Political Corruption in America 983Moreover, the opportunity now exists toexplore possible differences in corruption perceptionsbased on social class and other subgroupsin the population such as race, region,and sex (see Welch and Peters, 1977b). Corruptionmay also be related to psychological orattitudinal predispositions. For example, "private-"vs. "public-regarding" distinctions sometimesused to explain corrupt behavior can beencompassed within our scheme. For instance,are citizens and elites whose approach topolitical life is considered "private-regarding"inclined to be less severe in their condemnationof certain political acts than those displaying a"public-regarding" disposition? In this manner,the study of political corruption can be integratedinto the broader propositions aboutthe social and attitudinal bases of politicalbehavior.The scheme can also be related to thedefinitions of corruption based on "illegal acts"or violations of the "public interest." Are allcorrupt acts viewed similarly which are proscribedby law because they deviate from theformal duties of public office for personal gain?If so, the explanation for the common beliefmay lie in the components of illegal acts such asthe payoff, favor, public official or donor. Onecan view acts considered to be against thepublic interest or order in a similar way. An actof political corruption may or may not beviewed by all public officials and citizens asviolating a responsibility to maintain civic orderor as destroying a political system. Given thewide and varying opinions about the "publicinterest," one would expect they would not.And the four elements, public official, donor,favor, and payoff, allow us to compare andanalyze a wide variety of political acts, whethertheir potential corruptness is based on illegality,violation of the public interest, or condemnationby public opinion. Our approach is alsocompatible with the "systemic view" of politicalcorruption. If a large part of politicalcorruption in the United States can be attributedto inherent weaknesses in certainoffices, situations, or processes, then morehonest government will only come about whenthose weaknesses are identified and eradicatedby public officials and concerned citizens. Thusan understanding of individual attitudes isimportant even when considering the systemicview of corruption.Inherent weaknesses are difficult to identify.But once exposed they can be analyzed accordingto our conceptual scheme. Patterns mayemerge which would help one predict thoseoffices, institutions or processes susceptible topolitical corruption. In this manner the sourcesof political corruption can be systematicallyidentified.1 2Our approach to defining corruption, then,is offered as a way to integrate research oncorruption with the mainstream of research inAmerican politics, a way of integrating theoriesabout corruption to a well-grounded literaturein American political beliefs and behavior. Thisapproach also offers a way to study politicalcorruption from the comparative and internationalperspective. Again the four componentsare common to every potentially corruptact. Different hypotheses might be suggested inthe cross-national or international study ofcorruption, but our scheme offers a frameworkfor such a study. For example, a hypothesismight specify that one type of political cultureviews a certain type of payoff as a routine partof a public official's prerequisites, whileanother culture views the payoff quite differently.Thus our understanding of differentialviews toward potentially corrupt acts is en-hanced. The citizens of one country maycondemn a specific political act as corruptbecause it violates the norms of public officeholding, while the citizens of another countrycondone the same act because it does not. Thescheme can help us understand why the leadersof a foreign country consider it proper toexpect monetary kickbacks from large U.S.corporations in exchange for a governmentcontract, or to offer bribes to key members ofthe U.S. Congress in exchange for favorabletreatment. Moreover, it may well be that stagesof economic development, modernization, socialinfrastructure, and so forth, bear systematicrelationship to the components of our conceptualframework. It provides us with anotherway of demonstrating how political corruptionis related to political development.This approach can also be linked to the moretraditional approach of studying corruptiononly when a significant local or national scandalhas occurred. One can monitor public and eliteattitudes over time in an attempt to link publicattitudes to the situational context.For too long the systematic study of politicalcorruption has been neglected by seriousstudents of American politics. That this shouldbe so is understandable, considering not onlythe imposing conceptual problems but also the121n our own sample, 35.5 percent believed thatthere were no specific offices particularly susceptibleto corruption; rather, it was a few susceptible individuals(the "rotten apple" view). Of the remaining64.5 percent, there was little apparent agreement as towhich offices were more susceptible to corruption.Most frequently mentioned were offices handling a lotof money, named by 7.3 percent.

984 The American Political Science Review Vol. 72lack of intellectual respectability about theconcept itself. But it has become increasinglyevident to citizens, public officials, and scholarsalike that "corruption in politics" is just tooprevalent a phenomenon not to be subjected torigorous study. Our article has attempted todemonstrate one approach, but by no meansthe only approach, to the systematic study ofpolitical corruption.ReferencesAnderson, Jack (1976). "A Citizen's Committee isNeeded to Crack Down on Congressmen whoCheat."Parade, 21 November 1976,4-5.Banfield, Edward and James Q. Wilson (1963). CityPolitics. New York: Vintage.Beard, Edmund and Stephen Horn (1975). CongressionalEthics: A View from the House. Washington:Brookings.Berg, Larry L., Harlan Hahn, and John R. Schmidhauser(1976). Corruption in the American PoliticalSystem. Morristown, N.J.: General LearningPress.Cohen, Richard M., and Jules Witcover (1974). AHeartbeat Away. New York: Vildng.Edelman, Murray (1964). The Symbolic Uses ofPolitics. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Elazar, Daniel (1966). American Federalism: A Viewfrom the States. New York: Crowell.Gardiner, John (1970). The Politics of Corruption.New York: Sage.Getz, Robert S. (1966). Congressional Ethics: TheConflict of Interest Issue. Princeton, N.J.: VanNostrand.Greenstein, Fred I. (1964). "The Changing Pattern ofUrban Party Politics." Annals of the AmericanAcademy of Political and Social Science353:1-13.Heidenheimer, A. J., ed. (1970). Political Corruption:Readings in Comparative Analysis. New York:Holt.Lippman, Walter (1970; first published 1930). "ATheory about Corruption. In Arnold Heidenheimer(ed.), Political Corruption. New York: Holt, pp.294-97.Nye, J. S. (1967). "Corruption and Political Development:A Cost-Benefit Analysis." American PoliticalScience Review 61:417-27.Pinto-Duschinsky, Michael (1976). "Theories of Corruptionin American Politics," paper presented atthe annual meeting of the American PoliticalScience Association, Chicago, 1976.Rogow, Arnold A. and Harold Lasswell (1963). Power,Corruption and Rectitude. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:Prentice-Hall.Rundquist, Barry S. and Susan Hansen (1976). "OnControlling Official Corruption: Elections vs.Laws." Unpublished manuscript.Rundquist, Barry S., Gerald S. Strom and John G.Peters (1977). "Corrupt Politicians and TheirElectoral Support: Some Theoretical and EmpiricalObservations." American Political Science Review71:954-63.Scoble, Harry (1973). "Systemic Corruption," a paperpresented at the annual meeting of the AmericanPolitical Science Association, New Orleans, September,1973.Scott, James (1972). Comparative Political Corruption.Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.De Tocqueville, Alexis (1961). Democracy in America,Vols. 1-2. New York: Schocken.Welch, Susan and John G. Peters (1977a). "SomeProblems of Stimulating Responses to Mail Questionnaires:Controllable and Non Controllable Aspects."Political Methodology 4:139-52.(1977b). "Attitudes of U.S. State LegislatorsToward Political Corruption." Legislative StudiesQuarterly 2:445-64.Wilson, James Q. (1966). "Corruption: The Shame ofthe States." The Public Interest 2:28-38.Wolfmger, R. E. (1972). "Why Machine Politics HaveNot Withered Away and Other RevisionistThoughts." Journal of Politics 34:365-98.