Review of anti-corruption strategies Rob McCusker - Australian ...

It should be decided whether the focus should be placed upon the office or the officeholder. For example,
providing training to officials to allow them to manage resources in legitimate and effective manner
may simply provide them with transferable skills for a lucrative post outside the corrupt government
department. Equally, a trained official in an unresponsive and inherently corrupt department may have little
opportunity to apply that training in a systematic anti-corruption effort.
It is necessary to establish whether the focus of the anti-corruption strategy should be placed upon
protecting state revenue through the enhancement of the integrity of, for example, the tax and customs
agencies or upon investigating evidence of criminal activity such as corrupt contract negotiations. The
former will assist in creating financial stability and the latter demonstrate the capacity and commitment of
the anti-corruption efforts.
It must be ascertained whether the aim of the anti-corruption strategy is to seek retribution against
malfeasance, or restitution. Aside from the moral case for and against each in the corruption context
there remains an issue of practicality. The former requires an effective criminal justice system and the
latter would require effective asset tracing and confiscation systems.
An assessment should be undertaken of the relative benefits of targeting vulnerable departments or
anti-corruption agencies in terms of achieving systematic anti-corruption reform. Risk assessments of
departments and their procedures may identify important corruption vulnerabilities and thereby direct and
enhance anti-corruption efforts.
An assessment should be made of donor coordination given that, although virtually all donors have
policies on corruption, there is not necessarily an overarching process of coordination between donors.
The lack of a strategy may result in a number of donors operating in a single country with wholly different
aims and objectives, modes of operation and conceptions of corruption.
It has been suggested that the targeting of the public sector through processes such as the redrafting
and updating of legislation, enhancing the judiciary and ensuring the accountability of public service
departments is, while both logical and laudable, time consuming, expensive and prone to relapse.
Similarly, authorising externally appointed and funded agencies to engage with countries on corruption
issues may have negative impacts, given that such agencies will, without significant host country
government support, possibly be doomed to short-term success and run the risk of creating an
atmosphere of resentment (and subsequent non-cooperation) among the targeted sectors in that host
country (Doig & Riley 1998).
Other models advocate a comparison of the incidence of corruption and the quality of governance in order
to determine the priorities any anti-corruption strategy should possess. The model in Table 5 assumes that
countries with high corruption have a low quality of governance, those with medium corruption have fair
governance and those with low corruption have good governance.
Table 5: One size does not fit all
Incidence of
corruption
Quality of
governance Priorities of anticorruption efforts
High Poor Establish rule of law; strengthen institutions of participation and accountability; establish
citizens’ charter; limit government intervention; implement economic policy reforms
Medium Fair Decentralize and reform economic policies and public management and introduce
accountability for results
Low Good Establish anticorruption agencies; strengthen financial accountability; raise public and
official awareness; anti-bribery pledges; conduct high-profile prosecutions
Source: Shah 2006: 14