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

Executive summary
The Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) was asked to review the literature concerning anti-corruption
strategies, and particularly to identify the common elements deemed to underpin and/or undermine their
effectiveness.
A bibliography covering the period from 2000 to 2006 was compiled as part of this report and
endeavoured to provide details of indicative sources on the context and operation of anti-corruption
programs. The bibliography was not intended to be a comprehensive review of corruption literature per
se but rather to provide a specific overview of sources which contained details and analysis of anticorruption
strategies. It also sought to examine those sources which concerned themselves largely with
the Asia–Pacific region.
From the 231 sources located in the initial literature search, a subset which emphasised practical rather
than purely theoretical approaches taken, was evaluated.
Corruption continues to manifest itself in a number of ways. It ranges from petty to grand in nature, from
political to bureaucratic in focus and from incidental to systemic in scope. Emanating essentially from the
exploitation of public office for private gain, corruption radiates from governments through agencies and
impacts upon the individuals and/or organisations required to liaise with those agencies in order to obtain
basic services. Given the range and impact of corrupt behaviour, any anti-corruption strategy must be
cognisant of the causes of corruption, the political and socio-economic environment in which corruption
thrives and the broader links between corruption, organised crime and international illicit capital flows.
A key factor underpinning anti-corruption efforts is the requirement for a holistic approach to be taken.
This is best epitomised by the National Integrity System (NIS) proposed by Transparency International
(2001), comprising a set of objectives, supported by key strategies and delivered through institutions,
sectors or specific activities known as pillars. The NIS is not dependent upon each pillar functioning or
functioning in unison with other pillars. Indeed, the NIS structure permits weakness in one pillar to be
mitigated by strength in another.
Although perhaps self-evident, it is important to recognise that the errant behaviour of individuals lies at the
heart of corruption. Any successful anti-corruption strategy therefore should endeavour to understand the
often complex interactions that exist between the initiator of the corrupt act, the person who passively or
actively participates in corruption and the wider society which meets the costs, directly or indirectly, of that
corruption. Issues to be decided in the first instance include a determination of the focus of the strategy,
for example, upon the office or the office holder, whether efforts should protect state revenues (through
enhancing agency integrity) or seek to prosecute those abusing such revenues and whether a cost benefit
analysis of vulnerable departments can assist in determining the prioritisation of anti-corruption efforts.
In terms of the design of anti-corruption strategies it is important to construct a set of incentives to
encourage rule-abiding, and discourage rule-averse, behaviour by individuals engaged in corrupt
practices. Thus, for example, strategies which reduce the scope for corruption via policy changes,
increase the costs of corruption via monitoring and punishment of errant behaviour and induce selfrestraint
within government are important first principles.
It is clear from the literature that attempting to provide and implement a one size fits all anti-corruption
strategy is unlikely to be successful. Even where the strategy comprises a number of discrete parts, which
are designed to be implemented in an incremental fashion, it is imperative that an assessment of the
logic and potential adverse consequences of the implementation sequence is made. Thus, for example,
establishing an anti-corruption agency without ensuring that an honest judiciary is also present may
undermine the efforts of the former. Similarly, if police corruption remains rife and the judiciary honest, the
former will prevent cases of interest coming before the courts and thus negate the impact of the judiciary.