Corruption: Governance challenge towards reducing unemployment in Nigeria

The study examines the possibility of having a very low rate of unemployment in Nigeria, if there is a reduced rate of corruption in the long-term. While using cointegration regressions and Vector Error Correction Mechanism (VECM) over the period 1996–2020, it is affirmed that corruption could increase unemployment rate in the long run. The two corruption indicators employed (control of corruption and corruption index) are found to have a substantial effect on unemployment rate. Further evidence confirms that corruption and unemployment are cyclically interdependent. Findings indeed stress that a high level of corruption is harmful to employment growth. On the other hand, in the absence of sufficient job opportunities, rent-seeking government officials would be more interested in collecting bribes from job seekers, which results in sustained unlawful practices among the public officials. Thus, adopting effective corruption-control measures is critical. It is therefore suggested that to effectively tackle corruption incidents, there should be incentives for citizens or public officials to report bribery and the process of reporting corruption incidents should be further simplified. Strengthening anti-corruption agencies and developing a sound legal framework that promotes a culture of lawfulness and impeccable practices in the public sector are central.     

转型期中国公共领导体制变革与廉政建设

腐败与反腐败是社会政治生活中的一个永恒主题。腐败的存在与公共权力密切相关,作为公共权力运作的核心性规范,公共领导体制直接规定着高层领导者运用权力的方式,影响着社会的腐败与反腐败活动。伴随着社会发展,中国公共领导体制开始现代化转型,从传统型权威和个人魅力型权威向法理型权威转换,其反腐败方略也相应地从注重思想教育和社会运动转向注重制度约束。与此相适应,必须深化公共领导体制改革,以制度创新根治腐败,包括:进行良好的宪政分权,发展直接民主;引入政治竞争,实行政务公开;转变政府职能,推动行政体制改革,规范政府行为;强化监督机制和惩罚机制;加强思想教育和道德约束,提高政府官员的廉洁自律度,等等。     

Problems of co-ordination in upazila administration in Bangladesh

The present government of Bangladesh has extensively reformed the administrative system and upgraded the previous thana to upazila (sub-district) to serve as the focal point of development administration. A new tier of local government called Upazila Parishad (UZP) has been created and a large number of functions have been devolved to this institution along with the placement of central government employees at its disposal. The reformers argue that the present system will remove the inadequacies of the previous administrative system and will bring about an improvement in the co-ordination of field services at the upazila level. However, the actual situation represents a totally different picture. The desired integration— both vertical and horizontal—and co-ordination in local level planning is non-existent due to the absence of any clear direction from the central government. Proper co-ordination among the field services in the upazila administration does not exist due to the anomalous relation between the upazila and the national government, including excessive central control; the involvement of multiple agencies of the central government in guiding and supervising; ambiguity in government thinking; the absence of clarification from the ministries concerned and agencies on the timing of different development programmes; and conflict over the allocation of resources. There is also conflict between the different tiers of local government in respect of authority and resources. Relations between public representatives and officials at the upazila level are strained because a clear allocation of authority to political executives is lacking; areas for co-operation among different agencies have not been clarified; and public representatives and government officials lack mutual respect.     

Public Co-Financing of Private Sector's Investments: Subsidiarity and Corruption

The literature on corruption makes unclearpredictions on the relations betweensubsidiarity principle, according to whichpublic decisions should be done at thelower level government possible, andcorruption of public officials. In thispaper, we compare two alternative regimes,centralised vs. decentralised, forthe public co-financing of privateprojects. We show that, in the absence ofcorruption, the two regimes give the same results. Borrowing from the Chamberlin's analysis ofmonopolistic competition and from therent-seeking literature, we introducecorruption in the model as a selling costfor the private suppliers. We show that acentralized regime causes higher corruptionlevels because of the higher number ofprivate suppliers of competing projects. Asa result, a central government tends tohave a higher level of public capitalexpenditure than two (equally corruptible)regional governments.     

Corruption monitoring and the supply of politicians in China

Monitoring institutions are usually perceived as efficient instruments for improving governance. This article evaluates the link between corruption monitoring and the supply of politicians in nondemocracies. Using China as a case, I show that corruption monitoring pushes capable young elites away from seeking government positions. This effect may be driven by two possible mechanisms: economic returns and career prospects. Specifically, corruption investigations may reduce the expected economic returns for government officials, undermining capable young elite’ willingness and efforts to become government officials. In addition, corruption investigations may indicate that there are potential uncertainties and risks involved when taking on a political career, which reduce capable young elites’ desire to pursue a political career. The empirical analysis confirms these two mechanisms and provides unique evidence for the unintended negative impact of corruption monitoring institutions.     

Unveiling the Political Elite: High-Ranking Chinese Officials on Television Talk Shows

Many high-ranking Chinese officials have recently changed their low-key persona and have discussed sensitive issues on television talk shows. Using complete participant observations of a CCTV talk show, we argue, besides officials’ personal factors, that the unequal power distribution between the central ministries and the promotion competition among officials is the mechanism that motivates senior officials to enter the spotlight. State ministries with less political clout and local officials are more active talk show guests. They take advantage of media interviews to enhance policy adherence, signal administrative needs, and display achievements to the central government. The media political platform also brings more personal interaction between Chinese media and political elite, which may increase personalization of politics and autonomy for the media.     

Bureaucratic dilemmas: Civil servants between political responsiveness and normative constraints

The interaction between political executives and civil servants rests on a delicate balance between political responsiveness and the duty of civil servants and ministers to respect legal and other normative constraints on executive authority. In Danish central government, this balance is stressed by norms that define the correct behavior when the civil service provides ministers with political advice and assistance. Organizational factors strongly influence civil servants' behavior when they have to balance responsiveness against constraints on their role as political advisers. Moreover, civil servants working closely with ministers pay more attention to legal constraints than their peers among agency officials and specialists. Agency officials and specialists are much more prone to prioritize professional standards. We argue that this pattern can be generalized West European systems.     

Transparency, wages, and the separation of powers: An experimental analysis of corruption

We conducted an experimental analysis of the causes of corruption, varying the ease of hiding corrupt gains, officials’ wages, and the method of choosing the law enforcement officer. Voters rarely re-elect chief executives found to be corrupt and tend to choose presidents who had good luck. Directly elected law enforcement officers work more vigilantly at exposing corruption than those who are appointed. Increasing government wages and increasing the difficulty of hiding corrupt gains both reduce corruption.     

三方互动：规范我国地方政府间竞争的思考

在我国当前的制度环境下,地方政府在竞争中可以采取4种策略:约束“掠夺之手”、减少公共品的供给、将危机转嫁给不具流动性的要素、树立壁垒干预市场。规范地方政府间竞争应当避免地方政府采用第3、4种策略。为限制地方政府树立壁垒干预市场,从中央层面来看,需要建立全国统一大市场,推行以公平为基础的政策、制度化中央与地方的权力分配;从地方层面来看,需要转变地方政府职能,加强地方公共财政建设,构建地方特色;从社会层面来看,为限制地方政府转嫁竞争危机,需要充分发挥居民在地方政府间竞争中的裁决作用,发挥民营经济的力量以及发挥第三部门的力量。     

马克思主义权力观下建构防止利益冲突制度

腐败发生的重要根源在于公职人员的利益冲突,利益冲突的重要根源在于公职人员权力观的错位。树立“权为民所赋,权为民所用”的马克思主义权力观,从制度层面上规范和监督公共权力的运行过程,通过合理的制度安排使公共权力与私人利益相分离,从而阻断公职人员以权谋私的通道,最终达到预防腐败的目的。     

How Nation States 'Hit' Europe: Ambiguity and Representation in the European Union

This article analyses how differences in domestic institutional constellations shape the representational roles of member state officials when attending the EU Council of Ministers. The conceptual framework used draws on theories of political representation, institutional theories and the Europeanisation literature. Our primary argument is that role perceptions are considerably conditioned by actors' domestic institutional embeddedness. Comparing Belgian and Swedish officials attending working groups within the Council of Ministers substantiates this argument. Belgian officials are more supranationally oriented than their Swedish counterparts. This difference is related to varying levels of vertical and horizontal specialisation, federalism, competition among veto-players, the role of the Foreign Ministry, and the level of trust in domestic government compared to the level of trust in the EU.     

The Impact of Public Officials’ Corruption on the Size and Allocation of U.S. State Spending

This article demonstrates the impact of public officials’ corruption on the size and allocation of U.S. state spending. Extending two theories of “excessive” government expansion, the authors argue that public officials’ corruption should cause state spending to be artificially elevated. Corruption increased state spending over the period 1997–2008. During that time, the 10 most corrupt states could have reduced their total annual expenditure by an average of $1,308 per capita—5.2 percent of the mean per capita state expenditure—if corruption had been at the average level of the states. Moreover, at the expense of social sectors, corruption is likely to distort states’ public resource allocations in favor of higher‐potential “bribe‐generating” spending and items directly beneficial to public officials, such as capital, construction, highways, borrowing, and total salaries and wages. The authors use an objective, concrete, and consistent measurement of corruption, the number of convictions.     

政府评价层级差异与差序政府信任--基于2011年全国调查数据的实证研究

在2011年全国调查数据的基础上,尝试以民众对不同层级政府的评价差异解释差序政府信任产生和维系的原因。研究发现民众在对中央和地方政府在绩效、动机以及腐败程度等问题进行评价时显著青睐于中央政府,这种评价上的差异导致民众对中央政府的信任显著高于对地方政府的信任,从而产生了差序政府信任。     

王船山廉政思想述略

王船山在分析封建官吏腐败原因的同时,提出了“省官以清吏治,增俸以责官廉”的主张,提出反腐倡廉要抓住问题的关键,即严惩上官,主张设立谏官,建立完善的监督机制。王船山的廉政思想对于我们今天的廉政建设,仍有着深刻的启迪作用。     

Corporate Governance and Corruption: A Cross-Country Analysis

Because the empirical literature on the causes of corruption has focused primarily on the demand side of corruption, that is, the corrupt officials who receive bribe payments, the role of the private sector as the supply side of corruption has not been examined thoroughly in this literature. In this article, it is argued that corporate governance is among the important factors determining the level of corruption. Using a cross-country data set, hypotheses that explicitly link various measures of corporate governance to the level of corruption are tested. The results show that corporate governance standards can have profound impacts on the effectiveness of the global anticorruption campaign.     

Corruption and government size: A disaggregated analysis

Using annual state-level data over 1983–1987, this paper examines the effect of government size on corruption by public officials by including both demand and supply side incentives for engaging in corrupt practices. Our objectives are twofold. First, we assess the relationship between the incidence of corruption and overall measures of the size of the federal government and the state-local sector in each state. Second, we explore what kinds of government activities are more likely to be successful in deterring abuse of public office. Our results are generally supportive of Becker's “crime and punishment” model. Regarding the primary focus of the paper, our results show that government size, in particular spending by state governments, does indeed have a strong positive influence on corruption.     

Party competition and citizens' political attitudes in the American states

Democratic theorists argue that vigorous competition between candidates/parties is essential for democracy to flourish because it engages citizens' political interest and ultimately makes elected officials more accountable to their constituents. Using data on citizens' perceptions of government responsiveness to their political opinions from the American National Election Studies and the Ranney measure of party competition for control of state government, we examine the effects of competition on citizens' political attitudes from 1952 to 2008. Our analysis reveals that citizens feel government is more responsive to them when there is greater competition between the two parties for control of government in their state. However, this relationship is confined only to citizens who identify with the party that controls government in their state. We also find that the relationship between competition and efficacy is strongest among citizens with lower levels of education and income. These results suggest that vigorous competition for control of state government can have important implications for citizens' political attitudes.     

Does Corruption Hinder Private Businesses? Leadership Stability and Predictable Corruption in China

We study whether corruption hinders businesses by investigating China's private enterprises, which have developed rapidly despite high corruption levels. We argue that a key factor determining the effects of corruption is corruption predictability, which is significantly influenced by government leadership stability. When the same leaders remain in major offices for long tenures, corruption is relatively predictable, reducing hindrance to businesses. When leaders change frequently, entrepreneurs need to constantly cultivate new connections with officials and face more uncertainty; therefore, corruption becomes a major obstacle. We conduct field interviews to explore channels through which leadership stability encourages predictable corruption. We also use the 2012 World Bank Enterprise Survey of Chinese private firms and develop a novel measure of leadership stability of the local Chinese government based on a self‐collected data set of municipal party committees to test our hypotheses. Results of various models are consistent with our hypotheses.     

“报复性腐败”及其防范机制构建

报复性腐败"是指某些政府公务人员认为自己长期勤恳清廉的工作,却没有得到相应的升迁或重用,为报复单位和领导而大肆贪腐的现象。"报复性腐败"产生的原因,一是因为这部分官员的做官目的偏狭,导致心理严重失衡乃至极度扭曲。二是官员基本人生观、价值观的迷失导致极端的贪婪腐败。三是一些政府部门内部的民主行政不够健全,普通官员维权通道不畅通。因此,必须加强"报复性腐败"的防范机制建设,营造风清气正的廉政文化氛围;要建立公正公开的人事提拔任用机制,超越"天花板"逻辑,设置多维的正激励路径;要建立官员的精神干预和心理疏导机制、发展党内民主,加强对官员的民主监督。     

Decentralizing the Development Budget Process in Indonesia: Progress and Prospects

Decentralization of the development budget process in Indonesia has been a high priority of official reform efforts for over fifteen years, but in many respects the process remains highly centralized. This article describes the forces that helped shape this centralized process, in which central planners traditionally have had a degree of influence over budgeting that is unusual in the developing world. Efforts to help local officials play a more meaningful role in this process are reviewed, including innovative training programs introduced recently in response to enduring problems affecting local level participation. Although these recent efforts appear to be productive, government reformers recognize that meaningful decentralization over the longer term will be difficult to achieve without more fundamental changes in policies, procedures, and attitudes at the central level of government.