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2004
‘With Corruption Everyone Pays’
2004: When people in Kenya ask you for tea,
they are often not requesting a hot drink but rather a bribe. For many
years, this expression has been used to put a dirty meaning into nice words,
as Kenya’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Judith Mbula
Bahemuka recently explained at a briefing in April 2004. As useful as this
euphemism may have been for many years to avoid the word “corruption”, it
does represent how corruption can turn a society upside down. (Read
more...)
2004: This article argues that the lack of
significant progress can be attributed to the fact that many programs are
simply folk remedies or one-size-fits-all approaches and offer little chance
of success. For programs to work, they must identify the type of corruption
they are targeting and tackle the underlying, country-specific causes, or
“drivers,” of dysfunctional governance. (Read
more...)
2003
The Business of Corruption
AUGUST 2003: In explaining why Africa is not
just poor, but also has fallen so far behind most other regions in
development, the usual suspects are quickly lined up: Lack of
infrastructure, political and macroeconomic instability, poor education —
and, of course, lots and lots of corruption. (Read
more...)
Corruption: Causes and Cures
APRIL 2003: You’ll never catch Burgin,” television
investigative reporter Marsha Halford said to me during an off-camera
interview regarding rumors of bribery in the Mississippi senate. “He is the
smartest and most corrupt politician in the state.”
The Federal Bureau of Investigation had Senator William G.
Burgin Jr., chairman of the Mississippi State Senate Appropriations
Committee, under scrutiny. As the agent in charge of the case, I wasn’t
allowed to answer her. But I knew something that Halford and even Burgin
didn’t know: We’d just about nailed him, and he wasn’t very smart after all.
(Read more...)
FEBRUARY 2003: HOW ONE
FICTITIOUS FRAUDSTER SLIPPED THROUGH THE CRACKS IN A FLAWED
INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEM
Thomas MacNeil, president
of General Manufacturing Ltd., listened in cold silence to the
voice on the telephone. The caller, a would-be supplier, was
accusing MacNeil's plant manager, Bob Adams, of accepting kickbacks
from Equipment maintenance Inc., a company that had been awarded a
maintenance contract by General Manufacturing in each of the past
three years. (Read
more...)
Fighting
Corruption: What role for civil society?
2003: Since 1989 the OECD has played
a leading role in the battle against international bribery and
corruption.
Drawing lessons from the OECD’s experience,
this report will help policy-makers in OECD member and non-member countries,
as well as anticorruption experts in aid agencies and other international
organisations, make the most of civic forces. Furthermore, civil society
actors will find practical suggestions to define their strategy. (Read
more...)
How Bribery and Other Types of Corruption Threaten the Global
Marketplace
2002
October 2002: In Turkey, the
apartment buildings that collapse during earthquakes are known as
“bribe buildings.” In Africa, bridges dot the landscape with no
roads to connect them.
There’s no doubt that corruption,
endemic in emerging economies around the world, throws economic
development into chaos. It affects decisions made by bureaucrats,
degrades the quality of those in power, and discourages foreign
investment. It’s also an increasingly hot business topic, with a
growing number of influential business and political leaders from
around the globe regularly pinpointing corruption as one of the
greatest threats to global economic development. (Read
more...)
Curbing corruption
FEBRUARY 2002: Corruption is a
pervasive, worldwide problem that can crop up in any organization.
Internal auditors can combat this insidious threat by arming
themselves with effective anticorruption strategies
THE TERM "CORRUPTION" IMPLIES MANY
different meanings, but generally entails misusing one's position
for private gain or an unauthorized end. It can involve financial
and nonmonetary benefit. Bribery, extortion, influence peddling,
nepotism, and fraud are all acts associated with corruption.
The impact of corruption on an organization
can be devastating. Corrupt practices increase risks and costs to
businesses, damage investor confidence, and stifle growth. Eventually, these
activities can distort the organization's allocation of resources, undermine
its legitimate business practices, and even lead to bankruptcy. (Read
more...)
2001
Greasy money
OCTOBER 2001: When David Selley
was a consultant at a Big Five firm, he discovered in the fine
print of a contract that one of his audit clients had paid a
multimillion-dollar bribe to the government of a middle-eastern
country. The goal was to secure a major contract to build a turnkey
industrial plant. His investigation led him to suspect that the
client's US parent had directed the bribe through Canada to reduce
the chance of it being detected. At the time, Canada had no
legislation prohibiting the bribery of foreign officials. (Read
more...)
Corrupt Cities: A practical guide to cure and prevention
2000: Preventing corruption helps to
raise city revenues, improve service delivery, stimulate public
confidence and participation, and win elections. This book provides
practical solutions and a set of incentives charting a path away
from misgovernance toward effective local governance. The authors
present case studies of both success and failure to underscore that
addressing corruption is only an entry point to deeper public
sector reforms. The challenge facing local government is to develop
innovative ways of building effective, accountable, and transparent
systems. The book brings these innovations together, providing both
a conceptual and a practical framework as well as an international
perspective based on concrete country examples such as Hong Kong
and La Paz. (Read
more...)
8.96 MB
The causes of corruption: A cross-national study
2000: Why is corruption — the misuse
of public office for private gain — perceived to be more widespread
in some countries than others? Different theories associate this
with particular historical and cultural traditions, levels of
economic development, political institutions, and government
policies. This article analyzes several indexes of ‘perceived
corruption’ compiled from business risk surveys for the 1980s and
1990s. Six arguments find support. Countries with Protestant
traditions, histories of British rule, more developed economies,
and (probably) higher imports were less ‘corrupt’. Federal states
were more ‘corrupt’. While the current degree of democracy was not
significant, long exposure to democracy predicted lower corruption.
(Read
more...)
Reducing
Corruption at the Local Level
October 2000: Corruption ranks
together with effective democratic representation as the most
important problem facing local governments. The challenge facing
local governments is to develop innovative ways of building
effective, accountable, and transparent system that are able to
efficiently deliver services. The objective of this paper is to
provide both a conceptual and a practical framework, as well as an
international perspective with concrete examples, to address the
contexts that create perverse incentives for corruption to exist. (Read
more...)
Rising to the challenge
AUGUST 1999: Corruption has
pervaded all sectors of our society. It may be more prevalent
or more obvious in some countries than others. But in today’s
business environment, the implications of corruption at a
local level reach far beyond national boundaries. Corruption
has become a major global concern.
The impact of corruption on our
society cannot be overstated. It increases the risks and costs of business,
damages investor confidence, hampers economic development and reduces the
credit ratings of a country. It brings the integrity of professions and of
business into question. It deprives government and regulators of credibility
and weakens the forces of law and order. In such a scenario, public morale
inevitably suffers and social hardship – particularly in developing and
emerging economies – can be the inevitable result. (Read
more...)
Is it the professional duty of an accountant to expose corruption?
MAY 1999: Recently, I was in a
meeting with a group of accountants on the subject of
anti-corruption when the discussion leader asked us "Do you think
it is the professional duty of the accountant to expose
corruption?" I raised my hand in the affirmative. It seemed like a
natural re-action and I think that the general public would assume
that this is what accountants do. After all, we are often thought
of as "public watchdogs." (Read
more...)
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