StAR Initiative

The corruption is a complex and generalized phenomenon all over the world, with cultural, social, psychological, political and economical dimensions. The defining and the studying of the phenomenon are going through the most different thinking filters known in the specialized literature: social-cultural, political, administrative and economic. The article's aim is to quantify and analyze the relationship between corruption and political, administrative and economic determinants factors, through a regressive "pool data" model. The sample includes 135 countries of the world, from all continents, with different degrees of economic development and political-administrative structures, for the period 1996-2008. What is interesting is that, the study shows the distortion into the government intervention function in the economy, seen as a significant proliferation factor for the corruption phenomenon. This connection has different intensity, as the state is developed, developing or in transition. Moreover, there is a number of unobserved factors, which emphasizes or temperate in temporal approach the relationship between corruption-political, administrative and economic determinants factors.

Policy Research Working Papers, 1999

Abstract. This paper examines the relationship of corruption with democracy and bureaucracy in the 82 countries in a panel framework. For the analysis we use rule of law, regulatory quality, control over corruption and secondary school enrollment ratio as control variables. We find that democracy, rule of law and control over corruption decreases the level of corruption. When we allowed for interaction effect among independent variables we find the evidence of strong interaction effect between all of the explanatory variables.

IMF Working Papers, 1996

The study of the causes and consequences of corruption has a long history in economics, dating back at least to the seminal contributions to the rent-seeking literature by Bhagwati (1982), Krueger (1974), Rose-Ackerman (1978), Tullock (1967), and others. However, empirical work in this area has been limited, partly because the efficiency of government institutions cannot easily be quantified. Corruption in particular is by its very nature difficult to measure. Renewed interest in the topic has led a number of researchers to attempt to quantify, using regression analysis and indices developed by private rating agencies, the extent to which corruption permeates economic interactions. These indices are typically based on replies to standardized questionnaires by consultants in a variety of countries and therefore have the obvious drawback of being subjective. Nevertheless, the correlation between indices produced by different rating agencies is very high, suggesting a certain consensus on the ranking of countries according to their degree of corruption. In addition, the high prices that the rating agencies charge their customers (usually multinational companies and international banks) for access to these indices are indirect evidence that the information is useful. At the same time, however, the consultants judgments that form the basis of these indices may be influenced by the economic performance of the countries they monitor. Thus, researchers who use such indices must be extremely cautious in asserting a causal relationship between Paolo Mauro is an economist at the International Monetary Fund, Washington. Helpful conversations with Andrei Shleifer and Vito Tanzi are gratefully acknowledged. The views expressed here are strictly personal. The author does not necessarily agree with the subjective indices relating to any given country.

2004

Corruption and governance have come to the fore in contemporary discussions of reform in developing countries. Many of the problems to which corruption and governance refer are significant and longstanding. Yet, the way in which mainstream economics has analysed them simply provides support for a programme of marketenhancing reforms. These seek to reduce the role of the state to the delivery of a small range of core services that cannot be delivered by the private sector. The mainstream analysis is not only misleading in failing to identify many of the most important determinants of corruption and of apparent governance failures in developing countries. By offering wrong diagnoses and solutions, these mainstream approaches waste time and resources in programmes that are unlikely to provide reductions in corruption and improvements in governance. Even worse, by promoting reforms that lessen the ability of the state to accelerate development, they may paradoxically reduce the prospect...

2002

Journal of Economic Literature, 1997

Bangladesh Development Studies, 2002

The current empirical literature on the determinants of corruption has presumed a linear relationship between corruption and government regulations. This study reexamines this relationship. This re-examination is carried out by testing the presence of threshold effects of government regulations on the level of corruption after controlling the effects of bureaucratic competition, level of education, GDP growth, and urbanization. Using different measures of corruption from the World Bank survey, the study finds the evidence of threshold; the inverse relationship between corruption and government regulations is profound in countries where the index of government regulations is less than the threshold level. Consequently, it suggests that government regulations spawn corruption before the threshold level is reached. Thus, reducing government regulations only up to the threshold level will not reduce corruption. The study suggests that government regulations should be reduced well below the threshold level to circumvent corruption. Thus, policies without government interventions are less corrupt and, therefore, are more conducive to economic growth.