In places where corruption has beco-
me systemic, endemic and pervasive
such as in many developing count-
ries, governments have failed to effe-
ctively curb the menace of corruption
which appears to be spiralling out of
control. In those countries, govern-
ment retains a monopoly over both
the act of grand corruption and the
institutional arrangements to fight
it, leaving non-State actors looking
on as mere spectators. In those
countries many have come to believe
corruption is a public sector issue
with the power to fight it also resi-
ding there. This has increasingly been
shown over the last decade to be a
flawed conception of the problem. is clear and agreed on the standard
with which to judge their actual or
anticipated behaviour, presence of
factors to make it strongly try to
avoid some outcomes whilst gunning
for other outcomes (in other words,
presence of clear positive incentives
to benefit from and real sanctions
to avoid) and a strong internally
motivating force keeping the entity
focused on living up to behavioural
standards it has set for itself. Thing
is, in a context where the incentives
are perverse in that those who do
right seemingly gain nothing and
those who do wrong are not effec-
tively sanctioned, self-regulation is
weak at best.
In some of these countries, civil so-
ciety in the belief that there is power
in activism, have drawn attention to
the problem through mass protests
and media exposées. There has been
a clamour for greater access to go-
vernment held information, adoption
of open government data standards
around public procurement, whist-
leblower protection laws and so on.
Today, there is a lot more transparen-
cy in many countries through what TI
refers to as “sunshine laws” but this
has not necessarily translated into
greater levels of public accountability
or a reduction in corruption. The le-
verage needed to translate the public
anger and dissatisfaction over clear
cases of corruption has not necessa-
rily led to the anticipated change. Self-regulation preferred by busi-
ness is the very thing that puts it
in a catch-22 because this involves
the unilateral choice to do right in a
context where competitors are doing
well by cutting corners, where clients
are happy to pay for short-cuts to be
followed or rules bent to get them off
the hook, where government regula-
tion lacks credibility in that it clearly
serves special interests and not the
public interest.
In all this, the private sector has typi-
cally kept its head down and stayed
out of the fray. So, as far as some
governments and civil society actors
are concerned, business is part of the
problem of corruption in developing
countries, particularly big business.
The reaction of business has been ty-
pically to insist on self-regulation and
non-interference from government
and certainly civil society. However,
self-regulation requires that business
Business in corrupt climes are often
left wondering whether it wouldn’t
be suicidal to do right. And why is
it business in this dilemma? This is
because business is one of the biggest
victims of corruption – paying more
than necessary for government servi-
ces through corruption, vulnerable to
unpredictable and corrupt demands
from government inspectors and
approval agencies, competing for
business and losing despite having
the better competencies, experience
and pricing to deliver sound value be-
cause someone else has bribed. Many
then wait it out trying to develop
‘algorithms’ that help them predict
what they can do to also ‘win big’ like
those who do so through corruption
and success in business is reduced
to the odds of a national lottery. If an
individual business tries to go against
this tide, it is easily crushed by the
resulting backlash from the corrupt
system.
Governments that have tried to fight
corruption in contexts where it has
become an acceptable way of transa-
cting in society have also found that
“corruption fights back” and govern-
ment on its own cannot fight systemic
corruption. Civil society on its own
cannot fight the menace and business
on its own would find it suicidal to do
so. There is now growing consensus
that the approach to fighting systemic
corruption must be holistic involving
citizens, civil society, business and
government. This end and how to
achieve it bounds the intriguing sub-
ject of collective action. Even though
it makes sense that there is stren-
gth in such diversity, this does not
happen automatically because of the
conflicting interests between these
groups and the job of the facilitator
of collective action is in ensuring and
maintaining an alignment of interests
between the participants to channel
their strengths and energies in the
same direction.
Back to the hullaballoo. As anti-cor-
ruption specialists have gotten
the point of the approach and are
innovating to achieve and maintain
this alignment of interests, succes-
ses are emerging. The innovations,
successes and growing scale of
application of the approach is causing
commotion, clamour, excitement
and energy amongst anti-corruption
practitioners who are seeing greater
breakthroughs against the malaise. I
guess the excitement is akin to what
cancer or HIV/Aids researchers might
feel with every innovation that brings
them a step closer to a cure for the
disease. I think Collective Action is
one such breakthrough, what do you
think?
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