WHY IS CORRUPTION RAMPANT?
This
work studies retail corruption in the context of the public services and
attempts to provide structural remedies to improve service delivery and tackle corruption
festering within the sector.
To
understand the nature of this corruption (defined by the World Bank as “the
abuse of public office for private gains”) and its relationship with poor
service delivery, it is primary to understand the rationale behind an
official’s voluntary involvement in such acts. For this, we may look to
Becker’s Crime and Punishment model (1968). According to this model, a criminal
is a rational individual whose decision to partake in an illegal activity is
based on a cost-benefit analysis wherein he compares the gains arising from
illegal behavior against those arising from legal behavior and also the benefits
accruing from criminal activities against the cost of possible detection and
punishment.
Thus,
when we observe corruption under the scope of this model, we come to the
following conclusions
1.
“comparing the utility arising out of both legal and illegal
activities”:
The public servants partake in
corrupt activities as it provides for a source of larger profits than what can
be aggregated through legitimate sources. These legitimate sources would
include government wages, pensions and promotions. In terms of retail
corruption, this margin for gains is catalyzed by the citizen’s willingness to
pay. This willingness may either be for the provision of some benefits or to escape
delays, red-tape and harassment. Here, the phenomenon of learned helplessness plays
a key role by virtue of which the individual is blinded into believing that
there is no way to get work done without paying bribes and, as a result,
willingly pays bribes even if he/she may morally be against such payments.
2.
“by comparing the value of potential gain from a wrongful activity
to the cost of being caught and punished for that act”:
The chances of being detected for
corrupt practice are low as a result of legal loopholes and dilatory
anti-corruption efforts which allow easy evasion of conviction. Further, the
idea that corruption in the public services is an established culture
(particularly in developing and under developed countries) gives rise to path
dependence by which a servant is pressured into accepting bribes from both
above and below in the bureaucratic hierarchy. This consequently has a
spillover effect meaning individuals (such as touts) who previously had no
scope for making profits also begin churning profits. A police system that is defunct
by nature further reduces the chances of detection and punishment.
STRUCTURAL REMEDIES FOR IMPROVED SERVICE DELIVERY:
According
to the Council of Europe’s Multidisciplinary Group of Ministers, service
corruption may be structurally defined as the sum of monopoly over power, the
power to take decisions in discretion and the lack of accountability. This
definition highlights the existence of certain systemic problems that ail
service delivery across sectors. These overarching issues foment opportunities
for corruption in the provision of public services. The scale and depth of this
corruption in the services leads to a spiraling effect whereby the systemic
defects give rise to greater opportunity for corruption which in turn
facilitates the deepening of the defects and so on. A two-pronged initiative to
clean up the service sectors while simultaneously tackling corruption is therefore
imperative.
This
section looks at possible instruments to service delivery. Notable amongst
these are:
1.
Decentralization,
2.
Cultivating political support to bolster program delivery,
3.
Enhancing accountability.
1.
Decentralization:
Decentralization
includes political, fiscal and administrative autonomy that is thrust onto to
the people through shifting control to more localized levels. This means that local,
directly elected governments are empowered to hire and fire local staff without
any reference to higher levels of government and possess complete autonomy in
the spheres of taxing and expenditure.
Due to
the closer linkage between such directly elected local governments and the
people, the officials tend to act in a more accountable manner. Meanwhile, fiscal
control that is provided to them ensures that they spend public money prudently
as they face the real possibility of being voted out of office if the public
are dissatisfied. In comparison, with centralization, votes are partly on the
basis of performance in other regions and on issues of national interest. As a
result, accountability is defused and potential for corruption increases.
Apart
from accountability, a decentralized system allows for greater transparency of
government machinery and helps to tackle the nascent culture of bureaucratic
elitism. This rectifies the existent
dissociation of civil servants from the rest of society and provides greater
public access to policies and measures taken by the authorities.
From
the aspect of service delivery, we may also argue that decentralization
provides more far-reaching and cost-effective implementations of programs by
using superior access of local governments to information on local costs and
needs. Service delivery can also be seen to improve as a result of political
decentralization as the idea of being directly elected by the people gives rise
to competition for political office which opens the door for responsible and
innovative leadership which in turn becomes the driving force behind capacity
building, improved service delivery and reduced corruption at the local level.
Decentralization
is best enforced through devolution as opposed to de-concentration or
deregulation. Under devolution, there is a transfer of authority to
quasi-autonomous units of local government. This model will particularly yield
benefits in countries with large rural populations as allows for self-rule at
the village level through local bodies and break the existing government
monopoly over services. Considering that those in charge work for themselves or
their own societies, there is greater efficiency in provision of services due
to the involvement of personal stakes.
Such
distribution of power does come with its own problems. First, it may act
counter-productive and provide increased opportunities for bribery. Such argument
is logically premised on the idea that a unitary predatory government would set
moderate bribe rates to ensure that they are able to make illegal revenue while
ensuring that the firms and citizens are not discouraged from productive
activities. The advent of vertical competition through decentralization however
automatically generates multiple layers of officials who do not work in sync and
may consequently lead to raised bribe rates. Such arguments are furthered by
papers such as Treisman (1999, 2000) that indicate that federal systems have
higher corruption ratings as opposed to unitary systems.
Although
this is indeed a real possibility, it is important to note that administrative
decentralization results in a reduction in the amount of control that higher-level
governments have over lower-level administrations. This lowers the expected
gains from corruption since the number of individuals who are practically in
charge of a single decision is reduced. Thus, decentralization brings down the
quantum of large-scale bribes at the cost of a potential immediate hike in
petty corruption. With sustained accountability and transparency though, this
too may be eliminated.
Second,
there is issue of increased inefficiency in the services due to incapability of
the local bodies to satisfactorily govern. This may be corrected by
simultaneous programs focusing on capacity building at the local level.
Third,
it may be argued that decentralizing the governing structure shall not
necessarily yield greater efficiency from services as the service providers do
not necessarily change under such circumstances and it is only the governing
body that differs. Here, we may note that with change in the administration,
there is also a greater incentive to ensure the proper provision of services to
the community as a result of the creation of the possibility of social castigation
by the public if they provide for poor services and utilities. Thus, if the
service providers do not yield desired results, the local administration – with
its new autonomy - will simply discharge them from service and reinstate new
providers. This fear of being recalled for poor service delivery shall also
induce the providers to act more efficiently under the decentralized system.
CASE
STUDY:
Decentralization
across Ethiopia provided for expansion of the delivery of education and health
services. The process of decentralization in Ethiopia can be traced over two
major waves. The first wave that lasted from 1991-1994 marked devolution of
state power to geographically defined groups and regional or district councils
(‘woreda’). This devolution provided the local bodies with a range of
executive, legislative and judicial powers within their specified regions. The
second wave that began in 1995 marked an increased amount of responsibility and
control that was provided to the local bodies which culminated in 2002 when the
woreda were expected to completely take over service delivery using the block
grants that they received from their respective regional governments. Thus,
while the federal authorities retained authority over settling policies and
standards for the major service sectors, the woredas were placed in charge of
ensuring service delivery within their regions. This reform produced results
across multiple sectors and enabled Ethiopia in making significant progress to
achieving the Millenium Development Goals. Decentralization helped in reducing
poverty, increased the net enrolments in education, increased the access to
basic health services and allowed for greater agricultural productivity.
Conceptually, these results may be explained from the
following model of a woredas typical expenditure,
CONCLUSION:
Decentralization
has great potential for yielding results. Any such program must however be
backed by legal regulations to ensure the smooth functioning. The law must
provide a framework which clarifies the modes that are being adopted as
legitimate vehicles for decentralization and also elucidate on the functions
and the financing of such modes. To prevent failure of decentralization
schemes, such measures must also be well-designed and sequenced so as to
address pre-existing local conditions and inequalities.
1.
Cultivating political support to bolster program delivery:
Political
support refers to backing of program delivery by politicians both individually
and through their parties. This particular tool is valuable because once the program
garners political support it shall enjoy sustained state supervision in its
working. Such support ensures continued flow of resources – both financial and
administrative – to the planning and execution of these programs and shall
provide for a greater degree of autonomy to those driving the programs thereby
eliminating red-tape revolving around program initialization.
There
tends to exist, an unfavourable political equilibrium between politicians and
the service providers. While the service providers promise electoral favours to
the parties, parties in return promise to retain the service providers under
their reign despite poor delivery of functions. Due to the benefits accruing to
either side from their existing relationship, there is a force of inertia at
play that attempts to resist change of any form. This trend is particularly
visible in under-developed and developing countries. Here, elected politicians
are far more concerned with patronage from a few or with the provision of
favours targeted at some privileged groups as opposed to provision of public
services or goods that would benefit the citizens as a whole. In this process,
what is generally observed is that the larger sections of the populations in
these countries – those who are economically or socially disadvantaged – suffer
the most.
Theoretically,
this may be explained based on an understanding of the demand group, i.e. the
citizens, within these countries. Considering the extreme disparities between
the social groups in such countries, it may be understood that not all sections
of society have equal access to acquiring knowledge about party policies due to
limited education and poorly functioning social services and local bodies. As a
result of this, a situation of assymetric information exists which the political
parties tend to exploit to their benefit. Since political parties essentially
run with the objective of electoral success, they tend to favour or select that
group which shall better identify the party with the policy as also those
sections of societies that will vote or provide campaign money in return for
favourable policies. In extension to this, the nature of the policies that
different sections require also plays a key role. While those lower down
require basic services and provision of utilities and facilities, those higher
above require more nuanced policies to best suit their needs. While the former
type of provisions is generally harder to trace to any individual party’s
efforts, the latter group allows for the party to best showcase its own initiatives.
This means that through adverse selection, the parties tend to place the upper
sections of society over those lower down and reject citizen’s needs over the
wants of the elite. The poor meanwhile continue to vote for the incumbents due
to moral hazard caused by faith of the upper sections in the respective parties
and propaganda.
It
has been noted (Zahid Hasnain, World Bank Report, 2005) that this particular phenomenon
may however vary with three very crucial factors that define a party: fragmentation,
factionalization and polarization.
Fragmentation
refers to the
number of political parties that possess dominant competitive positions within
the party system. Factionalism measures the internal cohesion within the
political parties and finally, polarization refers to the degree of ethnic
divide among political parties. The higher the levels of each of the three
determinants, the greater are the incentives for patronage and poorer is the
quality of service delivery. Party fragmentation increases the informational
demands on voters since there are many more candidates and therefore, many more
messages that voters have to evaluate during election time. When political
parties are highly factionalized they do not provide their members stable
career prospects, and politicians have a relatively greater incentive to focus
on targeted goods so as to build a personal reputation that they can carry
across party lines. Finally, in highly polarized party systems, the provision
of public goods provides less political benefits as different ethnic groups
have different preferences over, and cannot agree on, the public goods to be
provided.
CASE
STUDY:
In South
India, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are states that enjoyed similar levels of
economic growth and development up to the 1980s. However, from the 1980s
onwards, Tamil Nadu pulled forward and has done significantly better than
Karnataka on all fronts of human development. While Tamil Nadu shifted from the
7th to the 3rd most developed state in the country over
three decades starting from the 1980s, Karnataka was only able to maintain a
steady rank of 7th. This was
also reflected in the literacy rates and measures of the indicators of health
between both states as can be seen from below.
This
discrepancy in results despite similar levels of expenditure in both states
between 1980 and 2000 may be attributed to the role played by the government in
terms of fashioning favourable public policies and interventions to boost human
development.
In
this aspect, Tamil Nadu displays greater success through sustained state action
on a variety of programmatic fronts starting from the late 1960’s. In 1967, a
regional party, the Dravida Munnetra Kazagham (DMK) took power in Tamil Nadu adopting
the welfarist ideology of its founder – the political leader ‘Periyar’
Ramaswamy. Although the DMK later split into Karunanidhi’ s DMK and M.G.
Ramachandran’ s All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazagham (AIDMK), both parties
drew their inspiration from Ramaswamy’s Dravidian thought. As a result, both
parties were permeated with ideas that emphasized social welfarism and
empowerment.
While
in power, both the AIDMK and the DMK enjoyed comfortable majorities and
possessed disciplined party cadres. Both parties also shared a consensus on
social policy, even as rivals at the polls. This made it politically possible
to translate welfarist beliefs into programmatic action in ways that would not
be easily imaginable in more chaotic political contexts. This commitment to implementing
party ideology was the product of a perception by the two Dravidian parties
that social programs would bring electoral returns. This support in the form of
a bipartisan consensus provided a crucial impetus for Tamil Nadu’s civil
service to design and implement a range of inter-locking programs to improve
human development outcomes in the state beyond what could have been expected by
economic growth alone.
In
contrast, Karnataka’s political parties in general did not seek to mobilize
political support by pursuing welfarist policies. This is evident from the
delayed introduction of overdue social welfare programs and persistent neglect
of the state’s more backward northern districts where female literacy rates,
health and school infrastructure and infant and child mortality rates remain a
cause for concern.
Thus,
the political support was a key factor in why Tamil Nadu outperformed Karnataka
in terms of provision of basic public services and utilities to the people. This
study also helps to verify the aforementioned conclusion that greater political
support is mobilized with a corresponding lower level of fragmentation,
factionalization and polarization within the party system.
CONCLUSION:
Although
this explanation makes sense theoretically, practically, it is impossible to
control any of the three factors (fragmentation, factionalization and
polarization) as these are largely dependent on the societal composition and
related factors that tend to vary with each country or state.
A
perfect example of this is India wherein the multitude of diversity along
linguistic, regionalist and ethnic lines necessitates the need for a
multi-party system at the state level to ensure that the best interests of all
sections are represented and realized. Advocating the benefits of a bipartite
system in such countries will hardly bring reforms as multiple parties are
essential for representation. Further, as polarization and factionalization are
results of the constructs within each state, it is difficult to reduce either
factor through any structural instruments.
Instead,
what we may conclude is that electoral reform is absolutely essential. The law
must ensure that there is proper implementation of transparent campaign finance
regimes and that there is a ceiling on the amount that can be spent on
campaigns. It is also suggested that the voter may induce the best results from
the political competition by voting on the basis of party ideology and
electoral promises as opposed to voting based on religious or ethnic lines.
1. Enhancing
accountability:
This
particular instrument aims at addressing lacuna in service delivery by
enhancing the accountability of the public servants and all service providers
to the people. A perusal of the pitfalls that are currently existent in
accountability lead us to the following key areas that need to be addressed:
premature transfers of civil servants and opaque administrative practices.
A.
PREMATURE TRANSFERS: The issue of premature transfers is one that
seriously affects accountability. Firstly, the premature transfers undermine
service delivery because managers are often not able to stay in place for long
enough to institute or sustain reforms. In addition to this, short tenures make
it impossible to hold officers accountable for their performance.
CASE STUDY:
More than 350 reports on Indian administrative reforms,
over the past six decades, have uniformly pointed out that premature and
untimely transfers are the main cause for poor administration. A recent study
indicated that on an average, district magistrates spent only seven months in
their posts and the average SP only five months. Within this time, the officer
usually comes across the local mafias that operate in the district. If the
officer starts taking interest in getting to know the modus operandi and the
persona of a particular mafia, the chance of exposure goes up sharply. Typically,
this is followed by cautioning the officer, and, further, transfers. A lot of
the time, officials may also be threatened by such gangs causing them to either
ignore the illegal proceedings around them or to turn into accomplices. Consequently,
services available to the public tend to falter in efficiency as districts get
inexperienced officers every few months, affecting the quality of
administration.
To some extent, it may even be
held that the citizen’s fundamental right to life under Article 21 is affected;
this was the basis of the landmark Supreme Court order of October 2013 that
every post should have a minimum tenure fixed, and reasons for premature
transfers recorded in detail. The same order specifies that postings and transfers
are to be done in a proper and scientific manner by a formal Civil Service
Board (CSB). Further, a report from the
potential transferee shall also be obtained regarding a personal statement on
the purported reason behind transfer.
The state of Karnataka has also
taken some individual steps such as placing a quantitative ceiling on transfers
that may be allowed per year and also introduction of a database to track the
transfers. These 1easures may be implemented across all states to provide
significant improvements to status quo.
A. OPAQUE
ADMINISTRATION: Improving
access to information is a vital part of any strategy designed to empower
clients in relation to providers and the government. There are a number of ways
to enable a higher degree of transparency within the system. Firstly, there must be popular access to
information relating to local level public works. Second, stricter
implementation of the acts designed to enabling public access to government
information across states and the simultaneous working of NGOs to ensure that
issues that citizens may face but lack the wherewithal to address are also
taken care of. Further, strengthening of the role of anti-corruption agencies and
the bolstering or introducing (as may be the case) of an ombudsman of the may
also help. Thirdly, there must be sound provisions in place to protect people
who might act as whistleblowers such as the Whistleblowers Protection Act of
1989 of the United States. Finally, citizen’s charters may also be used to
improve access to information and empower the citizens to ensure efficiency and
clarity in the services.
CASE STUDY:
1)
India
Public
Interest Litigations (PILs) are also be used by society to activate judicial remedies
when the services fail to work properly. Using this powerful tool, the Supreme
Court has intervened in matters as diverse as solid waste management, cleaning
up the air in Indian cities, and compelling candidates for elective office to
disclose information about their backgrounds to the electorate. This
intervention has clearly helped put pressure on the executive to improve the
quality of service delivery in many sectors.
The
states of Rajasthan and Delhi took the idea of protecting public interest a
step further by introducing the use of public hearings to examine documents
relating to public works (e.g., muster rolls, completion certificates, PDS
stock registers) and to look into any matters regarding discrepancy or wrongful
use of office by a servant. Such public hearings proved to have a massive
deterrent effect particularly once it had been implemented at the lowest local
levels. The move helped to discourage malfeasance because the public hearings
meant that the illegal act, if caught, would expose the official to social
rebuke in a circle within which he would be very well known. Fearing this civic
pressure, most officials would instead choose to perform their functions
correctly.
2)
Peru
A
report card to track performance records of various sectors is also a plausible
solution. In Latin America, Peru was the first country to use report cards to
assess its national health, education, nutrition, and employment programs, and
Bogota became the first city in the region to introduce report cards under its ‘Como
Vanzos?’ initiative.
Report
cards essentially consider the public’s satisfaction with various services and
ask them to evaluate each of these departments through these cards. This measure
is doubly effective as they indicate to the public the state of various public
service departments based on various pre-determined parameters and also prod
agencies into pressuring the politicians into action.
3)
Comparative analysis of legal systems in the US and India
A
comparison of the prosecution systems in the India and the US indicate that the
government lawyers are far more corrupt as opposed to those of the West due to
the absence and the failure of legal machinery to hold the lawyers accountable.
The American
legal system provides for a grand jury system under which the selected jurors
have relatively short tenures and are generally selected after ensuring that jurors
haven’t been repeated. As a result, the jurors can be said to be usually devoid
of links to the prosecutors and any other influential elements. The largest
advantage this provides is that the prosecutors are automatically made more
responsible. Further, these prosecutors also largely elected and those appointed
are selected through a decentralized and broad-based system under which the
mayor may elect a lawyer on the advice of the municipal councilors. The
citizens are also empowered to recall prosecutors if they are not satisfied
with his/her performance which acts as another important tool providing for
accountability of the government lawyers.
In
comparison, India lacks the grand jury system. Here prosecutors are usually
supervised by the District Collector, the Law minister and senior officials of
the Law Ministry offices. Since the Indian government lawyers are generally
appointed through a centralized system and enjoy long tenures, this vertical
supervision is not particularly effective as such official relationships are
usually heavily influenced by nexuses.
The
role of E-governance in bringing about accountability:
E-government
or the use of information technology by government agencies can also be used to
improve the government’s interactions with citizens and service providers and
enhance intra-governmental and intergovernmental exchange. Thus, local
governments can function more effectively and productively by digitizing
existing government processes and thereby improve service delivery. Such
process may also help in eliminating unnecessary positions or duties of public
officials and thus pre-emptively limit any opportunities for paying a bribe.
The
transfer of primary school teachers, a critical public policy issue in South
Asia, significantly affects service delivery to rural people. Because demand
for transfers is significantly higher than available opportunities, bad
governance and influence play important roles in the decision-making. Transfer
orders often contradict each other, teachers are disgruntled, and the needs of
poor people are often sacrificed. In two Indian states—Karnataka and Madhya
Pradesh—governments implemented a computer-aided system that identifies surplus
posts and teachers as well as schools with teacher shortages, publishes a
database of all openings, and helps to make a decision. This citizen-centric e-government
innovation has improved information and introduced transparency, openness,
fairness, and rationalization into government decision making.
Other
evidence shows that e-government can improve land administration as well.
Karnataka computerized more than 20 million records of landownership for 6.7
million farmers. Introducing e-government helped modernize the entire process
of keeping records of rights tenancy and crops by eliminating the delays,
harassment, and bribery that had been widespread. Now farmers can obtain a
printed copy of an online land record for Rs. 15 (US$0.32) at computerized land
record kiosks in more than 140 offices around the state.
OTHER IMPORTANT TOOLS:
It
is important to note that corruption within the public services is a consequence
of more deep-seated problems of policy distortion, institutional incentives and
governance. It thus cannot be addressed by simple legal acts proscribing
corruption. Particularly in countries with rampant service corruption, the rule
of law is fragile and can be turned around to favour corrupt interests.
Corruption has found acceptance in the social psyche and behaviorism, It can
therefore be even said to some extent that the corrupt politician or the
administration is a construct by the public.
The
strategy to reform the public services and through that, limit avenues of
corruption, must involve popular support as well to ensure full success. For
example, a shift of strategy by the Lokayukta in Karnataka towards high-profile
raids and investigations into corruption scandals ranging over issues from the
state of public hospitals to drug procurement to corruption in municipal agencies
mobilized public opinion. Due to the renewed public interest and involvement in
the issue, the government was forced to take at least some steps to reform the
system and thus helping to plug in some of the holes in the system.
The
easiest method to do so is through incentivizing the public to demand reforms
in the public services through educating them on possible gains or through
raising their own stakes. A good example of such attempts can be traced to
Latin America. Both Columbia and Chile have, for example, introduced school
voucher programs that effectively obliged schools to compete on the basis of quality
to attract students vested with the power of choice. Latin America has also
experimented with cash transfers to poorer households conditional on children’s
school or clinic attendance. A typical example of this was Mexico’s ‘Progresa’
program.
Finally,
the role of the media cannot be ignored in this aspect. The media can be
harnessed to provide added pressure to ensure that political parties and
service providers do not get away with unfair or illegal practices and can also
be used to help NGOs raise awareness amongst citizens about their rights and
their ability to participate in programs aimed at tackling gaps in the service
provision.
CASE
STUDY:
The ‘Zero Rupee Note’ initiative (ZRN) was spearheaded by NGO 5th Pillar based on the idea that transforming social norms is the key to fighting petty corruption. This project distributed valueless ‘zero rupee’ notes amongst the public and also educated them on the impacts of corruption on the democratic economy, their rights and alternatives to paying bribes.
This
movement introduced in Chennai in 2007 showed remarkable success in tackling
petty corruption and was then introduced across other states and has also been
introduced in countries like Ghana, Benin, Mexico and Nepal. By August 2014, over
2.5 million such notes were in circulation. The success of this project shows
that public involvement in the form of open resistance and condemnation to and
against corruption is instrumental in bringing about a change.
CONCLUSION:
The
public services sector is beset by a number of systemic issues that feed both
into and from corruption within these sectors. Thus, any attempt to reform the
sector must also consider the extent of corruption prevalent and simultaneously
attempt to address this. It is suggested based on analysis of given case
studies that all attempts to use the listed instruments must be based on
understanding the situation within the respective sector and the country.
Finally, public support and interest must be mobilized for sustained results.
AISHWARYA SURESH NAIR,
NLIU
BHOPAL
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