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UN Performance Problems UN Management Accountability Struggles Where is the Rule of Law? Inadequate UN Oversight Recent Developments
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Introductory
quote
"Considerations of conflict
resolution, decision making, economics, and space [require] large
societies to be centralized.
But centralization of power inevitably opens the door -- for those who hold the power, are
privy to information, make the decisions, and redistribute the goods -- to exploit the resulting
opportunities to reward themselves and their relatives. To anyone familiar with any modern
grouping of people, that's obvious.
As earlier societies developed, those acquiring centralized power
gradually established themselves as an elite .…
Those are the reasons why large
societies cannot function with band organization and instead are complex
kleptocracies."
Jared
Diamond, Guns, germs, and steel: The fates of human societies,
Chapter
14, "From egalitarianism to plutocracy: The evolution of government
and
religion", Norton, New York, 1999 and 2003, p. 288.
[Note. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, 1998. Does the above
quote from this prize-winning book seem exaggerated or extreme? It shouldn’t, in light of all the
preceding and following quotes presented in this subsection on corruption
worldwide over the years; as detailed in the ongoing research work of
Transparency International, the UNDP, the World Bank, and the OECD
identified in the Top Related Sources and Websites
subsection of this archive; and in the November 2004 global public opinion
survey findings cited at the end of this subsection.] Chronological
quotes "The first part of this book is
largely about Nigeria … [because it is] where the authors have lived
longest, outside Britain … and there are ample reasons for thinking that
the actual situations described can be paralleled elsewhere. The authors have indeed come
across them in other parts of Africa. [But the bulk of the book] is a
discussion of bribery and corruption in Britain… to explore … the factors
which led Britain, a country as corrupt as any, to achieve in a particular
century a standard of public integrity which is perhaps without precedent.
Perhaps even more important,
can any threads be traced in the pattern which are meaningful for
Britain's former African and Asian
dependencies?" Ronald Wraith and Edgar Simpkins,
Corruption in developing countries, George Allen & Unwin,
London, 1963, Foreword.
"I shall try to develop a positive
theory of corruption that can aid those concerned with the practical
application of political ideals …
on two different levels.
The first half of the book models the sources of high level
corruption in a democratic political process; the second half considers
the incentives for low-level bureaucratic corruption in the administration
of laws. … The main aim … has been to
demonstrate that [vote-maximization models, pluralistic models, and
institutionalist theories] and their interrelationships must be specified
clearly … to grasp the corrupt incentives inherent in a given political
structure. … I have shown …
that the opportunities for corruption remain high if bureaucrats and
legislators can collude on a common strategy, despite an institutionalized
system of checks and balances." Susan Rose-Ackerman, Corruption: A study in political
economy, Academic, New York, 1978, pp. 10, 212.
"Zaire is potentially the
wealthiest country in Africa, but it stands today as an impoverished
development tragedy. … The goal of this book is to
contribute to a sharper understanding of the twin processes of
underdevelopment and bureaucratic corruption in the Third World. The specific purpose is to clarify
the nature of the corruption-underdevelopment relationship in the case of
Zaire. … It will be necessary
to develop an analytic framework … of the various approaches to the
subject -- including a
critique of previous frameworks for analyzing corruption -- and to apply it to … contemporary
Zairian history." David J. Gould, Bureaucratic corruption and underdevelopment in
the Third World: The case of Zaire, Pergamon, New York, 1980,
pp. xi, xv.
"[The very diverse examples in
this book counsel much caution in attempting to broadly analyse] political
economies and their relative tendencies to require, permit and control
corruption. [Reasons include] first, the vague and morally accusatory
character of corruption …
Secondly, corruption appears to have an alarming tendency to appear
in all societies at all times …
especially where administration by formal modern bureaucracies is a
significant feature …
Finally, historical developments … provide constantly changing
opportunities for and pressures toward corruption even within the same
political economies." Michael Clarke, "Introduction", pp. xviii-xix, in Michael Clarke,
Ed., Corruption: Causes,
Consequences, and Control, Frances Pinter, London, 1983.
"Corruption is not the sole
province of developing countries. … Corruption is a complex and universal
phenomenon. Its effects are
cumulative and circular, and they extend beyond the boundaries of the
nation-state. We approach the subject by first
reviewing the data on corruption in selected developing countries and
identifying factors commonly associated with [that corruption]. Next, we describe the various
forms it assumes under different conditions. We conclude with an examination of
the impact of corruption on administrative performance and development
across developing countries." David J. Gould and Jose A. Amaro-Reyes, The effects of
corruption on administrative performance: Illustrations from developing
countries, World Bank Staff Working Papers, Number 580, Management and
Development Series Number 7, the World Bank, Washington, DC, 1983,
pp. 1, 3.
"This book is addressed to
government officials, especially in developing countries, who are
searching for answers to [questions about controlling corruption]. … The literature on international
development is surprisingly silent about such problems. One seldom encounters a
practically oriented examination of anticorruption policies. Yet corruption is an issue of
first-order importance.
…the situation is particularly
worrisome in the developing countries -- some of which, of course, have
fewer instances of corruption than some developed nations. As a group, [they] are
particularly vulnerable to the harms of governmental corruption. … [because] the government plays
such a large and central role in the society
… I will not spend much time on such
issues of more or less and here or there, however, because [I wish to
focus] on the neglected questions of policy." Robert Klitgaard, Controlling corruption, University of
California, Berkeley CA and London, 1988, pp. 2, 6, 10.
"This volume seeks to address
[public servants, students preparing for careers in public service, and]
scholars … who seek … to
clarify our understanding of ethical issues and options. We also hope that a wider public
might take interest in a work which addresses the urgent tasks of
combating corruption and encouraging ethical behavior in the public
service. The [contents] focus primarily
upon those ethical problems and topics which are associated with the
concept of corruption and its cousins -- lying, evasion of
accountability, and the abuse of authority. We recognize that there are other
dimensions to the field of ethics, but the problems covered here are, we
believe, central to the subject and … merit this emphasis."
William L. Richter, Frances Burke, and Jameson W. Doig, eds.,
Combating corruption, Encouraging ethics: A sourcebook for public
service ethics, American Society for Public Administration,
Washington, DC, 1990, Preface.
" How bribes, payoffs and crooked
officials are blocking economic growth … Corruption: the universal language
is graft, bribery and payoffs.
Can the advocates of market reform and economic growth be heard
above the din?" Michael Elliot, "Corruption", [cover story], Newsweek
International, November 14, 1994, pp. 10-15.
"Ob in Baubehörden oder
Anwaltskanzleien, Firmenbüros oder Finanämtern -- eine Hand wäscht die
andere in deutschen Amts- und Geschäftszimmern. Doch die Politiker geisseln die um
sich greifende Korruption nur in Sonntagsreden, tatsächlich wird die
Strafverfolgung bei Bestechungstatbeständen systematisch
erschwert." "Die alltagliche korruption: Deutschland: wie geschmiert", Der
Speigel (Germany), 50/1994, 12.12.1994, [cover story], pp.
114-129, "A sweeping crackdown against
corporate bribery is toppling business leaders and politicians from Paris
to Seoul. Why now? What's behind the drive to root
out corruption? Is real reform possible?" "Dirty money", Business Week International, [cover story], December 18, 1995, pp. 25-34. "Around the world, newly empowered
citizens are rising to battle the ancient disease of official
corruption." … Wherever there has been too much
concentrated power and too little accountability (read: most of human
history) there is a long pedigree of plunder and payoffs. What's different today -- and it will become more
noticeable -- is a worldwide effort to do
something about it. Around
the globe there's an overwhelming urge to purge.
…. In the end graft is a crime of
calculation: does the risk outweigh the reward? Public opinion can be a mighty
force on the risk side. ….
Bertrand de Speville, commissioner of Hong Kong's widely admired
Independent Commission Against Corruption …. [says] 'You have to make
corruption a high-risk activity, a high risk you'll be caught and a high
risk you'll be jailed.' Much
of the world is not there yet, but things are getting riskier all the
time. …" Michael Hirsh, "Graft busters", "Corruption 96", Newsweek International,
December 25, 1995/January 1, 1996, pp. 56-59, [56, 59]. "… How to conduct an ethics
overhaul: Here's the step-by-step approach the pros usually
advise. Step One Hire an
independent investigator to issue a report on the misconduct. Credible
former government officials are preferred. Step Two Write a new ethics
policy. Deliver [it] to all
company employees with memo from CEO instructing them not to ignore
it. Step Three Expand training. Hire consultants … start
scheduling regular informational sessions on subjects such as sexual
harassment, bribery, etc. Step Four Install a
whistle-blowers' hotline.
Publicize the phone number … and establish and detail fully a
systematic complaint procedure. Step Five Hire
a full-time ethics officer … to investigate whistle-blower complaints,
supervise training programs, and update the ethics
policy." "Ethics for hire: Laundering images of soiled companies is turning into big business", Business Week International, July 15, 1996, pp. 26-28. "As economic interdependence
grows, … more and more issues have taken on an international dimension. …
Corruption is by no means a new issue, but it has only recently emerged as
a global issue.
Corruption … distorts and slows
market-opening and pro-democracy reforms. Whenever it is pervasive,
corruption can deter investment, impede economic development, and
undermine political legitimacy.
Even when the consequences appear to have been contained for long
periods of time, … relatively widespread corruption can eventually spin
out of control. As the global implications of
corruption have grown, so has the impetus for international action to
combat it." Kimberly Ann Elliott, ed., Corruption and the global economy, Institute for International Economics, Washington, DC, 1997, pp. vii, viii.
"This handbook presents a
framework to assist USAID missions to develop strategic responses to
public corruption. The
framework sets out root causes of corruption, identifies a range of
institutional and societal reforms to address them, and introduces a
methodology for selecting among these
measures. … the final section of the handbook
describes the work of other organizations involved with anti--corruption
activities [and is followed by a bibliography with more than 150
entries.]" A handbook on fighting corruption, US Agency for International Development, Washington, DC, February, 1999.
"… the subject of the role of
money in our politics has come ever more to the fore of the public
consciousness.
… Moreover, there has been an
increasing public understanding that the funding system has a pervasive
impact on public policy.
… This understanding
needs to be intensified. This
book, with its new epilogue, is dedicated to increasing that understanding
and helping citizens realize what they can do about the corrupting role of
money in our politics. It
also seeks to provide a sense of how Washington has changed over the past
twenty-five years and why there has been a decline in the quality of our
politicians -- and what citizens can do about
that as well." Elizabeth Drew, The corruption of American politics: What went
wrong and why, Overlook, Woodstock and New York, 2000,
Preface. [Note: Ms. Drew was the Washington correspondent of The New
Yorker magazine for 19 years.] "This week the European Union is
hosting a UN conference on the problems of the so-called least-developed
countries. …. I would like to stress good
government and the fight against corruption. No amount of money from the rich
West will help unless our anti-poverty strategies are combined with a
drive for democracy, human rights, and the supremacy of the rule of
law. Corruption is an insult
to the poor, and we should all put the fight against corruption at the
core of our policies. …. A long, hard fight against poverty
will stretch into the years ahead.
As always, it is not words at the comfortable conference table that
will make the difference, but action and long-term political
commitment." Romano Prodi, "Corruption is an insult to the poor", International Herald Tribune, May 16, 2001. [Note: Mr. Prodi was president of the European Commission. However, in contrast to his handsome pronouncement, please see also the information on seriously defective anti-corruption efforts in 2003 within the EU itself, in the subsection on Other Multilateral Accountability Struggles which follows.] " …. Although the worldwide
transparency movement remains in its infancy, it has gained sufficient
momentum to ensure that the corruption problem will continue to receive
concerted and persistent attention over the next several years. The great diversity of actors and
contexts guarantees a diversity of country-level approaches -- a diversity which is sure to
generate further insights about how to go about improving national
integrity systems." Peter Richardson, "The global assault on corruption", The Journal of Public Inquiry, Fall/Winter 2001, pp., 3-7 [7]. [Note: The Journal is produced regularly by the Inspectors General of the United States. The cited issue is entitled "The war on corruption, " and includes a dozen further articles on fighting international and national corruption.] "But everybody does it! The staggering cost of corruption
in Europe. Across the Continent, corruption
is a way of life. It erodes
confidence in government and threatens the EU's
future." Stefan Theil and Christopher Dickey, "Europe's dirty secret",
[Cover story], Newsweek
International, April 29, 2002, pp. 14-20.
"Corruption is rampant in the
Central and East European countries expecting to join the wealthy European
Union, and is likely to persist after the union expands eastward in 2004
unless the EU significantly strengthens its own anti-corruption measures,
according to a new report. The report, based on a yearlong
study by the Open Society Institute, a leading nonprofit organization
active in the region, said that three-fourths of citizens in the candidate
states believed that most or all of their public officials were
corrupt. But more than a
decade after the fall of communism, governments have yet to enact adequate
measures to tackle corruption, and are not enforcing the few that are on
the books. 'Unfortunately, that kind of
public awareness doesn't create pressure for the governments to introduce
good anti-corruption policies,' Quentin Reed, the report's author said in
an interview. 'All it does is
make corruption a campaign issue and then governments do nothing about
it.' Corruption in the legislative
process is probably the biggest problem facing the post-Communist
countries, the report said, along with kickbacks and payoffs in public
procurement contracts." Peter S. Green, "EU candidates face corruption issues: Report urges Union to toughen its own laws before expansion", International Herald Tribune, November 8, 2002. “Distrust of political leaders is
high across the world, with significant majorities of people viewing the
authorities of their countries as dishonest, wielding too much power and
overly susceptible to influence, according to a new global opinion survey.
.... The ‘Voice of the People’ poll,
which surveyed 50,000 people in 60 countries worldwide, was conducted by
Gallup International [for] … the World Economic Forum [meeting in Davos in
January 2005.] … Globally, political leaders were
viewed as dishonest by 63 percent of those surveyed and as unethical by 52
percent. … Business leaders fared better … in
world perceptions … with 43 percent globally viewing them as dishonest and
39 percent as behaving unethically. Prospects for political stability
and economic prosperity will be at the center of discussions in Davos …
[under the theme] “Taking responsibility for Tough
Choices.” [A Forum spokesman said] … ‘Change
is not likely overnight’, adding however that if the leaders gathering in
Davos review the poll results and ‘see that what they’re doing is not in
accord with their people, hopefully it will slowly have an
effect.’ Gallup said the results are
statistically representative of the views of more than 1.2 billion people
worldwide.” Meg Bortin, “Poll finds little faith in politicians worldwide”,
International Herald Tribune, Nov. 19, 2004. Useful Sources
Segal, Lydia, "Roadblocks in reforming corrupt agencies: The case of the New York City school custodians", Public Administration Review (USA), July/August 2002, vol. 62, No. 4, pp. 445-460. Adams, Guy B., and Balfour, Danny L., Unmasking administrative evil, Sage, Thousand Oaks CA and London, 1998.
Richardson, Peter, "The global assault on corruption", pp.
3-8, in "The war on
corruption", Public
Inquiry, [A publication of the Inspectors General of the United
States], Fall/Winter 2001, pp. 1-62. Galtung, Fredrik, "A global network to curb corruption: The
experience of Transparency International", in Florini, Ann M., Ed., The third force: The rise of
transnational civil society, Japan Society for International Exchange
and Carnegie Endowment, Tokyo and Washington DC, 2000, pp. 17-47. Seligson, Mitchell A., "Corruption and democratization: What is to be done?", Public Integrity (USA), Summer 2001, pp. 221-241. United Nations, Global report on crime and justice, Graeme Newman, ed., Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention, Oxford, New York, 1999.
Wang, Hongying, and Rosenau, James N., "Transparency International and corruption as an issue of global governance", Global Governance, 7(2001), 25-49.
Huffington,
Arianna, Pigs at the trough: How corporate greed and political
corruption are undermining America, with a new epilogue by the author,
Three Rivers, New York, 2003. "Corporate crime wave", New Internationalist, No. 358, July 2003, pp. 9-28. Arendt, Hannah, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A report on the banality of evil, Penguin Twentieth Century Classics, (1963), rev. and enlarged ed., Penguin, New York and London, 1994.
Drew, Elizabeth,
The corruption of American politics: What went wrong and why,
Overlook, Woodstock and New York, 1999.
Elliott, Kimberly
Ann, ed., Corruption and the global economy, Institute for
International Economics, Washington, D.C., June 1997.
Klitgaard, Robert, Controlling corruption, University of California, Berkeley, CA (USA), 1988.
Kaplan, Elaine, "The international emergence of legal protections for whistleblowers," pp. 37-42, in "The war on corruption", Public Inquiry, [A publication of the Inspectors General of the United States], Fall/Winter 2001, pp. 1-62. Caiden, Gerald E., "Book reviews: Ethics and corruption: No more heads in the sand?, Public Integrity (USA), Spring 2002, pp. 179-187. Quah, Jon S.T., "Corruption in Asian countries: Can it be minimized?", Public Administration Review (USA), November/December 1999, Vol.59, No. 6, pp. 24-41
United Nations Development Programme/Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, OECD Development Center, Corruption and integrity improvement initiatives in developing countries, Nairobi, 1998.
www.usaid.gov/democracy/pdfs/pnace070.pdf
Hope, Kempe Ronald, Sr., "Corruption in Africa: A crisis in ethical leadership", Public Integrity (USA), Summer 1999, pp. 289-308. Kim, Pan S., "Improving ethical conduct in public service: Korean anticorruption initiatives in an international context," Public Integrity (USA), Spring 2000, pp. 157-171.
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