{"id":580,"date":"2017-01-31T08:30:08","date_gmt":"2017-01-31T08:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scscsussex.wordpress.com\/?p=580"},"modified":"2017-01-31T08:30:08","modified_gmt":"2017-01-31T08:30:08","slug":"chinas-an-corruption-drive-small-steps-made-in-lots-of-different-directions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/centre-for-the-study-of-corruption\/2017\/01\/31\/chinas-an-corruption-drive-small-steps-made-in-lots-of-different-directions\/","title":{"rendered":"China’s anti-corruption drive. Small steps made in lots of different directions"},"content":{"rendered":"

How effective is Xi Jinping\u2019s anti-corruption drive? If you believe the latest data published by anti-corruption NGO Transparency International then progress is indeed being made. But, it\u2019s slow going. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Trying to measure how much corruption exists is often a fool\u2019s errand.\u00a0 Corruption comes in many shapes and sizes and takes on a variety of different forms.\u00a0 This doesn\u2019t stop Transparency International<\/a>, one of the world\u2019s leading anti-corruption NGOs, from publishing an annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI)<\/a>.\u00a0 Data is taken from a range of surveys on corruption and related issues and put in to what is effectively a poll of polls.\u00a0 States are then ranked on a scale of 1 (the worst score possible) to 100 (the best).<\/p>\n

There are many reasons to be just a little sceptical<\/a> about the voracity of the data in the CPI, but that doesn\u2019t stop it catching many policy-makers\u2019 eyes.\u00a0 No one wants to see their country going the wrong way in tables like these.\u00a0 Chinese policy-makers are unlikely to be any different.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The 2016 data was released on Wednesday 25th<\/sup> January.\u00a0 It makes interesting reading. Perennial front-runners Denmark and New Zealand again head the pack, coming in joint first with scores of 90.\u00a0 Finland, Sweden and Switzerland are just behind them and they make up the top five.\u00a0 Somalia remains bottom of the pile (10 points), with South Sudan (11), North Korea (12) and Syria (13) also doing particularly poorly.\u00a0 Suriname showed the most improvement, scoring 45 in 2016 as opposed to 36 the year before.\u00a0 The impact of high profile scandals surrounding the awarding of football world cups no doubt contributed to Qatar being the state that performed worst compared to 2015; down ten points from 71 to 61.<\/p>\n

China has traditionally not done particularly well in the CPI.\u00a0 In 2015 it was in 83rd<\/sup> place (out of 168 countries), scoring 37 out of 100. 2016 reveals some improvement; China\u2019s score rose by three points to 40 and the PRC is now 79th<\/sup> out of 176 countries (8 have been added since the 2015 table was published).\u00a0 A journey of 1000 miles begins, as the Chinese say, with one small step.<\/p>\n

We should nonetheless be wary of taking the data in the CPI too seriously. Coming up with one single number to encapsulate all of China\u2019s corruption problems, for example, would seem like a heroically optimistic undertaking.\u00a0 How, for example, do you compare petty corruption in rural Guangxi\u00a0with the grand corruption that might well take place in Beijing? Many would say you can\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Be that as it may, if you\u2019re going to get to where you need to go, then you have to be taking steps in the right direction. And this data makes it look like China may indeed be doing just that.\u00a0 Chinese policy-makers are certainly likely to be pleased to see their score moving upwards.<\/p>\n

If, however, we take a closer look at what tends to characterise low corruption countries, then Chinese policy-makers will find much less to be enthusiastic about.\u00a0 As Transparency International\u2019s Chairman, Jos\u00e9 Ugaz, noted this week three key things help states genuinely root out corrupt practices; freedom of expression, transparency in all political processes and strong democratic institutions.\u00a0 Only then will civil society and the media be able to hold those in power to account and only then will the building blocks for a successful anti-corruption fight be in place.<\/p>\n

China, of course, displays precisely none of those core traits.\u00a0 Freedom of expression is strictly limited, decision-making processes are opaque and convoluted, and democratic institutions in the widely-understood sense don\u2019t exist.\u00a0 The civil society organisations that are permitted have only very narrow room for manoeuvre and the press is there to defend the Communist Party\u2019s line much more than to hold it to account.<\/p>\n

Ugaz may nonetheless be simplifying what is actually something that is very complex. Off the shelf anti-corruption tools don\u2019t exist, and the \u2018right\u2019 way to tackle corruption will depend on the nature of the challenge to hand.\u00a0 What works in one place may well have little impact in another and be counter-productive in a third jurisdiction.\u00a0 The introduction of democratic institutions across Africa in the latter part of the 20th<\/sup> Century, for example, did little to help those states tackle endemic corruption. \u00a0Indeed, in some it actually made it worse.\u00a0 Tackling corruption is subsequently messy, it\u2019s time-consuming and it\u2019s difficult.<\/p>\n

Xi\u2019s China will certainly have to find a \u2018Chinese Way\u2019 of tackling the corruption evident in the PRC.\u00a0 That may well involve different ideas and different approaches to what we\u2019ve seen elsewhere.\u00a0 But that doesn\u2019t mean that the baby should be thrown out with the bathwater. Much of what the CCP has been doing under Xi flies directly in the face of what anti-corruption thinkers tend to believe might work.\u00a0 Small improvements in a global anti-corruption league table shouldn\u2019t disguise that.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How effective is Xi Jinping\u2019s anti-corruption drive? If you believe the latest data published by anti-corruption NGO Transparency International then progress is indeed being made. But, it\u2019s slow going. Trying to measure how much corruption exists is often a fool\u2019s…<\/span><\/p>\n

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