b1854
Corruption, Good Governance and Economic Development: Contemporary Analysis and Case Studies
R. N. Ghosh and M. A. B. Siddique
23
(3) Shortages in the supply of goods and services encourage ‘rationing’ and thereby increase the power and authority of petty public officials. Such increased power of public officials encourages corruption. The rule that ‘power corrupts’ is universal, and it applies to the whole range of government activities, such as health, education, infrastructure, the judiciary, the police and the issuing of permits and licenses. Free competition is an effective method of reducing corruption. However, as we have seen earlier, in international trade and investment, competition among foreign rivals encourages corruption and the grand scale of bribe-paying. (4) Generally speaking, poverty and low income breeds, or at least encourages, corruption. Hence poor and underdeveloped countries are ridden with more corruption than high income and developed countries. Therefore it is possible to argue that economic development itself is likely to be an effective cure for corruption, particularly the so-called ‘petty’ types of corruption. Table 2.7 shows the ranking of different countries, according to the CPI and CCI. Table 2.7
Some popular measures of corruption (2009)
Country
CPI
CCI
Australia
8
8
New Zealand
1
1
China
79
136
Malaysia
56
89
Japan
17
27
178
213
Myanmar Singapore
3
2
139
177
84
114
Pakistan
139
185
Sri Lanka
97
118
Bangladesh India
N.B.: At the time this paper was written, 2009 figures were the most recent that were available for both CPI and CCI. The number of countries included in the CPI and CCI ranking are 180 and 213, respectively.
b1854_Ch-02.indd 23
12/2/2014 11:39:15 AM
