Chile has been one of the most successful new democracies in building control of corruption in the world, with a general audit agency (the Contraloria) which can be ranked as among the most powerful and efficient in the world and a judiciary which used to be the envy of Latin America. Its democratic politics have been from the onset plagued by finance scandals, however, which, coupled with perceptions of lack of social fairness have undermined trust in government. Chile needs absolute transparency in its party funding and public spending to restore trust and make its citizens value what they achieved already while demanding for more progress.
Country: Chile
Transitions to Good Governance: Creating Virtuous Circles of Anti-corruption
Why have so few countries managed to leave systematic corruption behind, while in many others modernization is still a mere façade? How do we escape the trap of corruption, to reach a governance system based on ethical universalism? In this unique book, Alina Mungiu-Pippidi and Michael Johnston lead a team of eminent researchers on an illuminating path towards deconstructing the few virtuous circles in contemporary governance. The book combines a solid theoretical framework with quantitative evidence and case studies from around the world. While extracting lessons to be learned from the success cases covered, Transitions to Good Governance avoids being prescriptive and successfully contributes to the understanding of virtuous circles in contemporary good governance.
Offering a balanced but always grounded perspective, this collection combines analytic narratives of existing virtuous circles and how they were established, with an analysis of the global evidence. In doing so the authors explain why governance is so resistant to change, and describe the lessons to be remembered for international anti-corruption efforts. Exploring the primacy of politics over economic development, and in order to understand how vicious circles can be broken, the expert contributions trace the progress of countries that have successfully transitioned. Unprecedentedly, this book goes beyond the tests of different variables to showcase human agency on every continent, and reveals why some nations make the best and others the worst of the same development legacies.
This comprehensive examination of virtuous circles of governance will appeal to all scholars with an interest in transitions, democratization, anti-corruption and good governance. Policy-makers and practitioners in the fields of international development, good governance and democracy support will find it an invaluable resource.
Reviews for this publication
“Vicious cycles, where corruption breeds corruption, present special challenges. Nevertheless, some success stories exist. The case studies in this edited volume highlight reforms that created virtuous cycles, where honesty breeds honesty. Nevertheless, the authors caution that reforms may be fragile and incomplete if policies do not shift expectations and behavior sufficiently enough toward a new, less-corrupt status quo.”
Susan Rose-Ackerman, Yale University
How Does Political Finance Regulation Influence Control of Corruption? Improving Governance in Latin America
In this paper, we address the question of how political finance regulation affects control of corruption in Latin America from a quantitative perspective. We present a Political Finance Regulation Index with panel data from 180 countries over 20 years (1996-2015). This index was developed using the IDEA Political Finance Database, and once created, was applied to assess the relationship between political finance regulation and control of corruption.
In order to do this, we use the equilibrium model of control of corruption developed by Mungiu-Pippidi (2015). We also included judicial independence and public investment, considered as a constraint and an opportunity to corrupt, respectively. Lastly, we use control variables for level of development.
Results show that, in Latin America, increases in political finance regulation are related with a deterioration of control of corruption. This relationship is statistically significant in the panel estimations. Inversely, the negative relationship between regulation and control of corruption becomes positive in countries with high levels of judicial independence. In a similar way, increases in opportunities to corrupt, represented by levels of public investment, have a significant and negative effect in control of corruption.
Process-tracing report on Chile
This paper traces the historical roots of Chile’s low tolerance for corruption and analyzes how the country has successfully remained free from significant corruption scandals despite the greater access to information and more demands for transparency that often result in uncovering corruption in areas that were previously inaccessible to the press and civil society. The economic transformations undertaken under military rule (1973-1990) and consolidated once democracy was restored in 1990 have created a stronger civil society, a freer press and have increased demands for transparency. There is growing information on corruption scandals as the number of social and political actors has increased and there is more competition for resources and markets. As power is more widely distributed, there is less opportunity for covert corrupt practices and more pressure to end former common corrupt practices. While opportunities for corrupt practices expand with economic growth—both in per capita and total national GDP—tolerance for corruption has remained low and a stronger civil society has raised probity standards in the public sector.
Background Paper on Chile
This report examines the successful performance of Chile to control corruption. It discusses the importance of structural and institutional factors that have shaped Chilean political development and its political economy and then it analyses the mechanisms implemented to achieve such a goal.
Political Economy Analysis of Control of Corruption in Chile
The analysis of the World Governance Indicator Control of Corruption and Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) shows that Chile has always been a clean country, but one cannot tell how control of corruption developed. In order to understand control of corruption in Chile, one must look at the transition to democracy period, and also at Chile’s history, analyzing the institutions, power distribution, and the rules of the game since the first democratic period until nowadays in order to understand why control of corruption in Chile has always been higher than in other Latin American countries.
Political Economy Analysis of Control of Corruption in Chile
The analysis of the World Governance Indicator Control of Corruption and Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) shows that Chile has always been a clean country, but one cannot tell how control of corruption developed. In order to understand control of corruption in Chile, one must look at the transition to democracy period, and also at Chile’s history, analyzing the institutions, power distribution, and the rules of the game since the first democratic period until nowadays in order to understand why control of corruption in Chile has always been higher than in other Latin American countries.