Democracy & Governance
Corruption and Development -By Suleiman Lawan Kolomi
Some countries have managed to have high levels of human development despite high levels of corruption, showing that the relationship is far from deterministic. In general, richer countries and those with high economic and political growth rates have less reported corruption and better functioning governments.
Corruption is the abuse of public power for private gain. This covers behavior such as a politician embezzling public funds or a police officer extorting bribes in the street.
Corruption represents illicit use of willingness-to-pay as a decision-making criterion. It most often occurs where private wealth and public power overlaps. Bribes induces officials to take actions that are against the interest of their principals, who may be bureaucratic superiors, politically appointed ministers, or multiple principals such as the general public. Corruption do occur at low level- that is opportunistic pay offs and high level “systemic corruption” which implies an entire bureaucratic hierarchy e.g., electoral system, or governmental structure from top to bottom.
Low-level corruption occurs within a framework where basic laws and regulations are in place, and officials and private individuals seize upon themselves opportunities to benefit personally. It can lead to the inefficient and unfair distribution of scarce benefits, undermine the purposes of public programs, encourage officials to create red tape, increase the cost of doing business, and lower state legitimacy.
Grand corruption shares some features with low-level pay offs, but it can be more deeply destructive of state functioning by bringing the state to the edge of outright failure and undermining the economy.
On one hand, countries with higher levels of corruption have lower levels of human development. Highly corrupt countries tend to under-invest in human capital by spending less on education, over-investing in public infrastructure relative to private investment, and degrading environmental quality.
On the other hand, some countries have managed to have high levels of human development despite high levels of corruption, showing that the relationship is far from deterministic. In general, richer countries and those with high economic and political growth rates have less reported corruption and better functioning governments.
However, the main cure for corruption is economic growth furthered by good policies, especially the promotion of education among citizens of a country; institutional reforms such as program redesign and policy to increase transparency and accountability in governance; constitutional change; civil service reforms to provide better salaries and improved monitoring and evaluations; ‘freedom-of-information law’ to give people access to government information, and many government decision making processes should be open to public scrutiny and participation. Democracy is said to be valuable for many reasons, but, taken by itself, is hardly a cure for corruption and therefore, more radical reforms in government structures will also play a key role in eradicating the menace of corruption in a giving country.
Suleiman Lawan Kolomi (M.Sc. in view)
suleimankolomi@gmail.com
Department of Sociology,
Bayero University, Kano.
