Corruption in the Context of International Business

Abstract

Corruption is widely accepted in the popular press as a problem for economic development and in conducting international business. Yet, it remains somewhat under-researched, particularly in an academic setting. This article describes corruption in the context of international business. It presents a critical evaluation of the conceptual and methodological issues associated with corruption. In doing so, it portrays the inherent complexities in studying this topic. The paper ends with recommendations for addressing the main concerns.     

Corruption: Theory and evidence from the Russian Federation

In this paper, we provide theory and evidence on the problem of corruption in the Russian Federation. Our theoretical model indicates that in the presence of official corruption, the numbers of tax inspection (collection) employees could be inversely related to per capita tax collection. Our empirical analysis supports our theoretical model, shedding light on one of the most intractable problems in the Russian Federation.     

A critique on the Corruption Perceptions Index: An interdisciplinary approach

The purpose of this study is to test the assumptions of the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) and examine the causal relationships among its data sources for improvement priorities. In doing so, we use a novel interdisciplinary methodology including cluster analysis, classification analysis, partial least squares structural equation modeling and importance-performance map analysis. Our methodology enables policymakers to identify the critical data sources that a given country should focus on in order to improve its position in the CPI ranking relative to other countries. Based on corruption perceptions of 176 countries in the 2016 CPI, our results provide evidence against the CPI's assumptions, as individual data sources have unequal effects on the CPI and exhibit the causal interrelations among one another. Corruption perceptions are not homogeneous across countries, with developed countries showing lower levels of perceived corruption than emerging countries. The presence of synergistic effects among the CPI's data sources suggests that national policymakers consider multiple data sources of the CPI for decision-making process rather than simply focus on any single one of these data sources or their equally-weighted aggregation. Moreover, policymakers should allocate the country's resources – which are often limited – with the first priority to improving the data source score of the Economist Intelligence Unit Country Risk Ratings, the critical driver of the CPI. Interestingly, the modified CPI which removes insignificant data sources outperforms the non-modified CPI in terms of the goodness-of-fit assessment, the unbiasedness and the association with the World Bank's Control of Corruption.     

Corruption, Growth, and Income Distribution: Are there Regional Differences?

This paper uses panel data from 61 countries at different stages of economic development over a 20-year period to investigate regional differences in the effect of corruption on economic growth and income distribution. Using two measures of corruption, we find that there are statistically significant regional differences in the growth and distributional impacts of corruption. The largest growth impact of corruption is found in African countries while OECD and Asian countries have the lowest growth impact. On the other hand, the largest distributional impact of corruption in found in Latin America. A 10% decrease in corruption increases the growth rate of income by about 1.7% in OECD and Asian countries, 2.6% in Latin American countries, and by 2.8% in African countries. A one standard deviation decrease in corruption decreases the gini coefficient of income distribution (0–1 scale) by 0.05 points, 0.14 points, 0.25 points, and 0.33 points in OECD, Asian, African, and Latin American countries, respectively. The results are robust to various specifications, measurement of corruption, measures of investment, as well as the conditioning variables. The results have interesting policy implications for economic growth, especially in low income countries with high rates of corruption.     

Nonlinear relationship between economic growth and nuances of globalisation with income stratification: Roles of financial development and governance

We study the effect of overall globalisation on economic growth in a neoclassical macroeconomic growth model. We further assess our model by considering the decomposed measures of globalisation including economic, political, and social globalisation components. To this end, we estimate panel data models by applying the cross-sectional dependency-autoregressive distributed lags (CS-ARDL) approach to a sample of 116 countries during the available period, 1980–2015. We classified our sample into upper middle-, lower middle-, and high-income groups to minimise country-specific heterogeneity. Our results affirm the presence of a quadratic (nonlinear) U-shaped relationship between the overall globalisation (including the economic, political, social components) and economic growth for the lower middle- and upper middle-income group. However, they provide evidence of a positive linear relationship between globalisation and economic growth for the high-income countries. Given the arguments that the impact of globalisation on growth is conditional on local financial development (FD) and quality of governance (QoG), we incorporate their role. We provide fresh evidence that the impacts of globalisation on economic growth are more profound in the countries with a higher QoG and a higher deepening of FD. We further check the robustness of our analysis applying the U test and dynamic generalised methods of moment approach. We also provide policy implications.     

Corruption control,shadow economy and income inequality: Evidence from Asia

Developing countries often suffer from high corruption, high income inequality and poor institutional arrangements that give rise to large shadow economies. Earlier evidence shows that shadow economies moderate the negative effects of corruption on income inequality in highly unequal South American countries. For Asia, we show that the persistence of shadow economies raises inequality even if corruption control is strong. Supported by static and dynamic panel data analyses of 21 countries in Asia between 1995 and 2015, we show that in order to combat rising inequality, corruption control must be complemented by the ability to translate secondary and tertiary school enrolment into industrial and, more importantly, service sector jobs. Countries with low corruption but high inequality can reduce inequality by committing to higher public consumption expenditures. Further, combining greater trade openness with low corruption lowers inequality, except for countries in South Asia.     

调控新政下上市房企应对策略评析

一、新政后上市房企的应对策略表现特征 2010年第一季度房地产市场的过快发展,直接导致4月份房地产调控政策的密集出台,沪深港三地的上市房企面临新的挑战,纷纷采取不同策略予以应对,主要表现有以下三个特征。     

财政腐败原因的制度分析

财政腐败是财政领域中权力行使者利用财政管理权力谋取私利并导致财政资金流失或被低效、无效使用的各种行为.通过建立一个制度分析框架对财政领域的腐败问题进行研究,发现财政腐败是一种制度性腐败,其产生的根源就在于有效的财政制度及其制约机制的供给不足.具体体现在:缺乏约束财政管理权力的机制;缺少约束的自由裁量权制度;尚未形成有效的问责机制;尚不完备的财政透明制度;缺乏有效的财政监督机制.因此,治理财政腐败的焦点也应该是完善相关制度以及强化制度约束.     

Corruption, economic growth, and income inequality in Africa

This paper uses panel data from African countries and a dynamic panel estimator to investigate the effects of corruption on economic growth and income distribution. I find that corruption decreases economic growth directly and indirectly through decreased investment in physical capital. A unit increase in corruption reduces the growth rates of GDP and per capita income by between 0.75 and 0.9 percentage points and between 0.39 and 0.41 percentage points per year respectively. The results also indicate that increased corruption is positively correlated with income inequality. The combined effects of decreased income growth and increased inequality suggests that corruption hurts the poor more than the rich in African countries. Received: March 19, 2001 / Accepted: December 14, 2001 RID="*" ID="*" An earlier version of this paper was presented at the first AmFiTan International Conference on Development Ethics in February 2000, Dar er Salaam, Tanzania. I thank two anonymous referees of this Journal for helpful suggestions. I am, however, solely responsible for any remaining errors.     

防止利益冲突:治理房地产腐败的有效途径

当前,中国正处在发展的黄金期、关键期和敏感期,经济发展的高速、腐败现象的高频,以及由此引发的各类矛盾高显是其突出表征。我国房地产业在迅猛发展、对国计民生影响愈来愈深远、并成为国民经济发展支柱产业的同时,却也因房地产领域腐败案件频发给其发展带来极大困扰。应当充分认识利益冲突是房地产领域腐败的第一诱因和根源;多管齐下,建立健全防止利益冲突机制是从源头上治理房地产腐败的必然选择。     

Bridging Africa’s income inequality gap: How relevant is China’s outward FDI to Africa?

This study examines whether: (i) the remarkable inflow of Chinese FDI to Africa matters for bridging the continent’s marked income inequality gap, (ii) Africa’s institutional fabric is effective in propelling Chinese FDI towards the equalisation of incomes in Africa and (iii) there exist relevant thresholds required for the various governance dynamics to cause Chinese FDI to equalise incomes in Africa. Our results, which are based on the dynamic GMM estimator and macrodata for 48 African countries, reveal the following. First, although Chinese FDI contributes to fairer income distribution in Africa, the effect is weak. Second, although Africa’s institutional fabric matters for propelling Chinese FDI towards the equalisation of incomes across the continent, governance mechanisms for ensuring political stability, low corruption, and voice and accountability are critical. Finally, the critical masses required for these three key governance dynamics to cause Chinese FDI and other income inequality-reducing modules to reduce income inequality are 0.8, 0.5 and 0.1, respectively. These critical masses are thresholds at which governance is necessary but no longer sufficient to complement Chinese FDI to mitigate income inequality. Hence, at the attendant thresholds, complementary policies are worthwhile. Policy recommendations are provided in the conclusion.     

经济制度和我国经济增长效率的实证研究

本文根据经济制度和经济增长作用模型,利用一国经济制度和经济增长指标的面板数据（Panel Data）,对经济制度和我国经济增长的作用机制进行实证研究.结果表明,近年来我国经济制度对经济增长不仅是重要而且是有效率的,并且政府对当前的经济增长起着决定性的作用.同时,我国宏观经济治理结构模型表明,我国经济增长存在最佳的经济制度安排,以经济增长为目标的政府治理能够实现我国最优的经济增长.     

MEASUREMENT,EVOLUTION, DETERMINANTS,AND CONSEQUENCES OF STATE CAPACITY: A REVIEW OF RECENT RESEARCH

There is increasing realization that state capacity is a fundamental ingredient for effective governance, and is a crucial element of long‐run economic development. This paper offers an overview of the strengths and limitations in current empirical research on the measurement of state capacity. The paper also surveys the fast emerging literature on the determinants and effects of state capacity. We argue that existing measures on governance quality used in cross‐national research can be usefully exploited to capture different aspects of state capacity, and show that post the end of the Cold War, developing economies have experienced improvements in legal, administrative and bureaucratic capacity, but the gap with advanced economies is still wide. Future research should address the short temporal coverage of available measures of state capacity, as well as providing a systematic quantitative assessment of the determinants of capacity and of its effects on development outcomes, such as health and education, which have not received sufficient scrutiny.     

Multi-period rent-seeking contests with carryover: Theory and experimental evidence

This paper develops and experimentally tests a model in which a players effort affects the probability of winning a contest in both the current and future periods. Theory predicts that rent-seeking effort will be shifted forward from later to earlier periods, with no change in overall rent-seeking expenditures relative to the static contest. Experimental results indicate a significant shift forward when carryover is present and that the amount shifted is directly related to the carryover rate. Finally, although experimental expenditures are greater than the equilibrium predictions, overall rent-seeking effort in the carryover contests is lower than in similar static contests.Received: 15 September 2003, Accepted: 15 June 2004 JEL Classification: D72, C91 Correspondence to: JohnCadigan     

THE FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH NEXUS: A META‐ANALYSIS

We conduct a meta‐analysis of the literature of financial development and economic growth. We cover a large number of empirical studies and estimations that have been published in journal articles. We measure the degree of heterogeneity and identify the causes of the observed differentiation. Among the most significant factors behind this heterogeneity is the choice of financial‐variable proxies, the kind of data used as well as whether a study takes into account the issue of endogeneity. Our results suggest that the empirical literature on the finance–growth nexus is not free from publication bias. Also, a genuine positive effect exists between financial development and economic growth.     

Financial development and governance: A panel data analysis incorporating cross-sectional dependence

This study investigates bidirectional causality between governance and financial development using panel data of 101 countries from 1984 to 2013. The financial development–governance nexus is explored using econometric methods robust to cross-sectional dependence, and the relationship between different levels of development and openness is analyzed. Long-run equation estimates show clear evidence that financial development positively affects governance, and this positive impact is found to be robust to three different measures of governance. Further analysis shows that improving governance quality has a positive effect on financial development, while Granger causality tests demonstrate bidirectional causality between financial development and the governance measures. Finally, the impact of financial development on governance is dependent on a country’s level of development and openness. These findings underscore the crucial role of financial development in bringing about good governance reforms and economic growth that, in turn, can further develop the financial sector. As such, a symbiotic and synergistic relationship can persist between good governance, growth, and financial development. The findings provide significant motivation for policymakers to encourage openness and financial sector development to lift the standard of living, especially in emerging economies.     

Rent-seeking in an emerging market: A DSGE approach

Due to the fact that rent-seeking is by definition an unobservable variable, measuring its size and evolution over the business cycle can be a daunting challenge. In this article, by embedding rent-seeking behavior in an otherwise standard open-economy DSGE model, we are able to derive a quarterly time series of this variable (expressed as a percentage deviation from the trend) for an emerging economy such as Brazil. The estimated series, spanning the period 2002Q1?2017Q4, shows a strong positive correlation with the “Commodity Super Cycle” of the 2000 decade and falls as a result of some political scandals and their ensuing investigations, among other driving forces. We also rely on the same model to assess how several shocks hitting the economy affect both rent-seeking and the relevant macroeconomic variables in our model. Barring monetary expansions, increased exports and higher income transfers to households, expansionary shocks are associated with lower rent-seeking activity. Factoring in these two sets of results, the upshot is that rent-seeking behavior shows a pattern of procyclicality in the Brazilian economy.     

Corruption,development and demography

This paper presents an analysis of the joint, endogenous determination of bureaucratic corruption, economic development and demographic transition. The analysis is based on an overlapping generations model in which reproductive agents mature safely through two periods of life and face a probability of surviving for a third period. This survival probability depends on the provision of public goods and services which may be compromised by corrupt activities on the part of public officials. The dynamic general equilibrium of the economy is characterised by multiple development regimes, transition between which may or may not be feasible. In accordance with empirical evidence, the model predicts that low (high) levels of development are associated with high (low) levels of corruption and low (high) rates of life expectancy. The authors are grateful for the comments of two anonymous referees on an earlier version of the paper. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Rent-seeking,promotion pressure and green economic efficiency: Evidence from China

Focusing on the quality and sustainability of urban economic development and using a panel dataset of 263 cities in China from 2004 to 2015, this paper regards each city as a production unit and uses the Epsilon-Based Measure approach to measure green economic efficiency by innovatively regarding labor, capital, land and energy as input factors, GDP as a desirable output, and environmental pollution emissions and land finance as undesirable outputs. Further, this paper examines the effect of rent-seeking on green economic efficiency with a fixed effects model and explores the role of promotion pressure in the relationship between rent-seeking and green economic efficiency with a panel threshold model. Our study finds that: (1) Rent-seeking exerts a significant negative impact on green economic efficiency. (2) Compared to areas of higher promotion pressure, the negative effect of rent-seeking on green economic efficiency is greater in areas facing lower promotion pressure. (3) The relationship among promotion pressure, rent-seeking and green economic efficiency differs in areas facing different “green” promotion pressure.