Corruption in UK local government: the mounting risks

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The state-private interface in public service provision

Political theory sets out a strong case for the state to play a major role in public service provision. Yet services are often provided by a range of state and non-state actors as well as by collaborative partnerships. This paper surveys the literature, seeking to map arrangements in developing countries and to understand the politics of different types of service provision

Background study: professional and ethical standards for parliamentarians

This study provides an overview of the practical measures OSCE participating States can take to promote ethical behaviour among politicians. It was undertaken by ODIHR with the fundamental objective of developing a practical tool that draws upon academic research and practical experience in OSCE participating States. The aim of this study is to identify the main concerns and possible obstacles that need to be considered while reforming, developing and designing parliamentary standards of conduct, in- cluding, but not limited to, codes of conduct. In the fast-changing field of parliamentary ethics, this publication favours a snapshot approach of currently existing codes of conduct or ethics in the OSCE region over rigorous cross-country analysis. The cases selected are skewed towards countries where such codes exist. This Background Study: Professional and Ethical Standards for Parliamentarians was produced to be a comprehensive but practical publication that analyses how to build and reform systems that set professional and ethical standards for Members of Parliament (MPs) and regulate their conduct to ensure that those standards are met

Understanding people's willingness to implement measures to manage human-bear conflict in Florida

Moderator: Stewart Breck.Presented at the 8th international congress for wildlife and livelihoods on private and communal lands: livestock, tourism, and spirit, that was held on September 7-12, 2014 in Estes Park, Colorado.Video presenter: Elizabeth Pienaar.In 2009 the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) began surveying individuals who reported human-bear conflicts. The purpose of this survey is to assess whether individuals take actions recommended by the FWC to reduce or eliminate conflicts. Using this data set, we determined which factors influence the likelihood that surveyed individuals will follow the advice provided by the FWC for managing human-bear conflicts. We find outreach efforts by the FWC increase the probability that people who report conflicts to the agency adopt recommended measures to reduce these conflicts. Our results suggest that outreach efforts by wildlife agencies increase the likelihood that people will alter their behavior to reduce human-bear conflicts

Shirking self-regulation? Parliamentary standards in the UK

In 2021, the UK system for regulating the conduct of parliamentarians was briefly plunged into crisis. The government responded to a proposal to sanction one of its MPs – who had been found to have egregiously breached the Code of Conduct and accompanying rules - by threatening to change the whole system. This highly unusual interference by the executive branch, though withdrawn within 24 hours, violated the axiom that the executive should not have a say in disciplining members of the legislature because this might compromise parliament’s ability to hold the government to account. Yet the ensuing debate has prompted calls to move the UK system yet further away from self-regulation and grant more powers of oversight to ‘external’ roles and bodies. This article draws on interviews with MPs to analyse whether this longstanding trajectory of reform is in line with how these “rule makers” perceive the system’s flaws. It concludes that, over the years, MPs have to a large extent forfeited the right to regulate their own conduct by repeatedly shirking their responsibilities to regulate themselves effectively. Moreover, the constant focus on ‘fixing’ the procedures for investigating and sanctioning misconduct has crowded out a more constructive discussion about how to promote ethical behaviour

Prey Coat Color Selection and Bioenergetics of Captive Screech Owls

Author Institution: The Institute of Environmental Sciences and Department of Zoology, Miami Universit

News never sleeps: When and how transnational investigative journalism complements law enforcement in the fight against global corruption : SOC-ACE BRIEFING NOTE

Grand corruption is a transnational problem requiring transnational cooperation among anti-corruption actors. In the case of law enforcement, cooperation is often difficult to achieve, and this has been attributed to the political sensitivity of investigations, lack of trust among agencies, difficulties in sharing intelligence securely, weaknesses and discrepancies in capacity, and organisational incentive structures that favour quick and easy cases. However, investigative journalists, who ostensibly face similar challenges, increasingly cooperate across borders to investigate and expose corruption with great success. Our research seeks to understand how investigative journalists have overcome these difficulties and to assess the contribution that they make, alongside that of other actors such as law enforcement, to global collective efforts to tackle grand corruption and illicit financial flows. We explore these questions through interviews with investigative journalists who have participated in transnational networks in Latin America, the Caribbean and the Balkans We find that these networks empower journalists operating in high-risk contexts by providing safety in numbers and facilitating strategic use of different legal frameworks or access to data, methods and standards, helping to bring stories to the public. They serve an important function in identifying individual perpetrators of crimes, but also in uncovering patterns of corruption and systemic weaknesses, informing policymakers about where there is a need for action. Moreover, by creating understanding and awareness about grand corruption and its impacts among the public, they help to create political pressure on office holders to act. We argue that transnational investigative journalism (TIJ) should be seen as a new institution of global governance which adds significant capability and value to our anti-corruption toolkit. The transnational networks are agile, dynamic, and capable of working across borders, making them a match for the perpetrators of grand corruption, money laundering, and organised crime. However, there is potential for them to make an even more important contribution, if their work could be better coordinated with law enforcement and if their funding model was more secure

A bitter pill? Institutional corruption and the challenge of antibribery compliance in the pharmaceutical sector

We investigate why top-down directives aimed at eradicating corruption are ineffective at altering on-the-ground practices for organizations that have adopted industry-wide “gold standards” to prevent bribery and corruption. Using interview and focus group data collected from leading multinational pharmaceutical firms, we unearth antecedents contributing to organizations’ systemic failure to embed their anticorruption policies in business practice. We identify two tensions that contribute to this disconnect: a culture clash between global and local norms, especially in emerging markets and a similar disconnect between the compliance and commercial functions. To overcome these tensions, we suggest that organizations are likely to find it easier to implement a no gifts policy if they cease to rely on local agents embedded in local norms and that there needs to be strong evidence of board-level commitment to antibribery programs, innovative ways of incentivizing compliant behavior, and a fundamental rethinking of organizations’ business model and remuneration practices

Lustration as political competition: vetting in Hungary

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