Background study: professional and ethical standards for parliamentarians

Abstract

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