The Effectiveness of Anti-Corruption Policy
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Systematic review The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy What has worked, what hasn’t, and what we don’t know by Professor Rema Hanna Sarah Bishop Sara Nadel Gabe Scheffler Katherine Durlacher July 2011 The EPPI-Centre reference number for this report is 1909. This report should be cited as: Hanna, R., Bishop, S., Nadel, S., Scheffler, G, Durlacher, K. (2011) The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy: what has worked, what hasn‟t, and what we don‟t know–a systematic review. Technical report. London: EPPI-Centre, Social Science Research Unit, Institute of Education, University of London. ISBN: 978-1-907345-14-2 © Copyright Authors of the systematic reviews on the EPPI-Centre website (http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/) hold the copyright for the text of their reviews. The EPPI-Centre owns the copyright for all material on the website it has developed, including the contents of the databases, manuals, and keywording and data extraction systems. The centre and authors give permission for users of the site to display and print the contents of the site for their own non-commercial use, providing that the materials are not modified, copyright and other proprietary notices contained in the materials are retained, and the source of the material is cited clearly following the citation details provided. Otherwise users are not permitted to duplicate, reproduce, re-publish, distribute, or store material from this website without express written permission. The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy i Contents List of abbreviations .......................................................................... iii Structured abstract ............................................................................ 1 Executive summary ............................................................................ 2 1. Background .................................................................................. 7 1.1 Aims and rationale for review ........................................................ 7 1.2 Definitional and conceptual issues ................................................... 8 1.3 Policy and practice background .................................................... 10 1.4 Research background ................................................................ 14 1.5 Objectives ............................................................................. 15 2. Methods used in the review ............................................................. 17 2.1 User involvement ..................................................................... 17 2.2 Identifying and describing studies ................................................. 17 2.3 Methods for synthesis ................................................................ 22 2.4 Deriving conclusions and implications ............................................. 25 3. Search results ............................................................................. 27 3.1 Studies included from searching and screening .................................. 27 3.2 Details of included studies .......................................................... 29 4. Synthesis results .......................................................................... 30 4.1 Further details of studies included in the synthesis ............................. 30 4.2 Synthesis of evidence ................................................................ 31 4.3 Synthesis results: quality assurance ............................................... 39 4.4 Summary of results of the synthesis ............................................... 39 5. Strengths and limitations ................................................................ 46 5.1 Strengths ............................................................................... 46 5.2 Limitations ............................................................................ 46 6. Conclusions and recommendations ..................................................... 48 6.1 Main conclusions ...................................................................... 48 6.2 Policy and practice recommendations ............................................ 49 6.3 Research recommendations ......................................................... 50 7. References ................................................................................. 52 7.1 Studies included in review .......................................................... 52 7.2 Other references used in the text of the technical report ..................... 53 Appendices ................................ .................. Error! Bookmark not defined. Appendix 1.1: Authorship of this report ............................................... 56 Appendix 2.1: Exclusion criteria ........................................................ 57 Appendix 2.2: Search strategy for electronic databases ............................ 59 Appendix 2.3: Journals handsearched ................................................. 67 Appendix 2.4: Coding tool ............................................................... 69 Appendix 3.1: Details of studies included in the review ............................ 76 Appendix 3.2: Details of studies excluded based on full report .................... 81 Appendix 4.1: Further study details (by intervention category and type) ........ 98 Appendix 4.2: Causal mechanisms ..................................................... 102 Appendix 4.3: Results/outcomes ...................................................... 113 The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy ii List of abbreviations 3ie International Initiative for Impact Evaluation ANM Assistant nurse midwives AusAID Australian Agency for International Development CCC committees of concerned citizens (Bangladesh) CIA Central Intelligence Agency (US) CID Center for International Development, Harvard University, US CPI Corruption Perception Index DFID Department for International Development (UK) DMV Department of Motor Vehicles (Delhi, India) EFA Education for All FCPA Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (US) GDP Gross domestic product (GDP) GTZ Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (Germany) HKS Harvard Kennedy School (US) IBSS International Bibliography of Social Sciences ICT Information communication and technology IDEAS Internet Documents in Economics Access Service, Department of Economics, University of Connecticut (US) IFPRI International Food Policy Research Institute IPA Innovations for Poverty Action JOLIS Joint Bank-Fund Library Network JPAL Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab KPK Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (Corruption Eradication Commission of Indonesia) MPRA Munich Personal RePEc Archive (Germany) MSI USAID Management Systems International NBER National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts (US) NCJ National Criminal Justice (Reference Series) (US) NEP NGO Education Partnership (Cambodia) NGO Non-governmental organisation NORAD Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation NPM New public management OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OPEN Online Procedures Enhancement for Civil Application The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy iii PAR Public administration reform PETS Public expenditure tracking survey PO People‟s organisations PPP Purchasing power parity (WB) PSI pre-shipment inspection RCT Randomised control trial SSCI Social Sciences Citation Indexes SSRN Social Science Research Network TI Transparency International UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme USAID United States Agency for International Development WB World Bank The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy iv Structured abstract Public sector corruption is a key barrier to effective service delivery and an impediment to economic growth and development. This report provides findings from a systematic review on the effectiveness of micro-level anti-corruption strategies implemented in developing countries. Our exclusion criteria were applied to nearly 6,300 papers and resulted in the inclusion of 14 studies in our synthesis of results. We employed the „narrative synthesis approach‟ to synthesise data extracted from the included studies. The review focuses on the distinction between interventions that utilised monitoring and incentives mechanisms and interventions that changed the underlying rules of the system. We find convincing evidence that monitoring and incentive-based interventions (both financial and non-financial) have the potential to reduce corruption, at least in the short term. We also find more-limited evidence that decentralisation, a strategy that changes the rules, has the potential to reduce corruption in certain settings. Strategies that change the rules are thought to be more sustainable in the long term, but additional research is needed to better understand the long-term effects of this and monitoring and incentives interventions. The review concludes with several policy recommendations and highlights pertinent areas for further research. The effectiveness of anti-corruption policy 1 Executive summary Background In many developing countries, public sector corruption is a key barrier to effective service delivery. Corruption can prevent the equitable allocation of goods and services to citizens by seeping into all aspects of life, from starting a new business to getting a passport or to seeing a doctor. It can take many forms, from bureaucrats asking citizens for bribes to perform basic services, to hospital employees stealing medicines that were meant to be distributed to the poor, to bureaucrats receiving