bs_bs_banner Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 273–286 doi: 10.1002/app5.22 Original Article Myths of Political Independence, or How Not to Solve the Corruption Problem: Lessons for Vietnam Martin Painter* Abstract 1. Introduction Corruption is widely identified as a critical In 2004, the World Bank proclaimed on its problem for developing economies and is also website that corruption was ‘the single greatest viewed as a priority issue by international obstacle to economic and social development’ organisations and donors. Governments such (quoted in Bukovansky 2006, p. 191). In many as Vietnam place anti-corruption high on their East and Southeast Asian countries, domestic policy agenda. However, external observers politicians are publicly committed to and sup- regularly criticise them for not meeting their portive of anti-corruption (AC) efforts. Public targets. The problem with the critique is that it and media exposés and criticisms of corruption mostly places the blame on implementation create political anxieties for political leaders, failures when the issue is as much a design not only in democratic but also in authoritarian failure. Templates for anti-corruption success regimes in the region. AC activists in many of in fact misread the practical lessons. One these countries (including Vietnam) work closely element of the standard template, the need for with international organisations, promoting a an ‘independent’ anti-corruption enforcement more or less standard set of diagnoses and rem- system, misreads the meaning and empirical edies, within the framework of a wider ‘good reality of ‘independence’. Evidence is pre- governance’ discourse. From this perspective, sented from Singapore, Hong Kong and there is much borrowing and emulation from Indonesia to show that their anti-corruption the apparent ‘success stories’ across the world. agencies are ‘independent’ more in the sense The remedies within this discourse emphasise that they are powerful, rather than in the sense enhancing citizen voice, including press free- that they are apolitical. The lesson for Vietnam doms; judicial reform, especially the creation of is that misleading design principles such as an ‘independent’ judiciary; civil service employ- ‘political independence’are a distraction from ment reform; modernisation of public manage- the task of strengthening the anti-corruption ment systems, including removing unnecessary law enforcement system. layers of regulation and bureaucracy; tough AC laws; and politically independent, special- Key words: corruption, Vietnam, good gover- purpose AC law enforcement agencies. nance, political independence, anti-corruption The subject of this article is the relevance reform of overseas experience and contemporary AC reform templates for Vietnam’s recent AC * Emeritus Professor, Department of Public Policy, efforts and prospective reforms. The main City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong; focus is on two aspects of these AC measures, email: Ͻ[email protected]Ͼ. namely investigation and enforcement. It draws © 2014 The Author. Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies published by Wiley Publishing Asia Pty Ltd and Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes. 274 Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies May 2014 primarily on material gathered during a Vietnam occurs in many forms, including research consultancy in 2012 for the Hanoi street-level harassment by police officers and office of the United Nations Development Pro- other government officials of ordinary citizens gramme (UNDP), the findings of which are going about their daily lives; ‘under-the- published elsewhere (Painter et al. 2012). The counter’payments for medical, health and other research included not only a survey of overseas services; demands for bribes from business literature and published sources on AC experi- entities in the licensing and permissions pro- ence in other jurisdictions, and an extensive cesses; ‘purchase of office’in all areas of public review of Vietnam government legal docu- employment; and theft of public resources ments and internal reports on AC, but also a (including land) by high officials, sometimes series of discussions with public officials in on a grand scale. Vietnam is firmly fixed in Hanoi in September and October 2012.1 The place as one of the lowest ranked countries conclusions drawn in the original report in Transparency International’s Corruption included a set of proposals and recommenda- Perception Index (ranked 112 out of 182 in tions based on an analysis of the historical 2011 and ranked 123 out of 175 in 2012). origins and experience of AC investigation The government has launched a series of and prosecution regimes in Hong Kong, Singa- measures to deal with the problem. In 2005, it pore and Indonesia, as well as Vietnam. The adopted an AC Law (amended in 2012), and in current article extends and expands on these 2006 it promulgated an AC strategy with bold conclusions. and ambitious aims. At this time, it set up a Gainsborough et al. (2009, pp. 378, 397) number of new special agencies and re-assigned argue that ‘corruption in Vietnam is a systemic roles and responsibilities, including a special problem’ and that since economic reform investigation unit in the Ministry of Public began, ‘both the incidence of corruption and the Security (MPS); a designated AC office in the sums involved have increased’. Corruption in Procuracy (which handles prosecutions); and a coordinating body under a Steering Committee 1. The officials concerned comprised Mr Duong Van chaired by the Prime Minister. Vietnam signed Phung, Director General, and Mr Le Mai from Department 1B on Prosecution and Procuracy for Corruption Cases, up to the United Nations Convention against the Supreme People’s Procuracy; Mr Nguyen the Binh, Corruption (UNCAC) and made commitments Director General of Monitoring Adjudication of Serious under it to conform to international standards Corruption Cases, and Mr Hoang Cac, Deputy Director on AC laws and enforcement, and to engage General of Department III, the Office of the Steering Com- in international cooperation. It has actively mittee on Anti-corruption; Mr Le Hong Hanh, Director General of Legal Sciences Institute from the Ministry of sought international advice and assistance on Justice; Mr Nguyen Dinh Quyen, Vice Chairman of Judi- AC reforms and has participated since 2007 cial Committee, the National Assembly; Mr Nguyen Van with donors and non-governmental organi- Thanh, Deputy General Inspector, Mr Do Gia Thu, Direc- sations (NGOs) in an annual high-level ‘Anti- tor General of Legal Department and others from the GI; Corruption Dialogue’. Recent Party Plenums in Mr Dang Van Hai, Deputy Director General and others from the State Audit of Vietnam; Mr Dang Thanh Tung, 2011 and 2012 have announced important new Deputy Chief Inspector, the Ministry of Home Affairs; Mr AC measures. In what was presented as a sign Le Ba Than, Chief Judge of Criminal Court, Ms Phung Thi of increased commitment, the Office of the Loc, Head of Division of Criminal Court, and Mr Vu Tuan Steering Committee in 2012 was moved and Duc, Deputy Head of Division of Criminal Court, the placed under the wing of the Communist Party Supreme People’s Court; and Mr Ha Huu Duc, Deputy Director General of the Research Department (the Party Central Committee, and the existing ministerial Inspection Commission of the Communist Party of Steering Committee chaired by the Prime Vietnam). The interviews with these senior experts were Minister was disbanded. conducted from 17 to 21 September 2012, and from 3 to 5 Thanks to some of these efforts, Vietnamese October 2012. While these discussions were helpful in reformers have been exposed to the good gov- contributing to the information required for the research study, the findings and judgments presented in this article ernance rhetoric and to the orthodox recipes for are the responsibility of the author and should not be reform. While these remedies have dominated attributed to any of those listed earlier. much of the donor and local NGO reform © 2014 The Author. Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies published by Wiley Publishing Asia Pty Ltd and Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University Painter: Lessons for Vietnam 275 discourse, including in dialogues with public case of Vietnam and describe the basic consti- officials, they have not been fully adopted or, if tutional and institutional frameworks within adopted, they have not always been imple- which AC programs are implemented. Finally, mented. On the one hand, this is interpreted by I discuss the possibilities of reform within the outsiders as a sign of ‘window dressing’ and existing system, drawing on both the reassess- weak commitment, a view reinforced by the ment of overseas lessons and also on current growing levels of corruption. But labelling it an reform trajectories in Vietnam. implementation failure is a soft option; it is also a design failure (Gainsborough et al. 2009). What Works? A Best Practice AC Model This is not to deny serious implementation problems, in that prevention measures and Emulation and learning from success stories AC law enforcement are under-resourced and is a standard operating procedure of admi- poorly coordinated (Painter et al. 2012). The nistrative reformers worldwide (Dolowitz & point remains that in Vietnam, many of the Marsh 1996; Common 2001; Dong et al. remedies of the orthodox AC template are 2008). In the case of borrowing and trans- rejected outright because they contradict stan- plantation of AC success stories, several of dard precepts of Communist Party rule or the most commonly recommended templates because Vietnamese society and historical con- originate from some of Vietnam’s neigh- ditions are said to be ‘special’or ‘unique’. Even bours, in particular Hong Kong and Singa- if it is the case that the existing political lead- pore.