Topic Guide: Corruption in Service Delivery

Marie Chêne. 2016. Literature review: The Use of ICTs in the Fight against Corruption. http://www.u4.no/publications/...

E-governance has gained popularity in recent years, with many countries resorting to ICT to modernise government, increase efficiency and improve public service delivery. As an additional benefit, ICT is also expected to reduce corruption by promoting transparency, opening government data to public scrutiny, and by automating government processes, restricting discretion of officials and limiting citizens’ interaction with gatekeepers to access key services. Despite these high expectations and massive investments in e-government, evidence of impact is mixed and limited and there is a high rate of failure of e-government projects, due to contextual factors as well as the type of the ICT interventions.

Marie Chêne. 2015. Corruption and Anti-Corruption Practices in Human Resource Management in the Public Sector. U4 Helpdesk Answer. http://www.u4.no/publications/...

In many developing countries, weak HR management processes have resulted in oversized and underqualified civil services, with distorted incentive structures and poor work ethics that ultimately undermine the goal of building a strong, efficient and accountable public sector. Corruption, particularly in the form of favouritism, nepotism and abuse of authority, can affect all HR management processes, including the management of recruitments and promotions, compensation, conditions of services and personal records. Preventing corruption in HR management involves merit-based HR and recruitment policies, transparent pay packages and internal controls, as well as integrity management systems, including the implementation of codes of ethics, ethics training and whistleblowing mechanisms.

Maira Martini and Thomas Luijken. 2014. The Role of Technology in Reducing Corruption in Public Procurement. https://www.transparency.org/f...

The benefits of e-procurement are many and include improvements in market access and competition, promotion of integrity, reduced information costs, easier access to information, and increased transparency and accountability, among others. In this context, e-procurement also has the capacity to prevent and reduce the opportunities for corruption in the different stages of public procurement. Albania, Georgia and South Korea have improved their procurement systems and mitigated the opportunities for corruption by publishing information on procurement online, standardising and streamlining processes, and facilitating control and oversight over the procurement cycle. Nevertheless, the establishment of e-procurement as a standalone reform is unlikely to bring about positive transformational results. Countries have to invest in coherent legal frameworks, training and oversight capacity to ensure that the potential benefits of e-procurement in terms of reducing corruption are exploited to their maximum.

Marie Chêne. 2013. Good Practice in Community Complaints Mechanisms. https://www.transparency.org/f...

Complaints mechanisms can increase accountability to aid beneficiaries by providing them with the opportunities to give feedback on the quality and quantity of the services they receive as well as to complain about potential wrongdoing. There is no blueprint for setting up a complaints mechanism as it needs to be adapted to the local context, taking into account issues such as cultural norms and values, level of literacy, phone coverage and social patterns, among others. To address all of these issues, there is a broad consensus that beneficiaries should be consulted in the design of the complaints mechanism to develop appropriate culturally-sensitive and context-specific responses that identify and address the various barriers to reporting. Irrespective of the forms, procedures and channels for handling complaints, the mechanism should be transparent, independent, accountable, accessible, safe and easy to use.

Marie Chêne. 2012. The Impact of Community Monitoring. U4 Helpdesk Answer.

http://www.u4.no/publications/...

There is an emerging but still mixed body of evidence on the impact of community monitoring interventions on corruption. Beyond anecdotal evidence of positive outcomes on detection/prosecution of corruption cases, such interventions have contributed in some cases to reducing corruption and leakages of funds as well as improving the quantity and quality of public services and strengthening the demand for longer term reforms. Partly due to conceptual and methodological challenges as well as the general scope and focus of impact tracking studies, it is difficult to isolate the factors or catalysts of change, underpinning the success of anti-corruption community-based initiatives. However, studies indicate that a combination of external – environmental/contextual dynamics that supported the implementation of the intervention – as well as internal factors – institutional design of the intervention, attributes and processes of the implementing agency – may have contributed to the effectiveness of such interventions.