Lilies That Fester: Seeds of Corruption and Peacebuilding
Reprinted from New Routes Journal
By Cheyanne Church and Kirby Reilling, F09
Originally posted in the third 2009 issue of New Routes Journal.
For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds. Shakespeare, Sonnet 94.
Contemporary conflicts are complex, and corruption enables, reflects and results from this complexity. War economies are built on corruption as the parties in conflict rely on criminal syndicates, fraud and bribery to grease the wheels of the supply chain for everything from weapons to timber. Many rebel groups would not be able to operate at all, were it not for the international black market. They are not alone. In the post-war environment, even where state institutions remain intact, the ‘fog of war’ and its aftermath provides cover for private profiteering from those who should be leading the reconstruction effort. Peace agreements can make winners out of the same traffickers and warlords who used the conflict as a profit-generating event. Conversely, ordinary citizens’ lives are made even more difficult when corruption prevents them from participating in the economy, enjoying their basic rights and securing their property and families.
As conflicts are riddled with corruption, peacebuilding1 work should be appropriately riddled with anti-corruption efforts. This issue of New Routes, Pilfering the peace: The nexus between corruption and peacebuilding, is intended to contribute to the conversation between these two fields.
Why corruption should matter to peacebuilders
The raison d’être of peacebuilding in a war context is, of course, to achieve a durable solution that stops the violence. Corruption, however, can limit peacebuilding agencies’ ability to achieve this end. In many contexts, a conflict analysis shows that corruption – particularly corruption at the highest political levels – is a key driving factor of the conflict. In conflicts where nepotism or patronage networks exclude vast swathes of the population from decision-making and access to resources, then corruption lies at the heart of society’s problems. Furthermore, corrupt networks themselves can reinforce the very divisions along lines of ethnicity, religion or class which feed the conflict cycle. If corruption is not addressed, the chances of that durable solution in the form of a lasting positive peace remain slim.
Corruption can also undermine peacebuilding programmes that are seeking to address key driving factors of the conflict unrelated to corrupt behaviour. It can distort the incentives of peacebuilding staff and workshop participants, for instance through abuse of per diems, travel payments, scholarships or other benefits. This muddies the water of intent, making it difficult to ascertain where real progress or blockages exist, or where personal gain is driving the agenda.
Such complications have greater consequences than a failed peacebuilding project. When the local population perceives the process, the international community at large or the peacebuilding community in particular to be corrupt or ethically compromised, the overall legitimacy of the peacebuilding process can be undermined. This will reduce the support to the processes and actors seeking resolution.
Peace agreements – the high-profile pinnacles of peacebuilding work – are not immune from illicit abuse. Powersharing approaches to peace agreements favoured by the international community may effectively institutionalise political corruption by shifting the fight for resources from one characterised by violence to one that distorts the trappings of governance structures for the same end. This distortion is generally deemed to be the price one pays for securing a deal, although this framing heavily favours short-term stability over the long-term legitimacy and effectiveness of the state apparatus. Gaelle Kibranian explores this issue in her article on peace agreements and corruption in Lebanon.
When these agreements are concluded with warlords, as in Afghanistan or Sierra Leone, then the actors that are now responsible for building the peace are rarely the ones most qualified for the job, nor those of the highest moral standing. Phyllis Dininio examines the issue of warlords installed in post-agreement governments and the inherent problems and potential remedies.
In fact, the international community has been known to use questionable means in order to entice these actors to the table, thus setting the expectation that one should receive a personal dividend for taking action that is beneficial to a wider community.
The rank and file of the paramilitary or rebel groups are not immune from the lure of corruption. Many rely on corruption during peacetime to facilitate lucrative criminal activity. Consider the Kosovo Liberation Army or the Ulster Volunteer Force in Northern Ireland for examples of paramilitary groups transforming themselves into sophisticated criminal networks in a post-agreement context.
Despite the frequent intersection of corruption with conflict and peacebuilding, few peacebuilding agencies have explicitly developed programming aimed at altering the vicious network of corruption and conflict. In fact, it is fair to say that many consider corruption, especially in its less sensational forms, a problem for the accountants and lawyers, just as those lawyers consider conflict and politics to be outside their mandate.
Unpacking the concept of corruption
In his memoir, Tropical Gangsters, the well-known scholar of corruption and development Robert Klitgaard remarks, “Around the globe, expatriate complaining has in common an alienated sense of superiority and a hopeless verdict. Whenever I asked about practical matters… [some internationals] would snap back almost impatiently that nothing could be done, that nobody cared.” The temptation to ascribe wide-ranging social ills to “the system” and more precisely to some general idea of “corruption” can be strong – and unfortunately all too common.
Corruption as a concept, like so many other social ills, is widely understood yet nebulous when one tries to nail it down operationally. Boucher et al neatly penned the conundrum when they wrote, “Corruption is a phenomenon that seems to have obvious, intrinsic meaning when viewed from a distance but that differentiates increasingly, like an impressionist painting, as one comes closer.” Conceptual confusion about corruption lends itself to foggy thinking and poor programming. Therefore, one of the first steps should be to inquire: What do we mean by the word ‘corruption’? Who is corrupt? How do we know if it is getting better or worse?
Working definitions of corruption have evolved over time. Joseph Nye’s definition, “behaviour that deviates from the formal duties of a public role (elective or appointive) because of privateregarding (personal, close family, private clique) wealth or status gains” was coined in the sixties and was the dominant work for many years. Today, the most common definition – employed by the anti-corruption leaders Transparency International and the World Bank, among others – goes something like “the abuse of public power for private gain”
This seemingly simple definition contains a number of important points for consideration. The distinction between the public realm and the private one is central to the definition, but the line may not be so clear when the government is party to a conflict. Likewise, the corrupt “gain” need not be financial. It is not only a status gain, but political power, personal safety assurances and even sexual exploitation can be procured through illicit exchanges, especially in conflict environments. There is a reason that the United Nations Development Programme contracts come with a standard paragraph stating “the contactor shall refrain from… exchanging any money, goods, services, offers of employment or other things of value for sexual favours or activities”. Finally, the gain need not be limited to a personal one; it may apply to a political party, clan or ethnic group.
None of the definitions, however, give full account to the breadth of illicit and abusive transactions that may be labelled corrupt. One study by USAID in Russia found that citizens’ uses of the word corruption differed significantly from official definitions, occasionally applying to routine governmental practices such as an increase in the price of electricity. Like Klitgaard’s cynical expats, the public at large may be more comfortable ascribing all social problems with the catch-all label of corruption, or it may be that cultures and values really do perceive the world differently. Thus, corruption can be used either very broadly to describe general injustice, or it can be used so narrowly as to only account for the most obvious crimes.
A common categorical distinction is to parse corruption into two types: bureaucratic (or “petty”) corruption and political (or “grand”) corruption. Bureaucratic corruption refers to the ‘low level’ abuse and demands for bribes that citizens encounter in the public administration, police, tax authorities and so on. Conversely, political corruption occurs among influential elites who are themselves corrupt and who use their influence to shape laws, institutions and policies in a way to facilitate their own private profiteering. The article by Daniel Freidman on parapolitics in Colombia illustrates how political corruption fuels conflict while undermining the state’s attempt to eliminate criminal networks.
Corruption is a dirty word, especially in the Western-dominated international community. To be sure, there is a litany of negative consequences from corruption, ranging from a negative impact on economic development to delegitimising a new post-war government. See Peter Uvin’s article on the impact of corruption in post-war Burundi for an explanation of the negative role of corruption on public perceptions of a new post-agreement government. However, corruption is not always or strictly a social ill. If one considers a conflict context or state collapse, corruption and especially patronage networks can be a survival technique that it is only rationale for the average person to utilise.
Furthermore, as described earlier, corruption can play an incentivising role in peace agreements and providethe glue to hold formerly warring parties together. These ‘positive’ consequences of corruption need to be understood from the perspective of ‘short-term’ wins. The challenge arises when one takes a longer-term perspective, weighing in issues of democracy, good governance and state legitimacy. Indeed, attempting reform and institutionalising accountability may threaten the post-war structures, which could itself lead to instability. Michael Johnston’s article looks at this conundrum and using his four types of corruption typology argues, maybe surprisingly, that one should not expect to eliminate corruption in societies in transition.
Measuring corruption
Corrupt acts occur in secret, and even when an illicit transaction or relationship is exposed, the precise terms of the exchange are rarely entirely clear. For these reasons, tracking or quantifying the scale and scope of corruption is extraordinarily difficult. These difficulties are only magnified when attempting to measure corruption in a conflict or post-conflict context, given that regular state data collection and reporting is often not functioning and that corruption is not limited to fiscal exchanges.
Despite this, there are several international measurement efforts such as Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index or the Global Integrity Index. The results of the various measures differ in the quality of their reliability, validity and responsiveness – especially in conflict countries. While this imperfection does not void them of value, peacebuilding professionals should use the results judiciously, as one set of information carefully calibrated and checked against others. See the Corruption Resource Page at the end of this volume for more information.
It’s not just ‘those guys’
Bribery, fraud, embezzlement and abuse occur everywhere, among people of all classes and nationalities – including peacebuilders. Although to date there has been no research on corruption in peacebuilding agencies per se, it behoves these institutions to be aware of the possible corruption risks.
Research by the Feinstein International Centre, the Overseas Development Development Institute (ODI) and Transparency International into corruption in humanitarian organisations in 2007- 2008 shows that beneficiaries of aid and humanitarian workers have abused entrusted authority for personal gain. Case in point: in June 2009, the BBC exposed a corruption scandal in World Vision’s Liberia programme, where 90 per cent of its aid to Liberia went missing. The corrupt patterns that arise in the aid process are so predictable that ODI developed a corruption risk map to be used by humanitarian agencies for gauging the risk associated with common steps in the delivery of aid such as assessments or procurement. Peacebuilders may be wise to reflect on ODI’s corruption risk map and its applicability to peacebuilding work in an attempt to proactively address corruption.
International peacekeepers have also been shown to abuse their power for personal gain. In West Africa and DRC peacekeepers have contributed to the perpetuation of the conflict through the selling of weapons. In DRC, those who led the UN disarmament process turned around and sold the weapons on the black market, re-fuelling the war. Matt Herbert’s article provides a more indepth look at consequences of corruption in militaries.
Anti-corruption strategies
Strategies for fighting corruption differ in design and implementation. Some programmes are top-down efforts within a government ministry or international body, others are bottomup initiatives of civil society. Regardless, anti-corruption efforts tend to fall into three general categories: punishment, prevention or values-based. Raymond June and Nathaniel Heller from Global Integrity provide an introduction to three typologies of corruption and offer some suggestions for anti-corruption tools applicable to post-conflict contexts.
The punishment approach, which includes legal prosecution, is perhaps the most obvious form of fighting corruption. The UN Convention against Corruption, which went into force in 2005, has helped change the legal playing field by establishing a set of international norms. Another tactic is the “name-and-shame” approach, similar to that employed by the human rights community. This has been popular among civil society groups, for instance some Transparency International National Chapters.
Prevention strategies, meanwhile, often exist in tandem with punitive legal frameworks. These tactics focus on deterrence, such as regular audits, accounting controls, staff vetting and resources for whistleblowing.
Finally, anti-corruption strategies based on changing values or ethical education aim to (re)instil a sense of accountability and integrity. The UN Office of Drugs and Crime’s recent “Your No Counts” campaign would fall into this category.
Yet, as is apparent on the front pages of newspapers, the anti-corruption field does not have all the answers or full-proof approaches. Strategies based on prosecution often end up attacking bureaucratic corruption among rank-and-file government officials without stamping out the high-level grand corruption that governs the system overall. As such the civil servant is punished while the warlord in a senior government position continues without consequence. In post-conflict countries struggling from weak institutions and poor rule of law, a punishmentbased approach may turn out to be both unproductive and infeasible. This environment poses similar constraints on typical prevention strategies.
Values- and ethics-based options certainly have a key place in a holistic anticorruption strategy. However, there are still many outstanding questions as to how they can be most effective. Consider public information campaigns which seek to raise awareness about the negative consequences of corruption. One suspects corruption, in many contexts, occurs not merely for lack of anyone knowing any better. The worst criminals, politicians and warlords know what they are doing is wrong (and don’t care). Meanwhile, the average citizen living without security, state services or rule of law may justifiably place more faith in a patronage network or bribe than in state institutions. In which case, are billboards with a “Say No to Corruption” logo likely to change the situation in a post-conflict society?
Regardless of the anti-corruption approach taken, one also has to be cautious that the fight against corruption is not hijacked by the same political narratives of the war. Accusations of corruption are a familiar refrain in electoral politics and coup rationales alike. Calls for integrity reform can easily get co-opted by the conflict dynamics, becoming a new tool to continue the old conflict. For example, the International Crisis Group has noted Sierra Leonean President Kabbah’s use of the anti-corruption commission to threaten potential rivals. The final article in this issue by Corinna Kreidler also picks up this theme as she reflects on the conflict-sensitivity of anti-corruption work.
Anti-corruption and peacebuilding programming: Similarities and differences
A review of the anti-corruption and peacebuilding literature shows that the problems these communities seek to address or transform converge around a clear set of themes: issues of power, abuse, trust, impunity, transparency and destructive ideologies such as a zerosum approach. These are all central to the analysis and response of both fields. Given that both fields are responding to similar problems, it is not surprising that the two communities have commonality in their aspirations: equality, access to resources and the value of the common good, for instance.
Common long-term aspirations require the two fields to seek similar types of change at the individual and at the socio-political level. Both fields seek to change individual knowledge, attitudes, behaviour and skills. Examples of the work done by anti-corruption campaigners include training in procurement procedures and media programmes on the costs of corruption. The peacebuilding field also does significant work in this realm with training on nonviolent conflict resolution or radio programme challenging stereotypes.
At the socio-political level both fields also work to change institutions, public opinion, social norms and systems. For instance, anti-corruption work focuses on judicial reform or the establishment of an Anti-Corruption Commission, while peacebuilding work may seek a new law on land reform or elections.
Where the difference lies is mostly in the approaches and tactics utilised by each community, thereby creating the opportunity for collaboration. For instance, the two fields have very different analytic frameworks. “It is illustrative that in 2003-2004 USAID was almost simultaneously working on two new analysis tools, one for conflict and one for corruption. Neither of which cross-referenced the other...” Exploring the possibility of cross-fertilisation of approaches and tactics with the aim of catalysing more fundamental and significant change in the lives of people deserves attention from both fields.
The majority of anti-corruption tools approach corruption through technocratic means such as increasing checks and balances in accounting procedures or providing increased salaries to the civil service. Though a technical approach to tackle these tangible catalysts of corruption is clearly necessary, it is not sufficient to break the cycle of corrupt behaviour. Conversely much peacebuilding work attempts to transform relationships, strengthen social capital and change institutions to enable peaceful resolution of differences. These approaches focus on the sinews that connect or underpin the issues rather than those that are tactile. Possibly, the combination of these peacebuilding approaches with the existing anti-corruption emphasis may create a far more powerful response.
One approach to blending a peacebuilding approach to anti-corruption is described in the article on Search for Common Ground in West Africa by Oscar Bloh and Ambrose James, while Amy Margolies explores how one might consider adapting an existing peacebuilding programme, the Burundi Leadership Training Programme, to include corruption issues.
This issue
In seeking to spark an interdisciplinary conversation between the peacebuilding and anti-corruption fields, the editors hope the peacebuilding field will start to include corruption more systematically and consciously in their conflict analysis while incorporating anti-corruption into their programme designs. Possible results of this inclusion might be the development of a ‘corruption sensitivity’ lens for peacebuilding work or further development and testing of the theories of change underpinning both fields.
The structure of this issue of New Routes has been developed with the historical separation of the peacebuilding and anti-corruption communities in mind. The first two articles provide brief introductions to core concepts in corruption analysis. Each article in the second section explores the corruptionconflict intersection in a particular country context, establishing how corruption “qualifies” as part of the peacebuilding agenda. The third and final section turns to the nexus of peacebuilding and anti-corruption work, offering words of caution and actionable ideas for peacebuilding professionals.
Finally, included at the end of this edition, the editors have provided a Corruption Resource Page listing some recommended starting points for further consultation. In particular, for those seeking a more interactive forum to expand their engagement with this issue it is suggested they join the anticorruption@elist.tufts.edu email listserv by signing up at https://elist.tufts.edu/ wws/info/anticorruption.