Abstract

CASTRO, Conceição. Economic Determinants of Corruption in the European Union (15 countries). Economia Global e Gestão [online]. 2008, vol.13, n.3, pp.71-98. ISSN 0873-7444.

Controlling corruption is an important challenge namely to developed economies due to globalization. For the effect, it becomes important to know the main economic factors that determine different levels of corruption in the public administrations. Considering the 15 States Members of the European Union, for which there are great divergences in perception indexes of corruption, the objective is to establish correlations between corruption and different indicators of income, governance, economic freedom and ethics in business. The conclusions are that honesty of bureaucrats and politicians is correlated positively with governmental effectiveness, better quality of regulation, political stability, voice and accounting, and economic freedom. Additionally, we conclude that corporate legal corruption component is relatively more important than the corporate illegal corruption component and that they are also positively correlated with the perception of corruption in the public administration.

Keywords : Corruption; Governance; Economic Freedom; Ethics.

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