Reducing Corruption in Post-Communist Countries

Abstract

International experience in combating corruption is relatively easily identify the causes and single out the societies with high levels of corruption in their bureaucracies and private sectors. It is much more difficult to prescribe effective remedies and even more problematic to get new approaches applied in an appropriate and sustained fashion. This is particularly true with respect to the post-communist countries that embarked on the road of transition to a new economic and political reality over a decade ago. Making significant advances along this road has turned out to be much more difficult than expected at the beginning and has revealed risks and obstacles not anticipated. The article explores to what extent the task of containing corruption was on the agenda of public management reforms in these countries, the impact of these reforms on the level of corruption, if any, and seeks to identify more effective approaches for combating corruption in transitional states.