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Addressing Corruption in Haiti
Robert Klitgaard
February 2010
Abstract: In the aftermath of the disastrous earthquake of January 12, 2010, Haiti will
receive unprecedented aid for reconstruction and for its promising economic strategy.
But given the country’s legacy of corruption, massive aid could simply result in another
massive Haitian failure. Success hinges on facing corruption squarely and developing a
hard‐headed, politically sensitive anti‐corruption strategy. How this could be done,
given Haiti’s realities and lessons from fighting corruption around the world, is the
subject of this paper.
Robert Klitgaard is a University Professor at Claremont Graduate University, Claremont,
CA 91711 USA. He has been an advisor and researcher in more than 30 countries in the
Americas, Africa, and Asia, including Haiti under the first term of President Aristide. His
eight books include Controlling Corruption, Adjusting to Reality: Beyond “State vs. Market”
in Economic Development, and HighPerformance Government: Structure, Leadership,
Incentives (with Paul C. Light).
This paper was prepared as an offering to Haitians and the many foreign friends who
wish to help the country rebuild and reform. Email: robert.klitgaard@gmail.com
.
1
Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS ......................................................................................................................................1
1. SUCCESS IN HAITI: AN IMAGINARY NEWS STORY FROM 2015.............................................2
2. ADDRESSING CORRUPTION IN HAITI: AN OVERVIEW ..............................................................3
3. GREAT BEGINNINGS AND ELEPHANT ELITES.................................................................................4
“W
E FALL INTO THE SAME TRAP OVER AND OVER AGAIN”.........................................................................4
Y
ESTERDAY AND TODAY.....................................................................................................................................6
T
HE EARTH MOVES............................................................................................................................................7
4. HAITI’S ECONOMIC STRATEGY..............................................................................................................9
5. INTERNATIONAL LESSONS ON COMBATING CORRUPTION................................................. 14
C
ORRUPTION CRIPPLES DEVELOPMENT....................................................................................................... 14
H
OW TO CHANGE THE INSTITUTIONAL CULTURE....................................................................................... 15
H
OW TO MOBILIZE ALLIES............................................................................................................................. 17
P
REVENTIVE MEASURES THROUGH BETTER SYSTEMS............................................................................... 19
H
OW TO SUBVERT SYSTEMIC CORRUPTION................................................................................................. 21
6. TOWARD A STRATEGY FOR HAITI.................................................................................................... 27
H
OW TO DEVELOP A STRATEGY..................................................................................................................... 28
H
OW TO BUILD MOMENTUM AND POPULAR SUPPORT.............................................................................. 30
H
OW TO AVOID DISTORTIONS FROM INTERNATIONAL AID....................................................................... 32
H
OW TO BUILD SKILLS AND LEADERSHIP.................................................................................................... 33
ANNEX 1. A PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING AN ANTI‐CORRUPTION STRATEGY................... 35
ANNEX 2. IDEAS FOR A HAITI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY............................................................... 38
O
BJECTIVES....................................................................................................................................................... 38
P
ROGRAMS......................................................................................................................................................... 38
T
HOUGHTS ON LOGISTICS................................................................................................................................ 40
REFERENCES..................................................................................................................................................... 42
2
1. Success in Haiti: An Imaginary News Story from 2015
Five Years after the Quake, Haiti’s “Model Recovery”
Port-au-Prince, February 13, 2015 (Reuters)—
Only a few years ago, Haiti was considered by some
a hopeless cause.
“After the earthquake of 2010, more than our
buildings had collapsed,” says Bonaventure Ouvert, a
Haitian journalist. “Our economy was in ruins. There
was almost no civil service. Our morale was
devastated. Everyone assumed that Haiti would just
drop deeper into our historic pattern of corruption
and instability.”
On the contrary, notes Masahito Okazaki of
Transparency International. “Today the level of
confidence in Haiti is high, and this reflects a
remarkable effort by its leaders to create a state that
serves its people’s interests.”
The percentage of people living in poverty has
fallen from more than twice the mean of Caribbean
countries to just above that mean. Growth has
averaged over 7 percent per year, driven by clothing
and textiles, agriculture, and foreign aid and
investment. Haiti created a new system for managing
reconstruction funds in a transparent way. Free zones
have been developed, with good infrastructure and
independent administration.
“Haiti’s recovery is a model for other countries,”
observes Jules Fisher of The Economist. “Haiti has
avoided most of the problems that arise after disasters
and during the subsequent reconstruction.”
Government in Partnership
Most people believe that behind Haiti’s success lies
effective governance, vital for the country’s large
new flows of aid and investment.
“Our government has learned how to work through
partnerships,” notes Alphonse Michel, Minister of
Public Works, Transport, and Communications. “In
reconstruction, and in activities ranging from social
services to free zones to agriculture, we use a variety
of public-private-nonprofit partnerships, all of them
ethically led and carefully evaluated.”
“They used foreign experts ruthlessly,” notes the
UNDP’s Jürgen Frommer. “They took advantage of
strategic help in areas like public works and social
audits. They re-conceptualized the whole idea of
foreign advisers, thinking of them primarily not as
doers but as teachers and capacity builders.”
The private sector has participated in “integrity
pacts” in most sectors of public works. Here business
leaders and government officials jointly pledge not to
engage in bribery or other forms of illicit behavior—
and to audit jointly any alleged violations.
Citizen surveys have been used to create
“scorecards” for every government agency. Also,
lawyers, accountants, and business people are
interviewed to “diagnose” corrupt systems—and help
design and monitor improvements.
These changes—coupled with strong, honest
leadership—have led to surprising improvements.
Performance indicators have been created for most
sectors of government, and they are on the rise. For
example, the cost per kilometer of roads built is about
30% less than the historical figure. The cost of
constructing a rural school has also declined about
30%. Customs revenues per dollar spent in customs
administration have risen to $240 this year (the world
standard is between $200-$300).
On Transparency International’s Corruption
Perception Index, Haiti has moved in five years from
near the bottom of world rankings to just a place just
behind Costa Rica and ahead of many other countries
in the Americas.
Changing Image and Reality
“A major challenge for us was to defeat a mentality
that Haiti could never succeed,” says Minister
Michel. “We still have much to do, but we believe
that everyone realizes that Haiti is a place that is on
the move, where excellence can thrive.”
Important steps in this direction were to improve
law and order and to create an effective system of
property rights. “Development in so many other
countries has foundered on property rights and the
problem of creating a transparent and efficient legal
system,” Frommer observes. “Haiti gave these issues
priority from the beginning, and it’s working.”
Haiti has been able to recapture talent that had gone
abroad. Thousands of highly trained Haitians
returned to work in public, private, and non-profit
sectors. The government has also emphasized the
development of talent within the country.
Leadership training has been another area of
remarkable innovation. Haiti employed international
[The rest of story is not yet available]
3
2. Addressing Corruption in Haiti: An Overview
The imaginary news story above makes welcome reading. Five years from now, we
learn, Haiti’s post‐earthquake reconstruction will be a great success. How this
success will happen is only hinted at. But note this big idea: Haiti will surmount
systemic corruption.
Impossible, many say. “The biggest obstacle to reconstruction and development in
Haiti is corruption,” they shrug. “But what can be done about that, especially here?”
The feeling of futility is part of the challenge in Haiti. To overcome it, we must begin
with Haitian reality. (“We” of course means Haitians first and foremost.) We must
appreciate the legacy of systemic corruption, understand Haiti’s proposed economic
strategy, and anticipate the scale and challenges of reconstruction.
Then we must look hard at the various phenomena that go under the rubric of
corruption. We must understand corruption’s costs, so that we do not simply sweep
it under the rug in the name of reacting quickly and strongly to urgent human needs.
We must understand corruption as a phenomenon of systems, rather than (just) of
immoral individuals. And we must appreciate that systemic improvements have
been made, even in very difficult settings. Experience in other countries shows how
corruption can be prevented and subverted—if never, alas, eliminated.
Then we can turn to the implications for Haiti. How can Haiti’s reconstruction and
development efforts address the old realities and the new possibilities of systemic
corruption?
4
3. Great Beginnings and Elephant Elites
In the aftermath of the earthquake of January 12, 2010, many people inside and
outside Haiti have called for a new beginning. The crisis is an opportunity to
remake the country, they say, not just the collapsed buildings but also the legacy of
bad governance and systemic corruption. “I want this to be a new country,”
President René Préval said at the end of January, waving his hands for emphasis. “I
want it to be totally different.”
This yearning for a new Haiti is by no means something new. In April 2009, Prime
Minister Michèle Duvivier Pierre‐Louis gave an impassioned speech to Haiti’s aid
donors (Pierre‐Louis 2009a). “I believe that together we will seize this opportunity
to make a real difference and change forever the course of history,” she said. “We
strongly believe that Haiti is at a turning point, perhaps even a tipping point.” But
she also acknowledged that in Haiti calling for a new beginning can evoke derisive
laughter.
“In Haiti, popular comedians have for the past 50 years parodied the almost
theatrical repeated announcement of a ‘Great Beginning’ in which they did not really
believe themselves. The time has come to break away from such cynicism.”
“We Fall into the Same Trap Over and Over Again”
Michèle Pierre‐Louis was present at another of Haiti’s “great beginnings.” In 1991,
she was part of the new government of Jean‐Bertrand Aristide, the first
democratically elected president since Haiti became independent in 1804. Aristide
came to office promising to wash away the old Haiti of Papa Doc and Baby Doc
Duvalier, the tonton macoutes, the predatory corruption.
“It was very exhilarating, at the beginning,” Pierre‐Louis told an interviewer in July
2009. “Everybody in the world was saying finally Haiti is going to come out, finally
democracy is going to be built” (Pierre‐Louis 2009b).
In 1991 Haiti was at a low point. One of Haiti’s ablest economists, Leslie Delatour,
concluded: “Recent events in the economic and financial areas present clear
evidence that the Haitian economic system is on the verge of a collapse.” In a book
entitled Paper Laws, Steel Bayonets: Breakdown of the Rule of Law in Haiti, the
Lawyers Committee for Human Rights concluded bluntly: “There is no system of
justice in Haiti (Lawyers Committee for Human Rights 1990). Even to speak of a
‘Haitian justice system’ dignifies the brutal use of force by officers and soldiers, the
chaos of Haitian courtrooms and prisons, and the corruption of judges and
prosecutors.” Two experts in public administration, Derick Brinkerhoff and Carmen
Halpern, said that Haiti’s “history and culture do not offer firm footing for transition
to either democracy or ‘service government’… The road to change is filled with
potholes and blind curves. Reformers beware.” (Brinkerhoff and Halpern 1989). A
French anthropologist argued that rural people had given up on the Haitian state.
5
Their every action and inaction was designed to protect themselves against what
Brinkerhoff and Halpern called “the sanctioned plunder that was and remains the
core of Haitian politics.”
President Aristide promised a fresh start. He seemed to have what for years Haitian
governments had lacked: integrity, political will, and popular support.
Six weeks after his inauguration, it was my good fortune to spend a week with
President Aristide and some of his cabinet. “There has been a change of mentality,”
he told me, “a political will not to have corruption, terrorism, drugs. We have begun
a strategy that reflects the importance of transparency and participation.”
I talk to people and they say we cannot do anything with Haiti because it has
always been corrupt. “They rob and they rob,” they say, and history
demonstrates it. I’m shocked by hearing this; but it is true, it is a fact. But
since we have come in, we are respecting the law and the rights of citizens. . .
So we will change this impression and create confidence, in America and
France and Germany. Our example will demonstrate this change, which is
real.
The President directed his new ministers to root out corruption. They seemed to be
listening. The Planning Minister told me, switching from French to English for
emphasis, “The President is dedicated to this cause. I swear to you that each
Minister is committed to fighting corruption.”
In April 1991, I wrote a short policy paper called “A New Start for Haiti?” I
expressed the hope that Aristide’s mandate would enable something dramatically
different, something that would change the psychology of defeatism. “Haiti may
invite some people to despair,” I wrote. “But as President Aristide's courageous
example shows, Haiti is also a land of surprises” (Klitgaard 1991).
The next surprise came less than six months later, on September 29, 1991, when a
military coup removed President Aristide from office.
Violence and repression followed; corruption resumed in force. Three years later, in
1994, Aristide was brought back to office with international help. But the hope he
had represented had largely vanished. To many people, Aristide had become what
he once had opposed, a dictator astride a machine of corruption. As Pierre‐Louis
(2009b) recalled:
Those were very long years, and something happened to the country and to
the president. When he came back, I think things got really rough, we really
started going down the drain. Somehow, something very deep happened in
the mind of this country, and we have not really put our finger specifically on
it.
Interviewer: What did you feel was different after the return of Aristide in
1994?
6
PierreLouis: The man himself had changed. He was married, he was into
money, he was into corruption. He invented the Petits Projets de la
Présidence [a corruption‐riddled system of presidential largesse]. I don’t
think he had escaped from the Haitian president’s syndrome, which is stay in
power by all means.
There are many Haitian presidents who have fallen into that trap. Once that
is your perspective and that is your project, all means are used... I don’t think
we know our history very well, and we fall into the same trap over and over
again. It’s unfortunate that we keep making the same mistakes.
Yesterday and Today
Now skip forward to 2008. Food riots and four hurricanes hammered Haiti, leading
to a sudden loss of 15 to 20 percent in gross domestic product. The global recession
undercut the ability to respond of Haiti and of the international community. But
Haiti and its friends did take positive steps. A new economic strategy, crafted by
Oxford University economist Paul Collier (2009) and developed with Haiti’s many
stakeholders, promised realistic and yet potentially transformative changes (more
on this plan below). The April 2009 donors’ meeting addressed by Prime Minister
Pierre‐Louis promised important partnerships. President Préval received
international praise for leading the country forward.
The problem, however, is not just Haitian presidents. In her July 2009 interview,
Prime Minister Pierre‐Louis talked about Haiti’s systemic corruption.
All the elites—the mulatto elites, the university elites, the union elites, the
peasant elites—are like a huge elephant sitting on this country and you
cannot move it, because there is no political class, because there are no
political parties, and everyone becomes corrupted and perverted. If you
can’t go into that system, the system rejects you. And so far we have not
found the wrench that will move this thing.
These words of the Prime Minister were received by many influential Haitians as a
slap in the face. A Haitian political analyst blogged (my translation):
Her remarks, however justified against an obsolete political class and a
largely corrupt economic elite, sapped her political support. The majority of
the political parties have poorly received and digested her truths. Against
her, a bloc has formed through the processes of illicit enrichment of the
Bourdon Group close to the president and his wife. The numerous potential
candidates for the presidency are made very nervous by her presence in the
prime minister’s office. Together these political sectors did not wait for the
constitutionally mandated delay of one year in office to attack her (Lucas
2009).
7
One of the justifications for their attacks on Pierre‐Louis turned out to be:
corruption. Widespread rumors said that part of $197 million in aid following the
2008 hurricanes had disappeared. Since it was her government, her critics said, she
was to blame.
Under fire, Prime Minister Pierre‐Louis addressed the nation on October 27, 2009.
She defended herself against the critiques. Three audits of the emergency fund
would show that accusations of corruption were unwarranted. She reviewed the
achievements during her year as head of government. She emphasized the creation
of a new image of Haiti, a new discourse about public administration and the role of
the state. She underlined the efforts her government had made to improve the
situation of the people and “change the negative image given to Haiti at the
international level.” In terms of international cooperation, she spoke of “a change of
paradigm.”
Two days later, on October 29, the Haitian Senate voted to dismiss Michèle Pierre‐
Louis and her government. Her own great beginning was over.
The Earth Moves
And now, of course, the world has turned its attention to Haiti once more. The
horrific earthquake of January 12, 2010, has been called the world’s greatest
peacetime disaster apart from the 2004 Asian tsunami. President Barack Obama
quickly galvanized an unprecedented U.S. relief effort. Other international actors
also reacted strongly. As I write several weeks after the earthquake, one sees
progress in relief work and the first steps toward an international strategy for
reconstruction and development. One hears calls for a Marshall Plan for Haiti. One
hears rhetoric about a new beginning, such as President Préval’s words cited above,
or those of John Miller Beauvoir, a young Haitian NGO leader: “I think we should
bury the status quo under the rubble.”
And predictably, one also hears what Pierre‐Louis called that old cynicism about
Haiti. “Despite the best intentions of the international community,” declares the
lead paragraph of a Reuters news story fourteen days after the earthquake,
“Haitians have little faith they will see the billions of dollars in aid pledged to rebuild
their earthquake‐shattered country, which international monitors rate as one of the
world's most corrupt” (Zengerle 2010). One learns of crime mounting from an
already high level, thanks to a combination of thousands of escaped prisoners,
greater economic privations, and new criminal opportunities following the
earthquake. Some have speculated that the drug economy, already huge in Haiti,
will flourish further in the chaos of 2010 and beyond. “Haiti has always been a weak
link against drug trafficking,” said Ivelaw Griffith of the City University of New York.
“It’s a grave situation, and it’s going to get graver, because people are now going to
be even more susceptible to whatever corrupting forces are out there” (Hawley
2010).
8
These are realities that Haiti’s reconstruction and development strategies must face.
It is no use saying, as one leading development economist did, that talk about
corruption is just an excuse for not doing anything. It is no use writing, as two
international experts on Haiti recently did, “Of course Haiti has failed, failed and
failed again. Yet episodes of traumatic failure are ingrained in the histories of even
the most advanced economies” and then simply moving on to the need for aid
(Collier and Warnholz 2010).
It is also of no use, at least not until we do the analysis, to jump to the conclusion
that Haiti’s legacy of failure makes Haiti a hopeless case. We should instead ask how
the design and implementation of Haiti’s reconstruction and development strategy
might address “the sanctioned plunder that was and remains the core of Haitian
politics.” This is the goal of this paper.
9
4. Haiti’s Economic Strategy
A legacy of systemic corruption is one part of Haiti’s reality. Another is Haiti’s
impressive new economic strategy (Collier 2009 and Government of Haiti 2009).
How do the corruption and the strategy interact?
The economic strategy, written before the earthquake, focuses on jobs, basic
services, food security, and the environment. The strategy is under no illusion about
the competence or probity of Haitian state institutions. It calls for many public‐
private partnerships, which though they involve government leadership and
monitoring also include NGOs and the private sector, as well as international
partners. It also calls for new institutions, such as property rights courts for free
zones.
In Table 1, I try to provide the key elements of the economic strategy and some of
the critical roles the strategy asks the Haitian government to perform.
Several points are worth underscoring.
First, both reconstruction and the new economic strategy will rely heavily on
publicprivatenonprofit partnerships. Government officials will have to learn
how to design and manage partnerships for rebuilding cities and infrastructure, for
maintenance, for free zones, for the garment industry, to name a few. These tasks
require going beyond the standard repertoire of public administration.
Second, some new government entities are foreseen, such as a dedicated court to
hear land claims in free zone areas and one or more independent service authorities
for social services.
In Haiti, unusually for developing countries, most social services are now provided
by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and private sector. In part, this reflects
the weakness of Haiti’s government, particularly in rural areas, and the desire of
donors to evade possible mismanagement and corruption. But the current system is
said to suffer from geographic imbalances, some current services of very low
quality, and nonoptimal subsidies for particular services in particular areas.
Therefore, the country’s economic strategy recommends the creation of a
government‐led Independent Service Authority (ISA)—or perhaps more than one—
to coordinate and co‐fund NGO and private‐sector provision of social services. This
quasi‐independent public organization would implement policies set by government
ministries (health, education, and so forth). An ISA would have three functions:
take in money from donors and government; channel the money via contracts to
providers; and monitor the performance, creating competition, with best providers
being scaled up. An ISA would have a board with a government majority but with
participation from donors and other pertinent actors. How to create and run such
10
an agency, how to lead and manage such a board, would be new challenges for
Haiti’s government—and for its partners.
Table 1
Schematic Summary of Governance Challenges in Haiti’s Economic Strategy
Objective Priority Role of State Key Innovations New Skills
Jobs Expand garment
industry
Improve and
expand free
zones
Create better
partnerships
with garment
industries
Property rights fast
track
New maintenance
funding and mgt for
roads
New private roles in
electricity and ports
New management of
Customs in free
zones
New partnerships
with garment
industries
Property rights
reforms and fast‐track
mgt.
Regulating enhanced
free zones
Creating and managing
maintenance
partnerships
Designing and
regulating private roles
in electricity and ports
Contract with and
supervise outside mgt
of Customs
Creating and managing
partnerships with
garment industries
Labor‐intensive
works with
maintenance
(roads,
reconstruction,
etc.)
Encourage use
of labor‐
intensive
methods
Revamp
maintenance
systems
New ways to fund
and perhaps to
deliver the
maintenance of
roads (and other
infrastructure)
New ways to involve
citizens in design
and implementation
of reconstruction
New ways to
monitor quality and
conditions
Create and manage
new relationships with
donors, businesses
involved in
infrastructure, and
citizens’ groups—in
design and in
maintenance
Design and manage
new processes for
citizen involvement in
reconstruction.
Create and use flows of
objective information
about activities and
results
Expand mango
exports (and more
generally
agricultural
development)
Create new free
zones in
agriculture
Facilitate farm‐
to‐market
transactions
Setting up rural free
zones
Property rights,
including fast track
in free zone
Lead in the design,
maintenance, and
mgt. of rural roads
Creation and
regulation of free zones
Property rights
reforms and fast‐track
mgt
Creating and managing
maintenance
partnerships
11
Basic
services
Extend and unify
basic public
services to all of
Haiti
Lead and
regulate efforts
by NGOs and
private
providers
Create independent
service authority for
public services
(more than one?)
Creation, mgt., and
evaluation of
independent service
authority(‐ies),
combining
government, NGOs, and
private sector
Create and use flows of
objective information
about activities and
results—including
systems for client
feedback
Food
security
With donors, create
a virtual insurance
policy against large
jumps in world
food prices
Enhance domestic
food production
Food‐for‐work
scheme plus
tapered
subsidies
Earmark aid
budget for
“insurance”
Facilitate farm‐
to‐market
transactions
New schemes of
many kinds
New ways to fund
and perhaps to
deliver the
maintenance of rural
roads
Creation and mgt of
domestic and
international
partnerships to
provide food for work,
subsidies, and virtual
insurance
Improve partnerships
for design and
maintenance of rural
roads, with donors,
businesses, and rural
people
Environ‐
ment
Reforest Haiti
Create clear
and marketable
property rights
Improve
maintenance
Change prices
of charcoal (+)
and “gas
bombs” (‐)
Reduce
population
pressure in
rural areas
Redo property rights
from laws to
registries
New public‐private
partnerships for
maintenance of
forests and of land
agreements
Property rights
reforms and fast‐track
mgt.
Creating and managing
maintenance
partnerships
Third, the partnerships depend on the evaluation of activities and results.
Evaluation is notoriously difficult in settings like Haiti’s, for reasons of cost, data
quality, data analysis, and possibilities for distortion. Nonetheless, around the
world exciting examples exist of the use of feedback from citizens and partners to
gauge what is working and what isn’t.
The demand for such information is another
12
challenge, and the developing world is replete with examples of performance data
that policymakers (and citizens) ignore. The best way to make sure that people care
about performance is to have their own incentives linked to evaluation. This opens
a large area of both concern and promise, where international experience should
help guide Haitian officials and their partners.
Finally, all the priority areas in the economic strategy, plus of course the huge
reconstruction effort, are susceptible to corruption. More on this below.
For the economic strategy to succeed, therefore, the Haitian government and its
partners will need strong skills, some of them novel. Some of the skills are cross‐
cutting, others are area‐specific.
Crosscutting skills. Designing and managing public‐private partnerships.
Public works and reconstruction: planning, management, and maintenance.
Evaluation. Preventing corruption.
Areaspecific skills. Property rights reforms and administration. Free
zones (clothing; agriculture). Enabling and regulating the private provision
of electricity. Enabling and regulating private ports. Customs reform
(managing private customs organizations in free zones; computerizing
customs data elsewhere)
Haiti’s massive reconstruction effort, still undefined at this writing, will no doubt
also demand better governance. Large‐scale public works programs are notorious
in Haiti and elsewhere for inefficiency and corruption. Moving people from
disaster‐susceptible areas to other parts of Haiti will require sophisticated planning,
political mobilization, security, and property rights. Haitian public officials will have
to do new things, and do old things in different ways.
The challenge goes beyond the mustering and development of new skills. In a
demoralized public sector, an important task will be to rebuild pride in Haiti and in
public service. The greatest lack is said to be ethical leadership and effective
management. How to address these needs is a first‐order challenge for Haiti and its
international friends.
Finally, the subject of this paper, corruption. Haiti’s economic strategy raises old
and new challenges of good government. Public‐private partnerships have the
promise of shared information and comparative advantage. They have the potential
disadvantages of creating of a quasi‐monopoly, increasing cronyism, and
inadvertently promoting a kind of “regulatory capture” on steroids. Privatizing port
activities or electricity provision promises lower costs but in many countries is also
the occasion for grand corruption. Independent service authorities need to guard
against a government takeover of NGO and private activities, with the threat of
cooptation and corruption, and the loss of diversity and competition inherent in a
decentralized system of service providers. And reconstruction after emergencies is
13
fraught with corruption even in advanced countries, but especially where
accounting is weak and people are not widely involved in monitoring public works.
In Haiti, therefore, improved governance and anti‐corruption should be central
components of reconstruction and development. Given the legacy of poor
governance and systemic corruption, how can this be accomplished?
14
5. International Lessons on Combating Corruption
Even an economic strategy as sensitive to governmental weakness as Haiti’s is will
require new governmental roles and skills. Even a plan that envisions so many
public‐private partnerships will face daunting risks of incompetence and corruption.
Can Haiti and its international partners possibly overcome these risks?
The question has an all‐too‐ready answer: “Not here.” The psychology of pessimism
in Haiti is not delusional, although it sometimes draws on some delusional rhetoric
(racism, imperialism, and so forth). History in Haiti does not lead to optimism.
Haiti’s current problems do include frightening levels of violence (Eberstadt 2006),
widespread childhood slavery (Cadet 1998), and appalling governance (and
sometimes in rural areas no governance). And yet when we confront people who
cite these facts as evidence that Haiti is beyond hope—be they Haitians or
outsiders—it is tempting to shout them down (“racists”) or simply to cheer the
Haitian equivalent of “yes, we can.” It is difficult to face up to systemic corruption.
We fear that admitting the problem will derail reconstruction and development
efforts, because we assume, wrongly, that nothing can be done about systemic
corruption.
This phenomenon is not at all confined to Haiti. Around the world, railing against
corruption is popular in local newspapers and in international agencies. But if
corruption is admitted to be a central problem, what can be done about it? This
question quickly changes the complainers’ tune from impassioned outcry to
embittered cynicism. “Nothing can be done about corruption,” many of the same
citizens and journalists and officials will mutter sadly, if privately. This mismatch
between diagnosis and response, between heart and head, means that we do too
little about corruption.
Corruption Cripples Development
So what? “What is the problem about corruption?” was the title of an article by
political scientist Colin Leys more than four decades ago (Leys 1965). His answer:
corruption is not much of a problem. Leys argued that corruption has its functions,
sometimes even its benefits. Under awful conditions, bribery may be socially and
not just privately beneficial. The political scientist Samuel Huntington (2006
[1968]) noted: “In terms of economic growth the only thing worse than a society
with a rigid, overcentralized, dishonest bureaucracy is one with a rigid,
overcentralized, honest bureaucracy.”
These scholars of the 1960s had a point. But today, informed by both careful case
studies and econometric estimates, we have abundant evidence of corruption’s
many costs. Systemic corruption distorts incentives, undermines institutions, and
redistributes wealth and power to the undeserving. Corruption slows economic
progress. Axel Dreher and his colleagues (2007) estimate that corruption is
15
responsible for a reduction of 58 percent in per capita income in Latin America and
the Caribbean, and 63 percent in sub‐Saharan Africa and south Asia. My research
with Johannes Fedderke shows that other things equal countries with more
corruption have less investment, and each dollar of investment has less impact on
growth (Klitgaard et al. 2005; Fedderke and Klitgaard 2006). Daniel Kaufmann and
colleagues (2009) have shown that measures of poor governance, such as high
corruption, lack of rule of law, and lack of citizen voice, have direct and negative
effects on long‐term outcomes such as infant mortality and educational attainment.
Corruption undercuts democracy and decentralization. As John T. Noonan (1984)
put it, dictatorship and corruption are the two great sins of government.
We should not think of opposing corruption in Haiti or elsewhere because we are
goody‐goodies and corruption is sinful. We fight corruption because it hurts what
we most want to achieve in society.
Can anything be done about corruption? The short answer is yes. Around the
world, one finds inspiring examples of cities and towns, ministries and agencies, and
countries making progress in the fight against corruption. Not everywhere, to be
sure, and even with the success stories progress is not overnight. Success is always
incomplete, and “recorruption” is always a threat (Dininio 2005).
Despite success stories in reducing corruption, it is surprising how cynical people
can become about this subject, to the point of fallacy. “Corruption has existed
throughout history. Every country has corruption, even the most advanced. So,
what can be done about corruption? Nothing.”
To see the fallacy clearly, substitute “disease” for “corruption.” No one would
conclude that nothing can be done about disease, that there is no use for public
health programs, doctors, hospitals, or medicine.
Like disease, corruption comes in many forms, some cancerous, some mild. Like
disease, corruption can be widespread like a pandemic or occasional like the
mumps. Like disease, prevention is important, and so is treatment of diseased
members of the body politic. Fortunately, we can learn from other countries about
preventive measures and cures for the various diseases grouped under corruption.
Of course, the problems and the settings differ, so we cannot simply copy. But
common themes emerge.
a. Successful reformers change institutional cultures.
b. They mobilize and coordinate a variety of resources inside and outside the
government.
c. They think in terms of corrupt systems instead of corrupt individuals.
How to Change the Institutional Culture
When corruption is widespread, the institutional culture grows sick. The norm is
corruption; expectations are that corruption will continue. Cynicism and despair
16
become widespread. Change seems impossible. Even so, there are cases where
leaders have made substantial progress in changing a sick institutional culture. The
leaders begin by sending a strong signal of change. Not just words: in corrupt
societies, people have heard plenty of rhetoric about corruption and now don’t
believe it.
Fry Big Fish
To break through this culture of corruption, experience indicates that “frying big
fish” is essential. Big, corrupt actors must be named and punished so that a cynical
citizenry believes that an anti‐corruption drive is more than words. This includes
those giving as well as those receiving bribes. It is also important that a campaign
against corruption is not confused with a campaign against the opposition.
Importantly, therefore, one of the first big fish should preferably come from the
political party in power.
In Hong Kong, for example, credibility for the new Independent Commission against
Corruption came when an ex‐police commissioner of Hong Kong was extradited
from retirement in England and punished in Hong Kong. The ICAC also nailed
scores of other high‐ranking police officials. To a skeptical public and a hardened
civil service, these prosecutions sent a credible signal of change. As a former ICAC
commissioner wrote:
An important point we had to bear in mind (and still have to) is the status of
people we prosecute. The public tends to measure effectiveness by status!
Will they all be small, unimportant people, or will there be amongst them a
proportionate number of high‐status people? Nothing will kill public
confidence quicker than the belief that the anti‐corruption effort is directed
only at those below a certain level in society (Williams 1983).
Just after he assumed power in Colombia, President Andrés Pastrana’s anti‐
corruption team flew to several regions and held hearings about supposedly corrupt
mayors and governors. The team had the power to suspend people from these
offices—something that leaders in other countries may not have—and the team
used this power to send a signal to the local leaders and to the whole country. The
President’s anti‐corruption team also went after a specific case of corruption in the
Congress—choosing as the big fish people from the President’s own party.
Under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Indonesia’s Corruption Eradication
Commission has won global praise for its performance. It has successfully
prosecuted scores of public servants, some of them extremely senior, as well as
business people giving bribes.
In 2001‐2002, President Enrique Bolaños of Nicaragua went one step further. He
locked up the former President Arturo Alemán, under whom Bolaños had served as
Vice President, on charges of corruption.
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Even though “frying big fish” is an indispensable step in breaking the culture of
impunity, the emphasis on past offenders can be overdone. An analogy with health
policy is germane. Individual cases of grave illness must be dealt with. But in the
long run, prevention deserves priority. Therefore, after frying a few big fish, the
strategy should emphasize prevention and the reform of institutions.
Pick Visible, Lowhanging Fruit
A second principle used by successful reformers is to show progress in some highly
visible areas within six to twelve months. These leaders do not tackle the most
important problem first, if that problem is very difficult. To build momentum, it is
good to begin an anti‐corruption campaign where citizens perceive it to be most
evident and most annoying, or where the political leadership has given a field
particular salience, or where it is believed that corruption is undercutting economic
reform.
In doing so, these leaders create short‐term successes that can change public
expectations: “Maybe things can change…maybe they will change.” Short‐term
success builds momentum for deeper, long‐term reforms.
Bring in “New Blood”
Even when they work with people within existing institutions, effective reformers
invite in people from outside. This “new blood” might be young people to be “eyes
and ears” (as Mayor Ronald MacLean‐Abaroa did with interns in La Paz, Bolivia),
business people to take important public positions (for example, the Anti‐
Corruption Czar under President Pastrana and several leaders of President Vicente
Fox’s reform efforts in Mexico), and young accountants to partner with “senior
heroes” in in‐depth investigations (as in the case of Efren Plana, who famously
cleaned up the Philippines’ Bureau of Internal Revenue more than two decades ago).
How to Mobilize Allies
Coordinate Government Institutions
A successful fight against systemic corruption must involve more than one agency of
government. Long‐term success requires the contributions of the supreme audit
authority, the police, the prosecutors, the courts, the finance functions of
government, and others. The fight against corruption also requires a strong
leader—someone strategic and brave and politically astute. But the leadership trait
that is most important is the ability to mobilize other actors and to coordinate their
efforts productively. The task is not command and control, but mobilization and
coordination.
For example, in Colombia the Anti‐Corruption Czars of Presidents Pastrana and
Alvaro Uribe have created mechanisms for coordination across major ministries and
agencies of government (auditing, investigation, prosecution, and so forth). Hong
Kong’s Independent Commission against Corruption works in three areas—
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prosecution, prevention, and public relations. In each area, the ICAC works closely
with and through other government agencies.
Involve Public Servants
Surprisingly perhaps, it turns out that even public servants involved in corrupt
systems are willing and able to analyze where those systems are vulnerable to
corruption—as long as the focus is on corrupt systems and not on condemning
isolated individuals.
Successful reforms also do something good for their public sector employees. For
example, new systems of performance measurement are linked with better pay,
promotion policies, and “prizes” such as overseas trips and courses.
Mobilize Citizens
The government must invite those outside of government to become part of the
solution. After all, corruption is not confined to the public sector. Business people
and lawyers pay the bribes while condemning the phenomenon of bribery. They
find themselves in a situation described in the novel Catch22:
“But suppose everybody on our side felt that way?”
“Then I’d certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way. Wouldn’t I?”
Only collective action and credible, systematic reform can break out of this corrupt
equilibrium. Citizens should be part of the solution. How?
Mayor MacLean invited citizens’ groups to become involved in local public works,
which enabled new kinds of accountability. So did Mayor Jesse Robredo in Naga
City, Philippines, and Mayor Elba Soto in Campo Elias, Venezuela. Mayor Soto
created an Office for Development and Citizen Participation, using citizens as eyes
and ears to insure successful implementation of public works. Benin’s National
Front of Organizations against Corruption discovered adulteration of glucose sacks
distributed by the government, leading to wide publicity and a conviction.
Citizens know where corruption is and how corrupt systems work. Lawyers
understand the workings of corruption in legal systems. Accountants know the
illicit games played with audits. Business people understand how corrupt systems
of procurement and contracting work. Citizens know where bribery shapes the
services they receive (or don’t receive).
This knowledge can be culled in many ways. In surveys, people can be asked where
they perceive corruption to be occurring. In confidential interviews, insiders can be
asked how
a corrupt system works. For example, a study of a procurement system
may lay out the various steps: prequalification of bidders, technical criteria and
their weights, the judging of the various bids, the process for post‐award changes,
and the payment of the contract. Each of these may be subject to corruption.
Interviewees are asked, in effect, “Here is how things are supposed to work in
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prequalification. In your experience, what problems tend to emerge? How
prevalent do you guess these problems are? What distortions are created?”
The results of many such interviews (perhaps fifteen or more) can then be the basis
for a diagnostic of a procurement system. The diagnostic can be shared with the
interviewees for comments and corrections. The final version can be shared with
many parties, including the government, and used to plan remedial actions. A year
later, the interviews and surveys can be repeated. Progress can be assessed. New
remedial actions can be recommended.
Mobilize International Partners
Successful leaders also mobilize international assistance in the fight against
corruption. Foreign aid can be used to fund the diagnosis of corrupt systems. Aid
can enable experiments, such as “report cards” where citizens give marks to
different public services (Paul 2002), and incentive reforms.
Preventive Measures through Better Systems
In the longer term, reducing corruption requires better systems. Successful leaders
understood that better systems go beyond better laws and codes of conduct.
Corruption can be understood through a stylized formula:
Corruption = Monopoly + Discretion – Accountability.
Corruption flourishes when someone has monopoly power over a good or service,
has the discretion to decide how much you get or whether you get any at all, and
where accountability is weak. It also is affected by positive and negative incentives.
So, corruption‐fighters must reduce monopoly, limit and clarify discretion, and
increase transparency in many ways. And they must alter incentives.
i. Reduce Monopoly
Reducing monopoly means enabling competition, as in government contracts in La
Paz and in Colombia. Mayor MacLean‐Abaroa got the city of La Paz out of the
construction business, meaning that public works could be carried out by any of a
number of private companies. Mexico put online all government contracts and
procurement plans, so plans, prices, and winners are public knowledge. Argentina
reduced corruption in hospitals by publishing prices of all purchases throughout the
hospital system. Corrupt deals that had resulted in higher prices were quickly made
evident.
ii. Limit Discretion
Limiting discretion means clarifying the rules of the game and making them
available to the common man and woman. Mayor MacLean‐Abaroa created a
“Manual for the Paceño,” which described simply and in three languages what was
required to get a permit, build a house, start a business, and so forth. President
Pastrana used the Internet to limit discretion: it became harder for a government
20
official to trick a citizen because the rules of the game were available online. Judge
Plana simplified the tax code, making it simpler to understand and reducing thereby
the effective discretion of tax officials.
iii. Enhance Accountability
Enhancing accountability can mean many things; creative leaders use a remarkable
variety of methods. One way to improve accountability is to improve the
measurement of performance. Leaders can work with their employees and clients
to create new systems for measuring the performance of agencies and offices—and
then link rewards to results.
Another method is listening and learning from businesses and from citizens. This
includes mechanisms for public complaints, but it goes beyond the reporting of
individual instances of abuse to the diagnosis of corrupt systems. President
Pastrana’s Colombiemos campaign linked up the veedurías around Colombia,
enabling these non‐government organizations to provide even better oversight of
public programs and leaders.
Efforts in e‐government are proliferating around the world, with the promise of
reducing corruption. President Pastrana’s team used the Internet to publicize all
contracts and budgets—and also to enable citizens to denounce cases of inefficiency
and possible corruption. Similar efforts in Mexico and Korea, among many others,
have led to documented reductions in corruption.
Accountability is also increased by inviting outside agencies to audit, monitor, and
evaluate. Less formally, the press is an important source of accountability.
Following the tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia, a team of local journalists produced a
daily one‐hour radio program dedicated to the rehabilitation and reconstruction
effort. These journalists acted as watchdogs, often drawing attention to cases of
corruption.
iv. Reform Incentives
Successful reformers recognize that corruption is a crime of calculation, not a crime
of passion. Reformers work hard to change the risk‐reward calculations of those
who might give bribes and those who might receive them. Raising pay is good,
especially for Ministers and other government leaders. Salaries should be
somewhat competitive with the private sector—perhaps 80 percent is a good norm.
But note that beyond some reasonable minimum that enables officials to live
decently, the level of pay does not have much of an effect on corrupt calculations.
“Should I take this bribe or not?” The answer depends on the size of the bribe
(which is a function of my monopoly power and my discretion), the chance I’ll be
caught (a function of accountability), and the penalty I’ll pay if I’m caught. It only
depends a little on my level of income, at least once I have enough to live on.
Therefore, once salaries for top officials are “reasonable,” leaders should emphasize
21
improving information about performance and the incentives attending good and
bad performance.
v. Ethics Reforms
What about ethics and morality? Successful leaders set a good example. They
sometimes create ethics programs for employees and citizens. Codes of conduct can
be useful.
Nonetheless, in the success stories I have studied, what might be called “moral
reforms” are not a key to long‐term success. Rather, the keys seem to revolve
around systems that provide better incentives for imperfect human beings to
perform in the public interest—and to avoid corruption.
How to Subvert Systemic Corruption
There is another set of anti‐corruption tools, which go beyond prevention. They
come into play in situations where corruption has become systemic. Consider a real
example, stylized and made anonymous. The example is not Haitian, but some of the
phenomena may sound familiar.
A government agency we’ll call PHS buys pharmaceuticals and distributes them to
the poor. There are eligibility cards and subsidies, supply chains and special health
posts, and lots of contracting and procurement. Corruption has always existed in
PHS. But suddenly, things get worse.
The country’s president is involved in a scandal. He may be impeached. Parliament
forms a committee to investigate and judge the president. The president and his
party try to influence the committee. A relative of the committee chairman is named
the director of PHS. Other new appointments in PHS involve people from the same
region as the committee chairman.
Procurement in PHS becomes deeply corrupted. Competitive bidding, once the
norm in 90 percent of the procurement contracts, is used in less than half. The other
contracts are declared “emergencies.” They are now handled through the PHS’s
regional offices, and contracts are let without competition. In these regional offices,
always scarce on talent and on oversight, the new leadership of PHS combines the
heretofore separate functions of procurement and internal auditing. In the words of
one official, “Many of these people decide which firms will get the contract and then
both manage the project and are responsible for auditing it.”
Even when procurement is competitive, abuses spread. Specifications are tailored
to enhance the chances of favored suppliers. Cost overruns are approved in
exchange for bribes.
Political influence paralyzes external controls. Parliament names a new director of
the Supreme Audit Agency, and the president’s party installs a compliant individual.
The Attorney General, the president’s old friend, is unwilling to pursue sensitive
cases.
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As the corruption in PHS grows, organizational chaos ensues. The manual of
procedures is abandoned. Eligibility cards are allocated through extortion and
fraud. Some files disappear, then many, so that even if investigations or audits are
started there are often no records. No one is sure if contracts have been let, or if
funds are available. As a result, some contractors are not paid. Delays and further
rounds of corruption follow. Eventually, suppliers charge higher prices or retire
from this market, leading to less competition and further opportunities for
corruption and inefficiency. An honest auditor finds a PHS warehouse full of
televisions, champagne glasses, and so forth. Straightforward theft becomes
widespread, and medicines disappear.
PHS free falls into financial collapse. Health care for the poor disintegrates.
Under Normal Circumstances, Do This
What to do? When facing normal levels of corruption, a variety of preventive
measures can be pursued.
1. “Agents” (that is, public officials) are selected on the basis of competence and
honesty.
2. Incentives are structured to reward projects and purchases with excellent
results. Penalties are exacted on those who give or receive bribes.
3. A variety of mechanisms are used to gather information about the possibilities of
corrupt behavior at each stage—information ranging from bidding patterns to
comparative costs to the lifestyles of the individuals involved (are officials living
beyond their salaries?).
4. Competition is encouraged.
5. Official discretion is circumscribed, for example by objective studies and clear
criteria.
6. The moral costs of corrupt behavior are sometimes emphasized through codes of
conduct, publicity campaigns, and the encouragement of reputations for probity
by the firms involved.
Under most conditions, these are valuable measures. But where corruption has
become systemic, government suffers a breakdown in its ability to act in each of the
six areas. Take the PHS, for example.
1. Suddenly, key “agents” are selected through a political process whose purpose is
to give them access to public wealth.
2. Their incentives are to make money for their political masters, and they are
protected by those masters and by the president who is in the m
asters’ debt.
Careers in PHS are not advanced through a record of economical purchases and
successful projects. Contracting firms are not punished for poor results. There
are few official incentives to discover and prosecute corruption, and increasingly
23
there are strong political pressures not to do so. The penalties for corruption are
weak and occur only rarely.
3. The many possible mechanisms used to gather information about performance
and about possible corruption are underemployed or abandoned. Within PHS,
financial and then administrative chaos has gutted record‐keeping and
accounting, so that information useful to investigate and control corruption is
often missing.
4. Competition has been undercut in many ways. Instead of using a well‐organized
procurement process that uses technical criteria to judge bids and firms,
contracting is decentralized and is subject to the classic formula: corruption
equals monopoly plus discretion minus accountability.
5. Some political appointees have the discretion to let contracts without
competition or technical reviews.
6. The moral costs of corruption diminish as systemic corruption takes hold.
Honest firms find it harder to do honest business. Reputation matters less and
less, and phantom firms are created for corrupt purposes.
When systems are so thoroughly corrupted, there may be little if any political will.
Calling for better agents, improved incentives, better information, more
competition, less official discretion, and higher moral costs is well and good. But
who’s going to listen? Who’s going to act? When corruption reaches this point, the
usual anti‐corruption remedies may have little traction. Now what?
The Analogy of Disease
Consider an obviously imperfect but nonetheless suggestive analogy. In some ways,
corruption is like HIV/AIDS. It is a problem in every country, and especially
prevalent and damaging in a few. It has aspects of a contagion. It is based on
private behavior, usually consenting, which the prevailing moral code usually
considers immoral. The social consequences are at many levels, including economic.
Finally, the disease is difficult to combat, and it may adapt itself to efforts to defeat
it.
Like HIV/AIDS, corruption has moral dimensions and is particularly prevalent in
certain subcultures. What might be called the first level of reacting to both
problems raises consciousness. This immoral behavior has pernicious social
consequences. The cure? Moral renovation, cultural change, an elevation of
consciousness. (Incidentally, this is where Colin Leys (1985) sought a remedy. The
“line of escape,” he wrote, is “a nucleus of ‘puritans’ applying pressure for a code of
ethics.”) The problem with this advice is practical. Alas, we know little about how
to engineer a moral renovation. So, just as with HIV/AIDS, we must also work at
other levels.
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A second level of reacting to AIDS or to corruption emphasizes prevention: keep
healthy bodies free of the disease. The anti‐corruption measures described above,
from selecting better agents to raising the moral costs of corruption, are derived
from this approach.
But what if corruption has already become embedded in the body politic? When
prevention fails, a third level of fighting corruption is also needed, one that goes
after the disease. This requires a different approach, as Table 2 suggests.
In addition to strengthening government institutions, the task is now to weaken
corrupt institutions. This is difficult but not impossible. To engage in corruption a
government official and a private party have to identify each other as potential
corrupt partners, find a way to reach and enforce an agreement, and then deliver
what each has promised. Each of these steps can be difficult, and each has
vulnerabilities to detection.
So, one asks how the corrupt systems work. How are corrupt buyers and sellers
found and matched? How do they make and enforce their implicit contracts? What
footprints do their illicit transaction create, and how do they try to cover them up?
Table 2
Levels Two and Three in the Fight against Corruption
Level Two: Fighting “Ordinary”
Corruption
Level Three: Fighting Systemic
Corruption
Key metaphor Controlling corruption Subverting corruption
Medical
analogy
Strengthen the body to prevent the
disease from taking hold. Examples:
exercise, nutrition, lifestyle.
Attack the disease itself. Examples:
antibiotics, chemotherapy, surgery.
Use analysis
to find out
Where healthy systems are vulnerable
and how to strengthen them
Where organized corruption is itself
vulnerable and how to weaken it
Some key
analytical
questions
How are agents selected? How is the
principal‐agent‐client relationship
structured? What are the incentives?
How can discretion be clarified and
circumscribed? How can
accountability be enhanced? How can
the moral costs be increased?
How are corrupt deals made? Kept secret?
How are corrupt goods and services
delivered? How are members recruited
and disciplined? What “footprints” are
there from all these things? How can risks
and penalties be created or enhanced?
How is impunity now supplied and where
is it vulnerable?
Draw
inspiration
from
Best practice in business
management; public health programs
Best practice in fighting organized crime;
pathology and medicine
Key functions
in the fight
against
corruption
Audit, systems design, incentive and
personnel system, control, citizen
oversight
All of these, plus undercover agents,
infiltrators, turncoats and key witnesses,
“dirty tricks”
Key actors in
the fight
People who run the system. The
“principal” (metaphorically, the
People who can influence and, if necessary,
subvert the corrupt system. Citizens,
25
against
corruption
people; in practice, the people in
charge)
professional associations, the press,
business groups, one agency or level of
government against systemic corruption in
other agencies or levels
Then countermeasures should be designed. For example, how might corrupt
contracts be exposed, undercut, or destabilized? How might undercover agents be
introduced to the system in order to disrupt it? Who are the disaffected in the
corrupt system, and how may they be induced to defect? How might disinformation
be injected into the corrupt system to create schisms, distrust, and greater risk?
Attacking Organized Crime
Let us return to the case of PHS and its corrupt coalition of the president, the
congressional committee, some contractors, some political appointees, and many
PHS officials. How could this corrupt system be subverted?
Disseminate information that the corrupt system would like to keep hidden.
For example, our research in PHS easily documented the switch from 90
percent competitive bidding to 50 percent. The “emergency” contracts had
been recorded, and we could readily show that most had been awarded to
cronies of political appointees. Inserting this information into the public
dialogue created pressure for change.
Some political appointees had received corrupt side payments, which proved
difficult but not impossible to trace. In some cases, houses, cars, and other
forms of conspicuous consumption were documented and then leaked to the
press. Politicians had to explain how they accumulated such riches.
The prices of various goods and services were compared with prices before
the erosion of PHS, with prices in the private sector, and with prices in
neighboring countries. All these comparisons showed the mark‐ups that had
taken place through corruption. These data provided a focal point for public
outrage and a baseline for monitoring improvement.
Businesses have a collective interest in reducing corruption, even when they
are virtually required to participate in corruption systems in order to
survive. One can work with firms that could potentially compete in PHS’s
activities, as well as with associations of industry leaders, auditors, and
lawyers. Pressure points can thereby be created to express outrage and to
push for change.
Organized extortion for PHS eligibility cards can be uncovered and
documented by using hidden video cameras, undercover agents, and
confidential exit interviews.
26
Successful efforts against organized crime attack the criminals’ culture of
secrecy. Crucial are such measures as using undercover agents, planting
electronic surveillance, and inducing key insiders to become state witnesses.
Also, misinformation and “dirty tricks” have been used to create distrust
among the corrupt—for example, planting false rumors that someone is a
turncoat, or catalyzing animosity among various factions.
In a situation where political will is lacking, who might undertake these steps? The
list of potential allies in fighting systemic corruption is long but not easy to mobilize.
Citizens’ groups, including the international NGO Transparency International. The
press. Religious groups. Business groups, who realize that as a whole business
loses from systemic corruption. International organizations. And, interestingly,
people and units of government who are not yet infected by corruption. Even within
a corrupted agency, the infection is never complete, and given the opportunity,
people ranging from secretaries to technicians to long‐term civil servants may be
valuable sources of information about how exactly the corrupt system functions.
Ideally, anti‐corruption efforts will bring together all these actors in order to
subvert systemic corruption.
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6. Toward a Strategy for Haiti
Reconstruction and development projects nowadays take corruption seriously.
They couple careful planning and evaluation with beefed‐up auditing, both local and
international. Donors sometimes add projects designed to reform and strengthen
the public sector. Reorganization, streamlining, outsourcing, training,
computerization, and technical assistance are the mainstays of these projects. But
these measures seldom address the underlying economics and politics of
corruption. As a result, they seldom make an impact on systemic corruption.
But as we have seen, systemic corruption is one of Haiti’s realities. It has undercut
the provision of social services, the efficiency of ports and electricity, revenue
agencies, the construction and maintenance of roads, and the system of justice—not
to mention Haitian politics. It threatens also to undercut the country’s
reconstruction and development strategies.
“It’s what I’d call a perfect storm for high corruption risk,” says Roslyn Hees, author
of a new Transparency International handbook called Preventing Corruption in
Humanitarian Operations (2010). “You have a seriously damaged institutional
infrastructure, a country with endemic corruption, a weak or fragile state in the best
of circumstances, and sudden influxes of huge amounts of resources to a highly
vulnerable population” (Baldwin 2010).
Three responses are possible. First, don’t become involved in a country that is as
systematically corrupt as Haiti.
Second, if you must become involved, evade corrupt systems as much as possible.
Use enclaves of foreigners to provide high‐level services such as planning, auditing,
and in some cases implementing. Ring‐fence development activities such as free
zones, keeping them safe from government interference. Use foreign companies to
do the reconstruction. Move development aid not through the government but
through nongovernment organizations and the private sector (presumably but not
always less subject to corruption).
This has been the approach of much aid in the past in Haiti. The results have not
necessarily been encouraging. Nonetheless, given the unprecedented amounts of
aid that will enter Haiti and the need for rapid, high‐quality construction, enclave‐
like mechanisms have been proposed, and they deserve careful, case‐by‐case study.
The short‐term benefits of efficiency have to be traded off against the longer term
costs of dependency and nationalist resistance. Some people have called for the
reconstruction to be administered by a new, independent organization that is
Haitian only through participation, not control. Several U.S. Senators have discussed
putting Haiti “at least temporarily in something like a receivership.” Not
surprisingly, this suggestion affronts many Haitians’ sense of sovereignty.
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A third response is to take on Haiti’s systemic corruption. We have seen that most
initiatives in Haiti’s new economic strategy cannot be carried out in an enclave or
receivership fashion, nor by NGOs and businesses alone. As section 4 described,
Haiti’s strategy calls for many important roles for government, and it is therefore
vulnerable in a variety of ways to corruption. To implement that strategy
successfully, Haiti and its international partners will need to address Haiti’s
systemic corruption. Fortunately, as we have seen, international experience shows
that corruption can be reduced, even in very difficult settings. And I would suggest a
further idea for Haiti: fighting systemic corruption can be a catalyst for a new vision
of governance in this country, one based on partnerships and accountability. (More
on this below.)
How to Develop a Strategy
What will success against systemic corruption entail? It is not simply more controls
and more audits, welcome though these may be. We must address the economics of
corruption. Experience elsewhere teaches that reforming highly corrupt systems
requires a shock to change expectations. “Big fish” must be fried. Then systemic
reforms are required. Monopoly powers have to be reduced and competition
increased. Discretion and arbitrariness in official actions and in the rules of the
game must be avoided. Transparency and accountability need to be enhanced,
through objective performance indicators and through systematic feedback from
citizens, businesses, and public officials themselves. Positive and negative
incentives need to be changed, for bribe givers as well as bribe takers.
Corrupt systems have their own economics. Even in places like Haiti, they cannot be
out in the open. They rely on secrecy, in how they recruit participants, make and
enforce contracts, make payments, and hide illicit gains. Each of these steps
constitutes a point of vulnerability in the corrupt system. Understanding these
weaknesses can enable us to subvert corruption. The needed measures go beyond
prevention to something akin to interventions against organized crime.
If Haiti is like other countries suffering from corruption akin to organized crime, its
corrupt systems are complicated and dangerous. Their secretive workings are not
understood by most Haitians. The mysteries of corrupt systems makes it easy to
accuse people, even innocent people, of corruption. Charges of corruption, never
proven but quickly brought to a head, led to the Senate’s rapid dismissal of Prime
Minister Pierre‐Louis last year.
A successful strategy against systemic corruption must go inside Haitian politics—
and the politics of possible anti‐corruption measures. This is an election year in
Haiti. A few weeks after the earthquake, opposition candidates were already
criticizing President Préval for inaction. The resource flows from reconstruction
will be unprecedented, and they will heighten political stakes in Haiti. The
supporters and opponents of the current administration will be excited by and
29
perhaps threatened by the promise of big changes in the way government works. In
this context, corruption fighters need to protect themselves from blow back.
At the same time, this is a propitious moment for change. Haiti is a country in deep
crisis, where corruption is already a headline issue and something the government
has already promised to tackle. “I want this to be a new country,” President Préval
said in late January. “I want it to be totally different.” The appropriate strategy may
be to put fighting corruption in bold face and to emphasize such politically salient
steps as the prosecution of a few “big fish,” symbolic steps to indicate that impunity
is over and the rules have changed, the tracking down of ill‐gotten wealth (even
when economically relatively small), and the creation of an anti‐corruption focal
point within the Haitian government.
Successfully taking on corruption means thinking as hard and concretely about anti‐
corruption strategy as one does in any other area of policy and management. We
need more analysis, more learning from experience, more getting Haitians together
to come up with ideas that can work.
An effective anti‐corruption initiative must involve local ownership and creativity.
It should be championed by the highest level of political leadership. It should also
involve the private sector and civil society.
It must have a strategy, as opposed to an assemblage of activities. This means, for
example, that it recognizes that a corrupt equilibrium requires a shock; that
incentives and information are at the heart of systemic corruption; and that one
must pick “low‐hanging fruit” rather than trying to do everything at once.
It must challenge political leadership without entailing political suicide.
It must recognize the Prisoners’ Dilemma aspect of many forms of corruption, where
firms bribe because others do. Therefore, solutions should build on collective
business self‐interest.
It must be legitimate for international partners to participate. For example, anti‐
corruption should be linked with the support of reconstruction and with each
component of Haiti’s new economic strategy, rather than be seen as an arbitrary
attack on Haiti or on a particular political regime.
A Possible Process for Haiti
If these ideas and those of section 5 make sense at least in a preliminary way, the
next step is to explore them in depth with Haitian leaders.
In my experience, high‐level workshops prove an excellent way to mobilize
creativity and create the beginnings of action plans. (Annex 1 outlines a method for
organizing such workshops that has proven successful in a variety of countries, both
government‐wide and in particular ministries.)
30
Ideally, the workshops would include leaders from government, business, and civil
society. Together, these leaders would examine the various kinds of corruption and
their costs. They would learn together about possible remedial actions, such as
those discussed in section 5 and others, using case studies of other countries. They
would analyze these alternatives in the Haitian context. They would identify areas
where the costs of corruption seem high and the costs of the remedial actions seem
relatively low—promising starting points in an anti‐corruption initiative. At the
broadest level, participants would consider how a strategy against corruption could
become a lever for transforming governance in Haiti.
How to Build Momentum and Popular Support
After these questions are addressed, Haiti’s anti‐corruption strategy would start to
emerge. Then another set of questions would arise. How does one get started
implementing the strategy? How should the strategy be made credible? In a climate
of cynicism, how can political leaders create momentum and popular support?
Here are some practical ideas, each based on a real, national‐level example.
1. The President announces that all public officials will sign a simple code of
conduct, which precludes the acceptance of bribes. At the same time, the
President declares that no one will be allowed to bid on a public contract who
has not signed a similar standard of conduct concerning the offering of bribes.
The private sector will be enlisted to form an independent monitoring capability
to follow up complaints. International organizations offer financial support for
such investigations, including by international NGOs and investigative firms.
Various versions of this idea exist. The “integrity pact” of Transparency
International is attractive because it enlists people from government and
business in the fight against corruption.
1
2. The President announces a focal point for a coordinated campaign against
corruption. The focal point may be the Prime Minister’s office, Ministry of
Justice and Public Security, the Ministry of Planning and External Cooperation,
the Supreme Audit Authority, or the Interior Ministery; or it may be a new
agency such as Hong Kong’s Independent Commission Against Corruption. With
international help, this new focal point will lead “vulnerability assessments,” a
review of procedures in each agency with an eye to reducing opportunities for
corruption. The focal point will coordinate high‐level investigations of
corruption.
3. The President and the new focal point will develop new ways to involve the
public in the fight for good government (Paul 2002). The people of Haiti know
where corruption exists; they need vehicles for reporting what they know. Here
1
http://www.transparency.org/global_priorities/public_contracting/integrity_pacts
31
are some examples of practical steps to connect the private sector and civil
society to the anti‐corruption initiative:
a. Give village councils and urban groups lists of the projects to be undertaken
in their areas over the next year, with detailed specifications, and offering
these groups a chance to report shortfalls (and also excellent
implementation).
b. Initiate small, confidential surveys of the private sector to identify where
corruption exists in the procurement system, the courts, various licensing
schemes, customs, and other areas of concern.
c. Carry out client surveys, which cover negative bureaucratic behavior as well
as the benefits and costs of public programs.
d. Organize focus groups, where manifestations of corruption can be revealed
and analyzed in confidence.
e. Create citizen oversight boards at various levels of the police and the courts,
the prosecutors, the procurement authority, customs, internal revenue, and
the controller general or equivalent.
f. Involve associations of accountants and lawyers in both diagnosis of corrupt
system and in overseeing progress.
g. Organize a hot line for people to report illicit activities.
4. The President (and perhaps key Ministers) designate teams of honest, senior
civil servants and young, excellent university graduates
a. to investigate high‐profile instances of corruption and
b. to evaluate random samples of tax payments and exceptions, public
procurements, and so forth.
5. The President announces an experimental program within the Customs Agency
and the Tax Bureau. If revenues in the next year exceed a certain target increase,
a small portion of that increase will go to employees of these agencies as a
bonus. At the same time, officials in both agencies will develop a performance
evaluation system, with revenue targets by region and type of tax and with non‐
revenue indicators of excellence and abuse (for example, time to clear customs).
International organizations are asked to provide technical assistance and
credibility to the design and evaluation of these experimental programs.
6. The providers of public services (including NGOs) are challenged to develop
measures of success against which performance may be pegged, and then to
design an experiment linking increased funding to improved performance.
Financial incentives might be included, using bonuses that could amount to 25 to
50 percent of salaries for excellent performance. The sustainability of the
experiment would depend on the prospect of user charges.
32
7. The President announces publicly that the country will conduct some number of
procurement “sting” operations during the next year. Even if only a few such
operations are carried out, as part of a package of initiatives this step could deter
potential bribe‐takers.
How to Avoid Distortions from International Aid
Suppose Haiti’s anti‐corruption strategy is launched. As we have seen, it should be
designed to support the reconstruction effort and the new economic strategy. It also
should take into account some of the problems that the large, forthcoming flows of
international aid may create.
For example, judging by the experience of other countries, reconstruction in Haiti
will be accompanied by predictable problems.
Haitians will become bitter over the ratio of “tooth to tail,” meaning aid with
too many studies and too little investment, with too much spending outside
the country and too little inside.
Foreigners will abound, and many of them will be earning ten or twenty
times the salaries of the Ministers under whom they work.
Some top civil servants will quit their posts to take lucrative consultancies
with international aid organizations in Haiti.
How might these problems be forestalled?
A key issue is the low salaries of top government officials. Consider the case of
Mozambique in the mid‐1990s. Some key civil servants quit crucial government
posts to become consultants to the donors. Their agencies suffered greatly,
imperiling the development agenda. How did the donors react? Not by addressing
the low government salaries, but by colluding to reduce the consulting salaries for
Mozambicans. Donors did not ask whether the market was trying to tell them
something else.
Agencies such as the International Monetary Fund sometimes analyze government
wage bills only in terms of their macroeconomic impact and budg etary
sustainability. They ignore the possibility of “capitulation wages,” the economist
Timothy Besley’s term for salaries so low that moonlighting or corruption are
required. The resulting low quality of people attracted to crucial positions in
government, and the negative behavior capitulation wages can induce, create social
and economic costs that go uncounted in the usual IMF analyses.
For many reasons, I believe the international community should support higher
wages for top Haitian officials, coupled with new requirements for performance.
One idea: Donors would create a special fund, in which they would deposit the
equivalent of 5 percent of the salaries received by international technical assistants
in Haiti. The fund would provide bonuses for Haitian public servants. These funds
33
could go to the Haitian counterparts of the international experts, or more generally
to the top levels of the government, where wages in Haiti seem far too low.
A related idea is to change the way foreign experts are conceptualized, from
“adviser” to “teacher.” Every technical assistance contract would include clauses
that Haitians must be trained to fill the position. In the contract, incentives would
be linked to measurable success in this training.
If Haitians see that some percentage of the salaries of foreign technical assistance is
going into a fund for Haitian civil servants, and that foreign experts are being paid in
part based on their success in building Haitian capacity, then Haitian bitterness and
resentment may be forestalled.
How to Build Skills and Leadership
Another way to forestall possible negative consequences of the reconstruction is to
take steps now to build skills and enhance Haitian leadership.
As we saw in section 4, Haiti’s economic development strategy requires the
government to do new things, and to do many old things better. Haiti faces short‐
term skill gaps. In the longer run, Haiti needs ethical leadership and effective
management, in government, business, and civil society. Does the country also need
a new vision for governance in the country, a vision that transforms a public sector
legacy that few Haitians admire?
To meet these needs and opportunities, I propose that Haiti and its international
partners create the Haiti Leadership Academy. Its short‐term objective would be
providing the competencies needed for reconstruction and for the new economic
strategy. Because that strategy is so dependent on partnerships between
government, business, and civil society, the Haiti Leadership Academy would teach
people from all three sectors, not just from government.
In the longer term, the Haiti Leadership Academy would create a new cadre of
Haitian leaders and support a new vision for the country itself. Some of the features
of this vision may be discerned in Haiti’s economic strategy. Governing will be
through partnerships. Bottom‐up strategies will be employed. Accountability will
be emphasized. And the ultimate objective is the empowerment of the Haitian
people, to enable them to overcome poverty and insecurity and to advance their
lives in the ways they see fit.
Annex 2 contains more thoughts about this proposal. Clearly, this is only the
embryo of an idea. It is based on two needs: in the short run, for skills that can
make a difference in reconstruction and development, and in the longer run, for
ethical leadership and effective management. It also rests on desire of Haitians to
enhance their sovereignty and transform the country’s governance.
34
These ideas, like the others in this paper, require vetting in Haiti—and if they pass
that stage, then detailed development by Haitians using the best support,
knowledge, and expertise the world has to offer.
35
Annex 1. A Process for Developing an Anti‐Corruption Strategy
In a number of countries and ministries and city governments, strategic workshops
have proved useful in diagnosing corruption and designing creative, effective action
plans. This annex briefly describes how and why participatory methods can be
useful in as sensitive an area as corruption.
In countries like Haiti, people have complicated feelings about corruption. They
may sincerely loathe it and wish to eradicate it, while at the same time they may
participate in it or allow it to occur. How might these mixed feelings be exploited to
diagnose corrupt systems? One answer is to enable people to discuss corrupt
systems analytically and without fear. Since corruption is a concept freighted with
emotion and shame and defensiveness, the first task is to demystify it. This is done
in two ways.
First, participants analyze a case study of a successful anti‐corruption
campaign in another country.
Second, participants learn analytical frameworks in order to see that
corruption is not (just or primarily) a problem of evil people but one of
corrupt systems. To members of corrupt organizations, this sort of analysis
sometimes proves therapeutic.
Ideally, the head of state convenes the first workshop. In some cases the exercise is
kept internal; in some cases outsiders are included. A few ministers, top civil
servants, legislators, judges, police officials, heads of labor unions, heads of business
groups, leaders of civic associations, and even heads of religious organizations may
participate. The ideal number of participants is 30 people. The ideal format is one
and a half to two days, in the mode of a retreat. (Another possibility is two hours a
day for five days.)
How is the workshop structured?
The first session analyzes a case of a successful anti‐corruption effort in another
country. The case is presented in two parts. First, the problems, conveyed via
slides. Then participants are split into subgroups of about eight people. Each
subgroup is asked to describe the types of corruption in the case, discuss which type
is most serious and which least, list alternative anti‐corruption measures and their
pros and cons, and make a tentative recommendation. The subgroups then present
summaries of their deliberations to a plenary session. After discussion, the second
part of the case is presented: what the country or city in question actually did, and
the results. Participants then discuss what happened and why. Even though the
context inevitably differs from their own, they are stimulated by the careful analysis
and by the fact that reforms worked.
36
Then after a break there is a lecture on the economics of corruption, focusing on
motive and opportunity, and on the equation
Corruption = Monopoly + Discretion ‐ Accountability.
Questions and discussion are encouraged.
Then the group analyzes a second case study, again of a success story. This case
requires them to provide both an analysis of corruption and how to fight it, and also
for a political and bureaucratic strategy.
Three lessons emerge from the case. First, in order to break the culture of
corruption and cynicism, “big fish” must be fried—major violators, including
violators from the ruling party. Second, after big fish are fried, anti‐corruption
efforts should focus on corrupt systems. This includes the selection of agents,
changing incentives, enhancing accountability, structural changes to mitigate
monopoly and clarify discretion, and efforts to increase the “moral costs” of
corruption. Third, anti‐corruption efforts should involve the people in many ways.
They know where corruption resides. Give them a chance to tell. Under this rubric
come such initiatives as hot lines for reporting corruption, citizen oversight boards,
using citizens’ groups and NGOs to diagnose and monitor agency performance, using
community organizations to monitor public works, involving accounting and
lawyers groups, and so forth.
After finishing the second case, the participants turn to their own country. The
facilitator here asks them to go through the same headings as before: what kinds of
corruption exist, which are more serious and which less, what are the alternatives
and their pros and cons, and what tentative recommendations would they make.
The subgroups go off and analyze, then present their results to the full group. A
vivid discussion ensues, and the result is a tentative diagnostic of the types of
corruption, their extent, their costs, and their possible remedies
As the workshop’s last exercise, the facilitator poses a challenge. “This has been a
fascinating exercise. But we don’t want it to be just another workshop. What has to
happen in the next six months, what concrete steps by this group, to move things
forward?” In some workshops, participants read together an imaginary news story
describing their country’s future success (like the one for Haiti in section 1 above).
How could this success happen? Each individual is asked to writes down the key
steps in a story moving from now to that successful then. Then individuals at the
same table share their key steps, and a composite story is created for each table.
The tables then share their results, and together participants discuss which of the
ideas are most attractive. Finally, the facilitator asks, “What does your discussion
imply for what needs to be done in the next six months?”
The results can be remarkable. A fascinating and practical agenda usually emerges.
But participants may lack the resources, the expertise, and the leverage to make that
agenda come true. Here national leaders, perhaps exploiting external assistance,
37
may propose a special project to follow such an event—or several such events at
different levels of the public and private sectors. The ensuing initiative should use
some of the workshop’s recommendations, co‐opt key participants as activists and
monitors, and via carrots and sticks improve the chances that the anti‐corruption
effort succeeds.
Similar workshops can be convened at various levels of government, in particular
agencies, and in public‐private partnerships. Haiti’s international partners might
run similar participatory diagnoses for themselves. One could combine staff
members with expertise in Haiti with a group of sectoral specialists, who would
identify the key points of vulnerability to corruption that typically arise. The results
may be new, unanticipated ideas for improvement.
38
Annex 2. Ideas for a Haiti Leadership Academy
Objectives
1. Provide skills urgently needed for Haiti’s new economy strategy
As we saw in section 4, for Haiti’s economic strategy to succeed, the Haitian
government and its partners will need strong skills, some of them novel. Haitian
public officials will immediately have to do new things, and do old things in different
ways. The Haiti Leadership Academy will provide modularized courses to convey
needed skills
2. Develop leaders in government, business, and civil society
Haiti’s challenge of course goes beyond the mustering and development of short‐
term skills. The greatest lack is said to be ethical leadership and effective
management. The Haiti Leadership Academy would educate the next generation of
Haitian leaders. Since effective governance from social services to reconstruction to
the environment requires partnerships between government, business, and civil
society, the Haiti Leadership Academy will educate people from all three sectors.
3. Create a new vision for Haitian governance
A predictable reaction to the massive foreign participation in Haiti’s reconstruction
and development will be a surge in Haitian nationalism. So much foreign
involvement will lead to calls for Haitian sovereignty. The calls may be negative and
simplistic: “Now it’s our turn to take over.” Or they can become an invitation to
analyze what was wrong in the past and to create a new vision for governance in
Haiti.
Programs
The Haiti Leadership Academy will have three sorts of programs.
1. Urgently needed practical skills
As we saw in section 4, Haiti’s economic strategies requires new skills. Some are
cross‐cutting, others are area‐specific.
Crosscutting skills. Designing and managing public‐private partnerships.
Public works and reconstruction: planning, management, and maintenance.
Evaluation. Preventing corruption.
Areaspecific skills. Property rights reforms and administration. Free zones
(clothing; agriculture). Enabling and regulating the private provision of
electricity. Enabling and regulating private ports. Customs reform
(managing private customs organizations in free zones; computerizing
customs data elsewhere)
39
Haiti’s massive reconstruction effort, still undefined at this writing, will no doubt
also demand better governance. Large‐scale public works programs are notorious
in Haiti and elsewhere for inefficiency and corruption. Moving people from
disaster‐susceptible areas to other parts of Haiti will require sophisticated planning,
political mobilization, security, and property rights.
Modules would also include the risks of corruption and what to do about them.
2. Education for future leaders
An important objective of the Haiti Leadership Academy is to develop the next
generation of Haitian leadership in government, business, and civil society. The
education will enable Haitians to develop a new vision for the country and how it
should be governed.
A curriculum for future leaders might be built around four large headings:
Transformation, Integrity, Partnership, and Accountability.
Transformation
Where can Haiti be in the future, say 20 years from now? What would a thriving
Haiti look like, economically, socially, politically, and environmentally? What
lessons can be learned from other countries, even though Haiti’s uniqueness means
that what others do cannot simply be copied? What might governance look like in
the future, given trends in technology, globalization, community empowerment, and
so forth?
Given all these things, what vision should Haiti have for its future? What sort of
governance does this imply? In order to make this possible, what sorts of leaders
will Haiti require?
Integrity
What are the ethical obligations of leaders in government, business, and civil
society?
What do careers look like that combine “doing good and doing well”?
What are the dangers of corruption, in Haiti and elsewhere? What does experience
around the world teach about the causes and cures of corruption? What can leaders
do to prevent corruption?
Partnership
Students would study worldwide trends toward new kinds of collaboration between
government, business, and civil society. In particular, they would look at successful
examples elsewhere of partnerships in sectors such as food security, social services
and education, environmental restoration, free zones, electricity, public works and
infrastructure, and security. They would examine the leadership and management
challenges posed by partnerships.
40
Accountability
Organizations in government, business, and civil society face increasing demands
for accountability. How can activities and outcomes be measured appropriately and
efficiently, so that relevant information can be shared within and outside the
organization? In Haiti and from around the world, what can be learned from
successful evaluations? From successful management information systems?
How can ordinary people be empowered through such things as rapid rural surveys,
client‐based scorecards, using social networking tools for peer‐to‐peer
communication of evaluative information, and other developments? How can the
results best be communicated to them and through them?
What new opportunities and challenges for accountability are presented by public‐
private partnerships? How might partnerships be used effectively to develop
evaluative information? How can partnerships employ such information to enable
more appropriate and efficient collaboration?
3. Education at the grassroots level
The people of Haiti have long felt both abused and neglected by centralized control
(both Haitian and foreign). The result may be a kind of learned helplessness, which
can lead to ignoring or disdaining possibilities for civic action and self‐reliance.
The Haiti Leadership Academy would provide training at the grass‐roots level to try
to unlearn the helplessness through examples from Haiti and elsewhere of
successful local action. The training provided will use pedagogical techniques
appropriate for a target audience that may lack formal education.
Thoughts on Logistics
Given the condition of Haiti’s current infrastructure, the Haiti Leadership Academy
will have to operate initially without a formal building and perhaps with only a
skeletal faculty. Short courses for immediate skills—the first category of training
provide by the Academy—will be organized within existing agencies, using ad hoc
faculty from Haiti and outside.
Over the medium term, the Haiti Leadership Academy will have its own facility, as
well as capabilities for online education. It will have capabilities for “traveling
education,” especially at the grassroots level.
The Haiti Leadership Academy demands both the highest level of Haitian support
and involvement and the marshalling of prestigious international institutions. The
Board should include a predominance of Haitians, drawn from the public, private,
and nonprofit sectors, as well as distinguished foreigners. The faculty might be
organized by a consortium of high‐profile universities with experience in leadership
development and management in developing countries. International aid agencies
would also be involved, bringing their experience from around the world about
41
what works and what doesn’t. Particularly in the first category of training—needed
skills in the short run—the Haiti Leadership Academy would work with
international partners to identify people with successful experience who can share
that experience in Haiti.
42
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