Abstract

BOEHM, Frédéric. Democracy and corruption. Dimens.empres. [online]. 2015, vol.13, n.2, pp.75-85. ISSN 1692-8563.  https://doi.org/10.15665/rde.v13i2.558.

It's been revised the arguments linking democracy to the control of corruption starting from the often heard call for a "strong man", an autocrat that could give a country the needed stability and that could take the decisions required to get rid of corruption. Clearly, the call does not survive empirical scrutiny. Rather, the evidence shows a robust negative relationship between level of corruption and level of democracy. However, the evidence also shows that the potential of democracy in fighting corruption hinges upon a series of conditions, and that the mere existence of formal political competition through regular elections on its own is not enough.

Keywords : Democracy; corruption; elections; politicians.

        · abstract in Spanish | Portuguese     · text in English     · English ( pdf )