05 Global Corruption
27/11/02 3:16pm
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Electoral rules and corruption Ugo Panizza Is there a relationship between corruption and electoral rules and, if so, what kind of electoral rules are associated with lower levels of corruption? A study carried out at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) shows that such a relationship does exist and that electoral systems that limit politicians’ incentive to cater to local interests tend to yield lower levels of corruption.1 The aspect of electoral rules that was examined in this research was their degree of ‘political particularism’. This is a measure of politicians’ incentives to build personal support bases in particular geographical constituencies, rather than adhere to party platforms.2 A high score on an index of political particularism indicates that the system is ‘candidate-centred’, while a low score is associated with ‘partycentred’ electoral systems. The index has three components. One captures the extent to which parties can control how a candidate appears on an electoral ballot. The second measures the extent to which a candidate can benefit from the votes of other candidates belonging
Corruption (log(GRAFT)). High value = low corruption.
Figure 1 Political particularism and corruption 4.6 4.4 4.2 4.0 3.8 3.6 3.4 3.2 3.0 Ve ry
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Data and research
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