Corruption and Social Norms: A New Arrow in the Quiver

Ina Kubbe, Claudia Baez-Camargo, Cheyanne Scharbatke-Church

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

One key question driving innovations in corruption studies is how anticorruption reforms can be more impactful and sustainable. This is critical to understand due to the detrimental impact of corrupt practices on equality, human rights, peace, and the rule of law. A significant body of research has shown that many anticorruption initiatives do not produce the expected effect, or they achieve results that fade after the intervention ceases. Seeking to understand how to improve anticorruption outcomes, scholars have turned to causal explanations of the persistence of corruption ranging from institutional settings and individual motives to informal practices and social norms. This article explores the intersection of social norms and corruption as a contribution to improving anticorruption programming. It explains how norms impact our conceptual understanding of corruption and the vicious cycle that exists between corrupt practices and norms. Grounded in the belief that programming and social norm diagnosis need to be contextually driven, we lay out the nascent research on changing social norms that drive corruption and the consequences of ignoring them.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)423-444
Number of pages22
JournalAnnual Review of Political Science
Volume27
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - 29 Jul 2024
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2024 by the author(s).

Keywords

  • anticorruption
  • context-specific approaches
  • corruption
  • descriptive norms
  • injunctive norms
  • social norms
  • social norms mindful approach

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