Rethinking corruption as a social dilemma

Whenever corruption is systematic, at country level as well as at other levels (e.g., FIFA or the oil industry), a collective action problem exists, so principal–agent tools will fail due to the classic problem of absent political will. Agency must be conceived in broader terms, and only coalitions of interested parties, of which some must be altruistic enough to make an initial investment, might be able to trigger substantial change if they manage to outnumber those who profit from the status quo. Outsiders (in the form of foreign donors or UNCAC peer-review missions) may find a role for themselves in providing this initial investment on behalf of some domestic actors. But as the success stories that we have seen are all stories of domestic agency, outsiders - when this is possible without unintended consequences - would be well advised to support pro-change coalitions rather than governments, as the ownership of aid should belong to citizens, and not kleptocrats. By 2022, popular demand for good governance was on the rise all over the world, powered by the spread of smartphones linked to the Internet. But grassroots activists are not the only ones that use smartphones. Populists like Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines or Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil are riding the same waves to profit from the popular demand for action against corruption. Anticorruption protests have multiplied exponentially, from Sri Lanka to Russia, but the political organizations to sustain interest representation on the basis of ethical universalism are still scarce.