IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ude/wpaper/0508.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The perception of corruption

Author

Listed:
  • Natalia Melgar

    (Departamento de Economía, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de la República)

  • Máximo Rossi

    (Departamento de Economía, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de la República)

  • Tom W. Smith

    (NORC/University of Chicago)

Abstract

In this paper we analyze the foundations of corruption perception. Even when we employ the concept of corruption in several areas and its connotations vary widely depending on societies and people, it is possibly to find some elements in common which are connected with the misuse of public office with the purpose of making private gains. This paper focuses on this wide concept of corruption. We use data from the module on Citizenship of the 2004 International Social Survey Program (ISSP). Ordered probit models were estimated in order to study the impact of independent variables on the perception of corruption. We conclude that there are significant socio-demographic variables: gender, marital status, religiosity, education and sector of employment, among others. Additionally, we find that country of residence matters and that there are similar results among countries with common characteristics.

Suggested Citation

  • Natalia Melgar & Máximo Rossi & Tom W. Smith, 2008. "The perception of corruption," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 0508, Department of Economics - dECON.
    • Handle: RePEc:ude:wpaper:0508
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12008/2112
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Montinola, Gabriella R. & Jackman, Robert W., 2002. "Sources of Corruption: A Cross-Country Study," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 32(1), pages 147-170, January.
    2. Inna Cabelkova, 2001. "Perceptions of Corruption in Ukraine: Are They Correct?," CERGE-EI Working Papers wp176, The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economics Institute, Prague.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Anita K Zonebia & Arief Anshory Yusuf & Heriyaldi, 2015. "Income and Education as the determinants of Anti-Corruption Attitudes: Evidence from Indonesia," Working Papers in Economics and Development Studies (WoPEDS) 201502, Department of Economics, Padjadjaran University, revised Apr 2015.
    2. Giorgina Piani & Natalia Melgar & Máximo Rossi, 2009. "Are there differences between perception of corruption at public and private sector? A multi-country analysis," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 0109, Department of Economics - dECON.
    3. Natalia Melgar & Máximo Rossi & Tom W. Smith, 2013. "Individual Attitudes Toward Others, Misanthropy Analysis in a Cross-Country Perspective," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(1), pages 222-241, January.
    4. Victoria Butmalai & Liu Qijun, 2021. "A Perception-based Investigation on Corruption in Higher Education: Evidence from the Republic of Moldova," Journal of Public Administration and Governance, Macrothink Institute, vol. 11(1), pages 201222-2012, December.
    5. Natalia Melgar & Máximo Rossi & Tom W. Smith, 2008. "The perception of corruption in a cross-country perspective: Why are some individuals more perceptive than others?," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 1808, Department of Economics - dECON.
    6. Jinwon Han, 2023. "Examining Determinants of Corruption at the Individual Level in South Asia," Economies, MDPI, vol. 11(7), pages 1-24, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrea Sáenz de Viteri Vázquez & Christian Bjørnskov, 2020. "Constitutional power concentration and corruption: evidence from Latin America and the Caribbean," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 31(4), pages 509-536, December.
    2. Lourdes ROJAS RUBIO, 2022. "Inequality, Corruption and Support for Democracy," THEMA Working Papers 2022-20, THEMA (THéorie Economique, Modélisation et Applications), Université de Cergy-Pontoise.
    3. Irvin Mikhail Soto & Willy Walter Cortéz, 2015. "La corrupción en la burocracia estatal mexicana," Revista de Economía Institucional, Universidad Externado de Colombia - Facultad de Economía, vol. 17(33), pages 161-182, July-Dece.
    4. You, Jong-Sung & Khagram, Sanjeev, 2004. "Inequality and Corruption," Working Paper Series rwp04-001, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    5. Graziella Bonanno & Lucia Errico & Nadia Fiorino & Roberto Ricciuti, 2024. "The Impact of Government Size on Corruption: A Meta-Regression Analysis," CESifo Working Paper Series 10956, CESifo.
    6. Simone CASCHILI & Francesca MEDDA, 2015. "The Port Attractiveness Index:Application On African Ports," Region et Developpement, Region et Developpement, LEAD, Universite du Sud - Toulon Var, vol. 41, pages 47-82.
    7. Cieślik, Andrzej & Goczek, Łukasz, 2018. "Control of corruption, international investment, and economic growth – Evidence from panel data," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 323-335.
    8. Nabamita Dutta & Deepraj Mukherjee, 2018. "Can financial development enhance transparency?," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 51(4), pages 279-302, November.
    9. Haass, Felix & Ottmann, Martin, 2017. "Profits from Peace: The Political Economy of Power-Sharing and Corruption," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 60-74.
    10. Gbewopo Attila, 2009. "Individual attitudes toward anti-corruption policies in Sub-Saharan Africa: Microeconometric evidence," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 29(3), pages 1933-1939.
    11. Al Mamun, Md & Sohag, Kazi & Hassan, M. Kabir, 2017. "Governance, resources and growth," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 238-261.
    12. Eugen Dimant & Guglielmo Tosato, 2018. "Causes And Effects Of Corruption: What Has Past Decade'S Empirical Research Taught Us? A Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 335-356, April.
    13. Kodila-Tedika, Oasis, 2012. "Marriage and Corruption : An empirical analysis on european data," MPRA Paper 40311, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Mariana Gerstenblüth & Natalia Melgar & Juan Pablo Pagano & Máximo Rossi, 2008. "Threats in Latin American and Caribbean countries: how do inequality and the asymmetries of rules affect tax morale?," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 1408, Department of Economics - dECON.
    15. Rajeev K. Goel & Aaron N. Mehrotra, 2012. "Financial payment instruments and corruption," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(11), pages 877-886, June.
    16. David L. Ortega & Raymond J.G.M. Florax & Benoit A. Delbecq, 2010. "Primary Determinants And The Spatial Distribution Of Corruption," Working Papers 10-6, Purdue University, College of Agriculture, Department of Agricultural Economics.
    17. James E. Alt & David Dreyer Lassen, 2003. "The Political Economy of Institutions and Corruption in American States," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 15(3), pages 341-365, July.
    18. Warning, Susanne & Dürrenberger, Nicole, 2015. "Corruption and education: Does public financing of higher education matter?," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 112836, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    19. Han, Xuehui & Khan, Haider & Zhuang, Juzhong, 2014. "Do Governance Indicators Explain Development Performance? A Cross-Country Analysis," ADB Economics Working Paper Series 417, Asian Development Bank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    corruption; microeconomic behavior; comparative research; public opinion; ISSP;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D73 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Bureaucracy; Administrative Processes in Public Organizations; Corruption
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • O57 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Comparative Studies of Countries

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ude:wpaper:0508. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Andrea Doneschi or the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/derauuy.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.