Anti-corruption Law: Exploring a Global Emerging Norm under the UN Convention Against Corruption

Abstract

This article explores the emerging global norm on anti-corruption law. It starts with an analysis of three anti-corruption domestic laws, which are quite influential in the building of the framework of this emerging global norm against corruption: The US Foreign Corruption Practices Act (1977), the UK Bribery Act (2010) and the Brazilian Anti-corruption Law (2013). These instruments were not chosen randomly, as they have been important in the growing body of law on anti-corruption. Some, such as the US Foreign Corruption Practices Act, influence international legal instruments such as the UN Convention Against Corruption. Thus, this article includes an overview of the main provisions of the UN Convention Against Corruption (2005) as the framework for this global emerging norm, and it compares it with other international legal instruments such as the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery (1997) and the African Union Convention on Preventing and Combating corruption (2003). It concludes that the UN Convention Against Corruption contains the framework of the global norm on anti-corruption, but it needs to be interpreted against other relevant international instruments, such as the Forty (40) Recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on money laundering and the growing body of soft law in this area.