Corruption as Social Exchange: The View from Anthropology

Abstract

Scholars and policymakers today are confronted with the fact that corruption has become one of the most pervasive notions in public debates about quality and efficacy of governance. Due to its social importance and complex nature, corruption has been studied by diverse social sciences. Thus, over the last three decades, various social sciences have covered numerous topics related to corruption, such as the movement from an evolutionary concern for the historical forms of corruption in the Western world (Scott, 1972; Heidenheimer, 1989), its influence on political factions and parties (Della Porta and Vannucci, 1999; Kawata, 2006), its functional role in political systems (Leff, 1964; Huntington, 1968; Montinola and Jackman, 2002), its nexus with democracy, civil society, and development (Bardhan, 1997; Rose-Ackerman, 1999; Doig and Theobald, 2000; Johnston, 2005). Obviously, each field has its own priorities in investigating corruption. For example, economists have been interested in, among other topics, the causes of corruption and its influence on economic development (Mauro, 1995; Svenson, 1995). Political scientists have addressed political themes such as the importance of political institutions, and the regulation or freedom of the press in relation to corruption (Rose-Ackerman, 1999). For example, Anderson and Tverdova (2003) showed that citizens in countries with higher levels of corruption express more negative evaluations of the performance of the political system and exhibit lower levels of trust in civil servants.