The World Bank Group has identified corruption as among the greatest obstacles to economic and social development. Below is a collection of governance and anti-corruption resources drawn from the World Bank Group, including links to strategy, policies, initiatives, tools, projects, and case studies.
Strategy
World Bank Group’s Governance and Anti-corruption Strategy and Implementation Plan
Governance and Anti-corruption Strategy: The World Bank recently held global consultations with representatives from governments, civil society, business leaders, donor agencies and other stakeholders which resulted in a strong consensus that promoting good governance and tackling corruption are critical to achieving sustainable development and poverty reduction. These extensive consultations resulted in a revised Governance and Anti-Corruption (GAC) Strategy to strengthen country-led efforts to improve governance and fight corruption.
Governance and Anti-corruption Implementation Plan: The GAC Implementation Plan sets actions to mainstream GAC at the country, sector, project and global levels.
Volker Commission Report: In 2007, an independent commission led by Paul Volcker reviewed the World Bank’s anticorruption efforts and issued a report which called for resolute and concrete progress on implementing an ambitious anti-corruption program.
Departments and Programs:
World Bank Group Sanctions System: Since March 2007 the World Bank Group’s sanctions system for cases involving the private sector—not Bank Group staff or governments—has consisted of a two-tier process conducted by the Evaluation and Suspension Officers (EOs) for IBRD/IDA, IFC, MIGA, and PRG (the first tier) and the Bank Group’s Sanctions Board (the second tier).
Department of Institutional Integrity (INT): The World Bank is concerned with assuring that its own projects and products are not corrupt. The Department of Institutional Integrity (INT) investigates allegations of fraud, corruption, collusion, and coercion in World Bank Group operations as well as allegations of staff misconduct. Based on INT’s investigations, the Bank may impose sanctions against firms and individuals, including Bank staff, found to have engaged in misconduct. The Bank publishes the names of sanctioned firms and individuals on its website in a public list of Debarred Firms and Individuals.
In the recent past, INT - now through its Preventive Services Unit - has worked with more than 70 Operational teams to assess and mitigate fraud and corruption risks in Bank-financed projects. These engagements and INT’s extensive investigative experience has increased information on the following issues: engaging with the government to fraud and corruption issues; assessing fraud and corruption risks during project design; and managing risks during project implementation.
The Bank is currently enhancing its investigation and sanctioning capabilities with proactive tools that further combat corruption through prevention and deterrence, including the Voluntary Disclosure Program.
Governance and Anti-corruption–World Bank Institute: Programs, tools and data to support improving governance and controlling corruption, including the Worldwide Governance Indicators, which report annually on aggregate and individual governance indicators on six dimensions, including control of corruption, for 212 countries and territories.
International Finance Corporation—Corporate Governance: Working with companies to improve their corporate governance practices, the International Finance Corporation provides advice and a host of resources, including the Doing Business guide with rankings on the ease of doing business worldwide.
Private Sector Roles in Fighting Corruption: The World Bank Institute’s Business, Competitiveness and Development Program assists businesses and their key stakeholders with integrating good governance, accountability and engagement with the poor as vital components of corporate strategy. Providing support to the private sector in structuring and implementing effective anti-corruption mechanisms that limit incentives and opportunities for corruption, bribery and extortion, the program helps clients to minimize corruption in specific commercial projects and promote long-term reforms to strengthen institutions and regulatory systems against corruption. The program also offers practical implementation resources for business to raise awareness about private sector roles in fighting corruption.
Procurement and Policy Services: Transparency International has estimated that at least $400 billion per year is lost to bribery and corruption in public procurement worldwide. These guidelines for procurement ensure policies and procedures governing procurement in Bank-financed projects and consultants for the Bank’s operational work.
Business Center: Procurement for Projects: Estimates show that most of Bank-related fraud and corruption takes place within procurement, which is particularly susceptible to corruption because of the often high amounts of money involved and the greater discretionary power that public officials have compared with other areas of public expenditure. The Business Center site has resources and guidelines for the procurement and project cycle.
Poverty Reduction and Economic Management (PREM) Network: The World Bank’s overarching PREM Network contributes to the design of global and country policies and the building of institutions to achieve shared growth in developing countries. Within the Network, the Public Sector and Governance Group helps governments build efficient and accountable public institutions, create the foundations for good governance, and fight corruption.
Collective Action Initiatives:
Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI): EITI is a coalition of governments, companies, civil society groups, investors and international organizations which supports improved governance in resource-rich countries through the verification and full publication of company payments and government revenues from oil, gas and mining.
Construction Sector Transparency Initiative (COST): Construction is consistently ranked as the industry most likely to involve bribes. Within the sector, the public procurement of construction projects is particularly prone to corrupt practices, since it is often characterized by lack of transparency and corruption. CoST aims to enhance the transparency and accountability of the construction sector by focusing on public disclosure of information by procuring bodies and construction companies for the cost and quality of public-sector construction projects.
Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative (STAR): To address the severe problem of theft of public assets from developing countries, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the World Bank Group jointly launched the StAR initiative in 2007 to assist developing countries in the process of recovering stolen assets. The international legal framework underpinning StAR is provided by the UN Convention Against Corruption, the first global anticorruption agreement.
Report: Stolen Asset Recovery (StAR) Initiative: Challenges, Opportunities, and Action Plan
Forestry Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG): The World Bank’s Forest Strategy acknowledges illegal logging and lack of appropriate forest governance as a major obstacle to the efforts of client countries to alleviate poverty, develop their natural resources and to protect global and local environmental services and values. The FLEG process aims to combat the threats posed to forests by illegal logging, trade, poaching and corruption, with current initiatives in Africa, East Asia and the Pacific, and Europe and North Asia.
Voluntary Disclosure Program: In an effort to enhance its investigation and sanctioning capabilities, the World Bank’s Department of Institutional Integrity has a Voluntary Disclosure Program (VDP), where participants commit to a set of principles in exchange for avoiding debarment for disclosed past misconduct. Under the VDP, participants’ identities are kept confidential and they may continue to compete for Bank-supported projects when they commit to (1) not engage in misconduct in the future; (2) disclose to the Bank the results of an internal investigation into past fraudulent, corrupt, collusive, or coercive acts in Bank-financed or supported projects or contracts; and (3) implement a robust internal compliance program which is monitored by a Bank-approved compliance monitor. Similar programs successfully promote legal compliance in the European Union, Brazil, Japan, Pakistan, the United States, and other countries.
Projects on Anti-corruption with Collective Action Components (selected):
Paraguay Road Project Addressing Weak Governance, Efficiency and Corruption
To improve governance and reduce corruptive practices in Bank financed projects, the Paraguay Road Maintenance Project was chosen as a pilot for the Latin America and Caribbean Region. This infrastructure project emphasized involving various stakeholders to build the governance environment and enhance the efficiency of public expenditure. These efforts to improve resource allocation have been accompanied by an enabling governance framework that facilitates accrued efficiency and inhibits corrupt practices.
Assessing Fraud and Corruption Risks in the Energy Sector in Pakistan: The World Bank recently re-engaged in the energy sector in Pakistan, in a project for Electricity Distribution and Transmission Improvement (see below), but allegations of collusive behavior during the project procurement process soon emerged. This initiated the start of collaboration among the government, the region and the Institutional Integrity Department (INT) to:
- Develop a Procurement Action Plan to address collusion risks
- Assess fraud and corruption risks in one of the distribution companies
The Electricity Distribution and Transmission Improvement Project for Pakistan laid out objectives to (i) strengthen the capacity of the distribution and transmission networks to meet increasing electricity demand in the selected areas more efficiently and with better reliability and quality; and (ii) strengthen institutional capacity of the selected distribution companies and support other priority areas of the power sector reform. The project also includes building Infrastructure services for private sector development. Pakistan and INT have contributed to strengthening the controls of the Procurement Action Plan to be signed among companies, and developed a risk control framework to better manage project-specific fraud and corruption issues.
RESOURCES