ABSTRACT
Most initiatives in developed countries target the openings for financial impropriety, mainly through requiring asset registers, public listing of corrupt firms, asset declaration requirements and registers of lobbyists. In public financial management (PFM), corruption is associated primarily with ghost government employees and phantom jobs, large investment projects, cash payments, procurement and artificially controlled exchange rates. Political corruption differs in intent and outcomes from economic corruption. The semantics of corruption can be catchy and very creative. When corruption becomes accepted as normal, the non-corrupt minority of government officials are viewed as fools rather than honest; bribery becomes a necessary "lubricant for the machine"—efficiency and effectiveness in government are undermined and the poor and powerless suffer the most. Even more damaging can be the indirect costs of corruption, which cannot be measured with precision. In parallel, a national and international consensus gradually evolved on the need to combat official corruption.
