Causes of Corruption

In Indonesia, during 2004-2019, the Anti-Corruption Commission had processed 114 criminal
regional heads, namely 17 governors, 74 regents, and 23 mayors. The causes of corruption are many and
quite complex. Corruption is a phenomenon no country is immune to and it has been a well-known fact
for quite some time that the classical view on corruption to concern only less developed countries, does
not hold. (Enste and Heldman. 2017).

The first cause is lack of strict and fast punishments. Corruption easily arises because of weaknesses
in the laws and regulations, inadequate quality of regulations, regulations that are less socialized,
sanctions that are too light, application of inconsistent sanctions and indiscriminate. In essence, laws and
regulations are not real in the field. Even if someone is found guilty or even caught red-handed by the
anti-corruption officials or media, the convicts get less punishment. The official who did the corrupt
practice is given a free license to continue his practice (Ranga, 2019).

The second cause is globalization. Theoretically it is believed that higher levels of globalization lead
to reduced levels of corruption. As Charron points out growing interdependence amongst states, both
politically through international organizations and socially through media should have an impact on
spreading better quality of governments and anticorruption norms (Charron, 2009).

The third cause is lack of transparency. Theory suggests that increased transparency should be
associated with lower levels of corruption. With increased transparency, the probability of detecting
wrongdoing increases, as does the accountability of each decision maker (Diman and Tosato, 2017). This
theory received some initial support by a paper that showed a strong association with possible causation
between greater freedom of the press and lower levels of corruption based on data from 145 countries
during the period 1972–1996 (Brunetti and Weder, 2003).

In conclusion, when the consumptive behavior of the people and the political system are still aimed
at the material, then it can increase the playing of money and is a cause of corruption. Corruption will
continue if there is no change in looking at wealth. The more people who misinterpret wealth, the more
people will commit corruption. Societies can do a lot to reduce the intensity of this problem but not single
action will achive more than a limited improvement and some of the required actions cmay require major
changes in existing policies (Treisman, 2000).
REFERENCES
Brunetti, A. and Weder, B. (2003) A free press is bad news for corruption. Journal of Public Economics
87(7):1801–1824.
Charron, N. (2009) The impact of socio-political integration and press freedom on corruption. The
Journal of Development Studies 45(9): 1472–1493.
Dimant, E., & Tosato, G. (2017). Causes and Effects of Corruption: What has Past Decade's Empirical
Research. Journal of Economic Surveys, 7.

Enste, Dominik; Heldman, Christina (2017) : Causes and consequences of corruption: An overview of
empirical results, IW-Report, No. 2/2017, Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft (IW), Köln

Ranga. (2019, July 17). Causes of orruption 10 Main Reasons whih an be Eridaated. Dipetik October 17,
2019, dari Mind Controversy: https://www.mindcontroversy.com/causes-of-corruption/

Treisman, D. (2000). The causes of corruption: a cross-national study. Journal of Public Economics, 406.

FARAH SHABIRAH

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