Political Corruption by Emanuela Ceva and Maria Paola Ferretti | 2021

Political Corruption by Emanuela Ceva and Maria Paola Ferretti | 2021

• Offers the initial comprehensive examination of political corruption within the context of public ethics
• Highlights the shared origin of both personal and organizational expressions of political corruption
• Reinterprets anti-corruption efforts beyond conventional legalistic punitive methods, emphasizing the need for officeholders to actively combat political corruption as part of a broader public ethics framework centered on office accountability.

From the proliferation of kleptocracy in Venezuela, impacting the nation's economy, to President Trump appointing family members to high-ranking White House positions, and President Lukashenko's persistent grip on power in Belarus, political corruption is a global issue—so widespread that it is challenging to monitor comprehensively. These examples demonstrate that political corruption is often linked to various abuses of power, stemming either from individual character flaws or emerging within dysfunctional institutions. However, according to Emanuela Ceva and Maria Paola Ferretti, this fragmented perspective is insufficient. They argue that individual and institutional instances of political corruption share a common origin, only fully graspable by addressing corruption and anti-corruption within the framework of a public ethics of office. Political corruption acts as a Trojan horse, undermining public institutions from within through a interconnected behavior of officeholders. Even well-designed and legitimate institutions can go astray if officeholders, through their actions, fail to uphold a public ethics of office accountability.

The book provides a meticulously defined concept of political corruption and explores its shared normative root in two forms—corrupt individual character and corrupt institutional mechanisms. Both are seen as relationally wrongful practices involving an unaccountable use of the power of office by public institution officeholders. From this perspective, political corruption is perceived as an internal threat to public institutions, requiring opposition by mobilizing officeholders to remain accountable and mutually responsible for their actions. Anti-corruption, therefore, emphasizes the responsibility of officeholders to collaboratively uphold an interactively just institutional system.

Table of Contents of Political Corruption: