Cooperate globally to fight corruption in China
- Source: The Global Times
- [00:27 June 09 2009]
- Comments
By Wang Yuan
It was recently announced that China is expected to become a formal member of Transparency International (TI), the most influential anti-corruption international NGO, as early as this year.
This demonstrates China’s growing realization that its best bet in fighting corruption is not to go it alone and continue self-supervising, but rather to join forces with foreign governments and international organizations including independent, neutral NGOs like TI.
Becoming a full member in the organization will also afford China heightened clout – China will be able to vote in elections for the board of directors, as well as promote projects which it has an interest in.
One such project might be the problem of corrupt Chinese officials who flee the country to live abroad. This has been a tough nut to crack. China has extradition treaties with 43 nations, most of which are developing countries. It is the developed countries China has no extradition treaties with that have provided the most shelter to corrupt officials. Some countries also use the promise of extraditing officials as a bargaining chip with China.
Some developing countries had pushed TI to produce an index showing which countries harbor the most ill gotten wealth of corrupt officials. But the list would mostly be comprised of developed nations, which provide the majority of TI’s funding. TI has thus found it hard to secure donations to produce the list. Becoming a formal member of TI might encourage more donations from China, which could help fund such projects.
TI has carried out many projects in China in the past 8 years, such as promoting a set of principles to combat business-related bribery in China and calling on Chinese enterprises to be socially responsible and transparent. TI has also launched a pilot program in Shanghai and Guangdong called “Access to Official Information.”
This is a good start, but there’s more that could be done. As a full member of TI, China could increase its effectiveness and transparency in cracking down on its serious, widespread corruption. China would also get more professional suggestions and assistance from TI in many fields.