TI: Canada Among least Corrupt Countries; China Down From 75th to 80th

Posted by david on Dec 5, 2012 in Blog | 0 comments

In Transparency International’s 2012 Corruption Perceptions Index, Denmark, Finland and New Zealand tied for first place out of 176 countries – meaning they were perceived to have the lowest levels of state sector corruption. Sweden was fourth with Singapore ranked as fifth.

Germany came in at 13th, one notch better than 2011 and Japan remained at 17. The United States ranked 19th in 2012, up from 24th out of 183 countries in 2011. China ranked 80th after 75th in 2011.

 The 2012 index ranks 176 countries by their perceived levels of public sector corruption. The index assigns scores of between one and 100, 1 being highly corrupt and 100 clean.

Here is a list of the 10 most corrupt nations and the 10 cleanest in reverse order:

MOST CORRUPT: RANK COUNTRY SCORE 174 Somalia 8 174 North Korea 8 174 Afghanistan 8 173 Sudan 13 172 Myanmar 15 170 Uzbekistan 17 170 Turkmenistan 17 169 Iraq 18 165 Venezuela 19 Burundi, Chad and Haiti are all ranked at 165

LEAST CORRUPT: RANK COUNTRY SCORE 9 Netherlands 84 9 Canada 84 7 Norway 85 7 Australia 85 6 Switzerland 86 5 Singapore 87 4 Sweden 88 1 New Zealand 90 1 Finland 90 1 Denmark 90

Commentary on China’s performance this year:

China saw its ranking slip to 80 from 75 last year, but Swardt said the Beijing leadership showed a greater understanding of the dangers of ignoring corruption, including among Chinese companies operating both at home and abroad.

Last month, state media quoted Communist Party chief Xi Jinping as saying that if corruption was allowed to run wild, the Communist Party risked major unrest and the collapse of its rule.

TI Managing Director Cobus de Swardt drew comparisons with standards in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which groups wealthy nations. “We have seen a criminalization of bribery to the standards of the OECD,” he said.

“The Chinese used to say their companies could not be held to rich country standards because they needed to catch up, but now they realize tackling this is in their own interests.”

But tackling corruption in a lasting way required allowing ordinary citizens the power to scrutinize public services and institutions, he added.

– TI and Reuters