Economic Gangsters (2008) on Corruption and Diplomatic Parking Tickets

Question 1

a key form of saving: grain storage

Answer 1

problem of high inter-annual rainfall variability in SSA

important way to save from one year to the next is to store grain
- oldest form of financial institution

most efficient to store centrally to exploit economies of scale

Question 2

history of grain storage in Meatu, Tanzania

Answer 2

government set up several grain stores in the mid-1970s

grains were stolen by government officials so little trust in public grain stores
- government corruption

prevented an important economic activity from ocurring

Question 3

NGO grain storage process

Answer 3

in 2004, an NGO (ICS Africa) established a grain storage facility in a village

number of households leaving grain grew gradually
- more transparency with the process

NGO succeeded where the local government failed
- people trusted them not to steal the grain and they built up a track record where they didn’t steal the grain

Question 4

corruption

Answer 4

defined as the abuse of public office for private gain

major impediment to economic development and growth today

Question 5

active research/policy questions about corruption

Answer 5

how widespread is it?

to what extent does it affect economic and political development?

what are the key underlying causes and what can be done to control it?

Question 6

exploiting diplomatic immunity

Answer 6

diplomatic immunity means no legal enforcements so diplomats are only constrained by norms

unpaid parking tickets (exploiting the benefit of public office to avoid paying for parking)
- observing behaviour in the absence of legal enforcement

also exploiting a policy change in NYC that increased legal enforcement in 2002

Question 7

identifying the effect of culture/norms

Answer 7

what if its the case that societies with less observed corruption also have different cultural norms/legal enforcement?
- could be OVB if they differ on multiple dimensions

able to observe diplomats from different countries with different social/cultural norms in the same place (NYC)

Question 8

country with the most unpaid violations

Answer 8

Kuwait with 246 parking tickets per diplomat per year

SSA countries also overrepresented

Question 9

corruption and parking tickets

Answer 9

strong correlation between corruption measured in the home country and the number of parking tickets that diplomats get

Question 10

countries with no unpaid violations

Answer 10

Turkey (e.g. of a case where diplomats were abusing political power but the government paid off the debt

Question 11

main results of the study

Answer 11

social norms are influential and persistent
- diplomats from more corrupt countries commit more violations

increase in country-level corruption from a country like Norway (-2.35) to Nigeria (+1.01) leads to an 80% increase in unpaid diplomatic parking tickets

greater legal enforcement after 2002 reduces unpaid parking tickets by 98%