The Integrity of Corrupt States: Graft as an Informal State Institution in UA
08/11/2011 | Keith Darden
The Integrity of Corrupt States: Graft as an Informal State Institution
http://pas.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/36/1/35
This article argues that corrupt practices such as bribery and embezzlement, which scholars have previously assumed to be evidence of the breakdown of the state, may reinforce the state’s administrative hierarchies under certain conditions. Drawing on a cross-national analysis of 132 countries and a detailed examination of the informal institutions of official graft in Ukraine, the article finds that where graft is systematically tracked, monitored, and granted by state leaders as an informal payment in exchange for compliance, it provides both an added incentiv e to obey leaders’ directives and the potent sanction of criminal prosecution in the event of disobedience. Where graft is informally institutionalized in this way, it provides the basis for state organizations that are effective at collecting taxes ,maintaining public order, and repressing political opposition but that may undermine the development of liberal politics.
Keywords: Ukraine; informal institutions; corruption; state
http://pas.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/36/1/35
This article argues that corrupt practices such as bribery and embezzlement, which scholars have previously assumed to be evidence of the breakdown of the state, may reinforce the state’s administrative hierarchies under certain conditions. Drawing on a cross-national analysis of 132 countries and a detailed examination of the informal institutions of official graft in Ukraine, the article finds that where graft is systematically tracked, monitored, and granted by state leaders as an informal payment in exchange for compliance, it provides both an added incentiv e to obey leaders’ directives and the potent sanction of criminal prosecution in the event of disobedience. Where graft is informally institutionalized in this way, it provides the basis for state organizations that are effective at collecting taxes ,maintaining public order, and repressing political opposition but that may undermine the development of liberal politics.
Keywords: Ukraine; informal institutions; corruption; state
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35. The audio files are available at http://www.wcfia.harvard.edu/melnychenko (accessed on March 7, 2005).
36. For an excellent criticism of the notion of the Ukrainian state’s weakness, see J. Allina-Pisano, “Sub Rosa Resistance and the Politics of Economic Reform: Land Redistribution in Post-Soviet Ukraine,” World Politics 56 (July 2004): 554–81.
37. “Yulyu nado unichtozhit” [Yulia should be destroyed]. Author’s translation. Ukrainska Pravda, April 14, 2001, http://www.pravda.com.ua/?10414-2- (accessed on March 7, 2005).
38. Note, for example, the conversation recorded between Kuchma and Derkach regarding Surkis’s foreign accounts (“Vse svyazi evo kievskie vivertaem” [We’ll turn inside out all his Kiev connections]. Author’s translation. Supposedly recorded on October 3, 2000; source no longer available online; hard-copy transcripts in author’s possession).
39. “Suddi vzagali podonki” [Judges are bastards]. Author’s translation. Ukrainska Pravda, February 1, 2001, http://www.pravda.com. ua/?1021-1-8 (accessed on March 7, 2005).
40. “Ob nyogo, yak ob tryaku, nogi vitrut” . . . [We’ll clean our feet with him . . .]. Author’s translation. Supposedly recorded on March 29, 2000. Ukrainska Pravda,April 13, 2001, http://www.pravda.com.ua/?10413-4-8 (accessed on March 7, 2005).
41. Timoshenko was dismissed and then arrested on corruption charges in spring of 1999.
42. “Fragmenti rozmov Leonida Kuchmi iz zapisiv, zroblenikh ofitserom Mikoloiu Melnichenkom” [Fragments of Leonid Kuchma’s conversations from the recordings made by the officer Mikola Melnichenko]. Author’s translation. Radio Svoboda, (2001), Epizod 20,http://www.radiosvoboda.org/programs/kuchma/2001/04/20010420061624.asp (accessed on March 7, 2005).
43. This was obviously an important element of political control in Soviet times as well. There is evidence that the KGB had a similar practice of collecting compromising materials without acting on them but used them as a means for intimidating the population into compliance. Mark Kramer, the Director of the Cold War Studies Project at Harvard University, informs me that the KGB archives in Lithuania were full of reports on illegal activities that were never acted on by the authorities (discussion with author,
2004, Cambridge, Massachusetts).
44. “Fragmenti rozmov Leonida Kuchmi iz zapisiv, zroblenikh ofitserom Mikoloiu Melnichenkom” [Fragments of Leonid Kuchma’s conversations from the recordings made by the officer Mikola Melnichenko].
45. These resources were then used for, among other things, financing Kuchma’s reelection in 1999.
46. Kuchma uses this expression in talking about Timoshenko. In several of the recordings, Azarov and Derkach report to Kuchma on individuals who have taken more than their share or who have taken resources without permission. See the discussion of Feldman and Shuba in “Yulyu nado unichtozhit” [Yulia should be destroyed], March 24, 2000, conversation between Kuchma and Azarov.
47. “Yulyu nado unichtozhit” [Yulia should be destroyed].
48. “Ob nyogo, yak ob tryaku, nogi vitrut . . .” [We’ll clean our feet with him . . .].
49. For a history and description of the “thieves-in-law” (vory-v-zakone), see
Frederico Varese, The Russian Mafia: Private Protection in a New Market Economy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).
50. “Kravchenko: Smirnov znav, zhto yomu tut govorili.... [Kravchenko: Smirnov knew what you told him. . . .]. Author’s translation. Ukrainska Pravda, April 24, 2001, http://www.pravda.com.ua/?10424-8-8 (accessed on March 7, 2005).
51. “New Tape Translation of Kuchma Allegedly Ordering Falsification of
Presidential Election Returns,” KPNews, February 14, 2001, http://kpnews.com/main
.php?arid=7458 (accessed on March 7, 2005).
52. Ibid.
58 POLITICS & SOCIETY
at Service Commun de la Documentation Université de Strasbourg on August 11, 2011 pas.sagepub.com Downloaded from 53. The recordings reveal that Kuchma vigilantly monitored even the local press in
every region of the country for opposition. At several points, there is discussion of Kravchenko using a special unit “with no morals” to “muffle” these opposition channels. A television station that Kuchma demands to be shut down was in fact temporarily shut down during the campaign. Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)
Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, “Ukraine Presidential Elections 31 October and 14 November 1999, Final Report” (Warsaw, Poland, 2000).
54. OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, “Ukraine
Presidential Elections 31 October and 14 November 1999, Final Report.”
55. Ibid., 18.
56. Ibid., 17.
57. Ibid., 18.
58. “Zver’yo Prosto!” [Real Animals!]. Author’s translation. Ukrainska Pravda, June 7, 2001, http://www.pravda.com.ua/?1067-1-8 (accessed on March 7, 2005).
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