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The rise of the internet has upended numerous industries, but none more so than news production. The connectivity fostered by digitization has been accompanied by the emergence of content aggregation, the proliferation of fake news, and the extended geographic reach of industry leaders, all of which have served to hollow out local reporting capacity. In this work, we examine the result of changes wrought by the internet on an outcome of theoretical and practical significance: corruption. Inasmuch as newspapers are viewed as an important investigative arm of local communities, it is possible that corrupt local actors will be emboldened in their absence. To test this hypothesis, we employed a difference-in-differences approach, exploiting the phased closure of major daily newspapers across the country. Our results indicate a significant and positive correlation between federal corruption charges and newspaper closures. Further, we observed no evidence that the rise in online news vendors or the democratization of the press ameliorates this effect. This suggests a key issue with the increased geographic reach of digitized firms in the form of "information blindness" to local issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrating the theory of workplace deviance with person–environment fit theory, we propose a two‐pathway model to explain why and how employees who feel overqualified engage in time theft behavior. Specifically, we anticipate that feeling overqualified will negatively influence focal employees' experienced authority fairness and erode their work meaningfulness, which in turn will lead to increased time theft behavior. Further, we argue that voice endorsement serves as a key boundary condition mitigating the negative effects of perceived overqualification. We conducted two multi‐waved and multi‐sourced field studies to test our proposed hypotheses. Study 1 (247 employees and 47 supervisors) revealed that perceived overqualification is associated with time theft behavior through the mediators of experienced authority fairness and meaningfulness. Study 2 (405 employees and 73 supervisors) replicated the findings of Study 1 and tested our full model. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research summary: This study utilizes the administrative data of an innovation grant program in a major emerging economy to study which firms are best positioned to capture the state and access resources beyond what their rule‐complying merits command. We trace the grant allocation process and directly observe occurrences of rule‐violating funding. We show that firms vary in capability to secure irregular awards, depending on factors such as geographic proximity and the social and bureaucratic setting within which entrepreneurs and officials interact. Furthermore, by comparing the actual allocation of irregular awards with the counterfactual scenario in which recipients were evaluated solely based on grant rules, we conclude that crony capitalism, rather than bureaucratic heroism, is the primary driver of irregular awards. Managerial summary: Governments often use innovation grant programs to promote firm innovation, but these programs sometimes fail to achieve their objectives due to grant officials violating policy rules to provide resources to undeserving firms. We study a public funding program in a major emerging economy to analyze the bureaucratic structure and the social dynamics within which entrepreneurs and bureaucrats interact to identify the sources of state‐resource misallocation. We find that geographic distance, intragovernmental checks and balances, and the lack of direct social intermediary connecting entrepreneurs with bureaucrats help reduce the likelihood of collusion for state‐resource misallocation. Our results generate insights to help guide the (re)design of public funding programs, particularly in countries with low levels of transparency and public accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the study of international legal instruments in the field of corruption prevention, specifically addressing the definition of «conflict of interest». The relevance of the topic stems from the increasing incorporation of the conflict of interest concept into various areas of public management and administration through national legislation. Many works of scientists are devoted to the study of the problem of conflict of interests: the authors analyzing the definitions of key terms as outlined in national legislation; the essence of the definition is revealed through the typology and the classification of different types of conflicts of interest. However, at the national level, a comprehensive understanding of the application of the conflict of interest concept has not yet been fully developed. There is also a lack of a conceptual framework that satisfies the requirements of legal certainty. The question of the definition of «conflict of interest» in a way that is suitable for judicial and administrative application remains a matter of debate. An important step toward resolving this issue is the examination of international legal approaches to defining the essence of the concept. The article analyzes international conventions, declarations, and other legal instruments related to the fight against corruption to interpret and clarify the meaning of «conflict of interest». It clarifies international legal approaches to defining the term for the purposes of legal regulation. The article notes that the definition of conflict of interest can encompass a broad range of issues, particularly those related to combating corruption, which may fall within both administrative and criminal law. It is concluded that the term «conflict of interest», as a specific legal term, is not explicitly defined in international legal acts. The definition of «conflict of interest», as a complete and independent legal term, suitable for judicial and administrative use, is shaped by the context of state interests, the constitutional and legal framework, and public service requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scientific article focuses on the key aspects of the problem related to identifying and proving the facts of corrupt activity and turning such activity into an investigation. The investigation itself is connected with the collection and assessment of evidence, their correct fixation. Particular attention is paid to ensuring that all collected evidence is included in the criminal proceedings and evaluated correctly by the court. In this case, the evidence must be proper, admissible, reliable and sufficient. Methods of evidence collection, features of their assessment, and attachment to the proceedings are analyzed. The evidence must relate to the circumstances of the criminal proceedings and include: witness statements, written documents, material evidence, expert opinions and electronic evidence. The collection of evidence in such a category of cases as corruption requires detailed attention, since corruption offenses are secret schemes and agreements, the involvement of an intellectual component and the difficulty of detecting such actions. During the investigation of corruption offenses, indirect evidence is most often used, such as financial and accounting documents, electronic documentation between participants, to certify agreements, testimony of third parties. Special attention is paid to the normative and legal framework, which regulates the process of proof in corruption cases, as well as practical aspects of the work of law enforcement agencies. The article also highlights procedural violations of legislation in corruption offenses: presumption of innocence; conducting searches; dissemination of information obtained during the conduct of secret investigative (research) actions; excessive publicity; disclosure of information about persons who carry out confidential cooperation. A relevant aspect is a certain distinction between evidence that was obtained in a legal and illegal way: «clean» (the guilt of the accused was established on the basis of proper and admissible evidence and proved beyond a reasonable doubt) and «dirty» (inadmissible evidence was used, provocation was used, the rights of the participants were violated proceedings). In the process of formation and verification of evidence, the goal is to create specific means (evidence), then in the process of proving the circumstances of the crime, these means should be applied by way of argumentation, substantiating certain theses (conclusions, procedural decisions). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scientific article examines the institution of witness testimony in the process of investigating criminal offenses. A topical issue is the role of witnesses in criminal proceedings as a key source of information that can significantly influence the establishment of the truth. The scientific article is devoted to the problems that arise when obtaining and using witness statements, in particular, their reliability and, accordingly, admissibility, the influence of external pressure and other participants in the proceedings or officials, as well as the possibility of distortion of information, unreliability of data. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the legal confirmation of evidence in the protocol, which is important to ensure the acceptance of this evidence. The rights and obligations of the witness are investigated before the interrogation begins and such results are recorded in the protocol. An appropriate source of accurate recording of the testimony of a witness is audio recording or video recording, and the use of information technology during interrogation is a certain deterrent to the provision of reliable information by witnesses. The testimony of persons in criminal proceedings is recorded in a protocol, which has the form defined by the criminal procedure law and is a mandatory document. In the interrogation protocol itself, it is indicated that the witness was warned about giving false testimony and refusing to testify. At the same time, witnesses have the right not to testify against their relatives. The interrogation protocol has a clearly defined structure, mandatory requisites for filling it out, during the interrogation the witness has the right to use the legal assistance of a lawyer. An important procedural activity is the assessment of the credibility of witness statements and other procedural sources of evidence, which is carried out by the investigator, prosecutor, investigating judge, court on the basis of the law and within the limits of their procedural powers. The main properties of the testimony of a witness, the totality of which forms the content of this type of evidence: the information is an oral or written message; the source of information is a person granted the procedural status of a witness; the information is important for this criminal proceeding; compliance with the requirements of the legislation is ensured when receiving and processing information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article highlights the current problem of criminal responsibility for corruption offenses in Ukraine through the prism of compliance with the basic principles of legal responsibility. The fight against corruption is one of the key aspects for the development of a democratic society and the rule of law, however, excessive rigidity in approaches to the criminalization of corrupt acts may lead to a violation of the principles of justice, proportionality and individualization of punishments. The author of the article focuses on the fact that measures of criminal law influence should correspond to the degree of social danger of a specific offense and take into account the individual circumstances of each case. In particular, an argument is given regarding the need to take into account the personal characteristics of guilty persons when determining the type and degree of punishment, which will contribute to increasing the effectiveness of anti-corruption policy. The article emphasizes the importance of implementing effective preventive mechanisms in the fight against corruption and reforming institutional processes, which will help reduce the level of corruption offenses. The authors propose an approach to improving the mechanisms of individualizing punishments, as well as humanizing the legislation regulating the fight against corruption. This will allow achieving a balance between the severity of criminal sanctions and the observance of legal justice, ensuring at the same time the effectiveness of punishments and the possibility of rehabilitation of offenders. The article also draws attention to the importance of integrating international experience in the field of anti-corruption measures, which will increase the effectiveness of national reforms. The issue of institutional independence of anti-corruption bodies is considered separately, which is an important factor for ensuring the objectivity and impartiality of their activities. This approach will contribute to building a more transparent and effective justice system in Ukraine, capable of effectively combating corruption. The article emphasizes the need to ensure compliance with the principles of legal justice, proportionality and individualization in the process of criminalizing corruption offenses as one of the key conditions for an effective anti-corruption policy in Ukraine. It is noted that the punitive function of legal responsibility cannot be considered the main one in a democratic society, because otherwise responsibility turns into an end in itself, «responsibility for the sake of responsibility.» The purpose of punishing an offender is not just punishment, but primarily the prevention of new offenses. This also applies to corruption offenses, which must be considered in the context of a wider system of norms that promote lawful behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyses the legal mechanisms and tools for combating corruption in the system of law enforcement agencies of Ukraine in the National Police. It is determined that corruption remains a serious problem for the democratic development of Ukraine and undermines public confidence in state institutions. This is especially true of law enforcement agencies, on whose activities public order and security depend. The author emphasises the importance of legal acts regulating the work of the police and implementing anti-corruption measures. The author outlines the key problems in anti-corruption activities, including insufficient internal control, imperfect legislative framework and the need to harmonise it with European standards. Particular attention is paid to the role of such documents as the Law of Ukraine 'On Prevention of Corruption' and the ethical rules of conduct for police officers, which lay the legal basis for the fight against corruption. The introduction of an electronic asset and income declaration system, control over conflicts of interest, and ethical behaviour of police officers are important tools for preventing abuse. Attention is focused on the role of civil society organizations and the media in shaping public control over the activities of law enforcement agencies. Public oversight and openness of the police are critical for increasing public trust and reducing corruption risks. It was determined that the basis for the formation of anti-corruption policy in the National Police is international standards, as well as laws of Ukraine, which determine the principles of corruption prevention. In particular, the role of special anti-corruption bodies that monitor the implementation of legislation and investigate corruption cases is important. Such cooperation between state institutions allows us to create a more effective and coordinated system of c ombating corruption. The author concludes that to effectively combat corruption, it is necessary not only to improve the legislative framework, but also to ensure its proper implementation, through training and raising the legal culture of police officers. Only through a comprehensive approach can we achieve a significant reduction in the level of corruption in the law enforcement sys tem and increase its efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses a subject that has not been examined by scholars: the extent of corruption in early Scottish chief constables. Three men placed in charge of their forces in the county of Roxburgh between 1861 and 1902 succumbed to corruption. There are striking similarities in the backgrounds of the men: they were all married men, experienced police leaders, highly regarded by their previous forces and successful in their new roles. James McMaster abused his position of power to cajole a young constable into a homosexual relationship, Daniel Munro deserted the force with a married woman and John Macdonald experienced alcohol abuse issues. All three men stole from their force. The research presented here is grounded in primary sources ranging from police records, police commissioners' minute books, the reports of the Inspector of Constabulary, the private correspondence of the duke of Buccleuch and local newspapers. The article describes the circumstances whereby their crimes were revealed and the reaction of their police commissioners. It also poses an important question: if this examination of one small rural county uncovers such a high level of criminality, how widespread was corruption amongst Scotland's early police leaders? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present inquiry addresses the nexus between the development of electronic government and corruption in the provision of public sector services in developing and transition economies. The study analyzes the potential contribution of electronic government in combating petty corruption within the framework of two superimposed principal-agent model and show that electronic government could potentially limit bureaucratic corruption. To address the research question empirically, the study applies random tobit and linear random effects panel estimators to a dataset made of 121 countries, which covers the time period between 2008 and 2018. Estimations reveal that the adoption of electronic government in the delivery of public sector services has been the central factor that contributed to the reduction of petty corruption in developing and transition economies. The level of per capita income, political rights, civil liberties and share of natural resources in gross exports also correspond with less bribery in the public sector service delivery. Furthermore, the study finds that a lower level of socio-economic development corresponds with a greater level of petty corruption. Hence, e-government presents one of the utmost opportunities for socio-economic development and offers solutions for the improvement of the efficiency and effectiveness of public administration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corruption is a major challenge in the Arab Mediterranean countries (AMCs). The fight against it was a key point in the Arab uprisings, yet since then and despite the international community's attempts to support anti-corruption strategies, the governments of the AMCs have not been able to address effectively the demands of their population. The article compares the anti-corruption initiatives in four AMCs: two republican semi-presidential systems (Egypt, Tunisia) and two constitutional monarchies (Jordan, Morocco). It focuses on their fight against political corruption, which has different forms. To reduce corruption, policymakers advocate the decentralization of power, as it leads to more accountability and transparency. The article unpacks the idea of decentralization and asks to what extent it contributes to reducing political corruption in the region. In doing so, the article produces a new typology that adds two important factors that contribute to a better understanding of the links between anti-corruption initiatives and decentralization: the challenges to the political survival of the government and the type of external support to fight corruption. The findings show that decentralization measures frequently result in administrative deconcentration rather than the decentralization of decision-making. Thus, they reproduce political corruption in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the Round 9 Afrobarometer survey data for Niger, this study examined the determinants of support for military intervention with particular focus on political instability, perceived corruption in the democratic government, and socioeconomic deprivation. The descriptive results showed that Nigeriens generally do not have a strong aversion towards military rule. In fact, about 70 percent of them agreed that the military should intervene when the democratic government is corrupt. The regression results showed that political instability, which was measured using the total number of violent conflict incidents in the region where respondents resided, was positively correlated with support for military intervention. This might be because people who are exposed to violence feel that a military government would do a better job at providing security. Perceived corruption in government was also positively correlated with support for military intervention. This might be because corruption engenders discontent with democratic institutions, prompting people to see military intervention as a way of curtailing the democratic government's excesses. Socioeconomic deprivation was negatively correlated with support for military intervention, which suggests that the poor prefer democracy to a military government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Generalization across various forgeries and robustness against corruption are pressing challenges of forgery detection. Although previous works boost generalization with the help of data augmentations, they rarely consider the robustness against corruption. To tackle these two issues of generalization and robustness simultaneously, in this paper, we propose a novel forgery detection generative adversarial network (FD-GAN), which consists of two generators (a blend-based generator and a transfer-based generator) and a discriminator. Concretely, the blend-based generator and the transfer-based generator can adaptively create challenging synthetic images with more flexible strategies to improve generalization. Besides, the discriminator is designed to judge whether the input is synthetic and predicts the manipulated regions with a collaboration of spatial and frequency branches. And the frequency branch utilizes Low-rank Estimation algorithms to filter out adversarial corruption in the input for robustness. Furthermore, to present a deeper understanding of FD-GAN, we apply theoretical analysis on forgery detection, which provides some guidelines on data augmentations for improving generalization and mathematical support for robustness. Extensive experiments demonstrate that FD-GAN exhibits better generalization and robustness. For example, FD-GAN outperforms 14 existing methods on 3 benchmarks in generalization evaluation, and it separately improves the performance against 6 kinds of adversarial attacks and 7 types of distortions by 16.2% and 2.3% on average in robustness evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The essay advances a sustained close reading of perhaps the most complete representation of a white male character in Toni Morrison's oeuvre, Jacob Vaark, the Anglo‐Dutch settler portrayed in her ninth novel, A Mercy (2008). Interpretations that comprehend Vaark's conduct as illustrating a fall from grace, whether that falling off is construed as rapid or gradual, overlook the various textual clues that Vaark's ethical standards have eroded even before he steps into the narrative and is confronted with material temptations. Vaark is a man already selfish, covetous, lascivious, hypocritical, and unexpectedly and chillingly indifferent to the misery of others. Hilary Mantel has complained of Morrison's portrait of Vaark that, "Having created him carefully, Morrison sweeps him out of the story"; rather, Morrison's novel provides the reader with a forceful, disturbing, and resonant figure who casts a long shadow over the other characters throughout the narrative. Through Vaark's corruption, Morrison unmasks an American project that is neither experimental nor instinct with promise or possibility, but tainted ab ovo and vitiated from before the beginning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore the roots of perceptions of local corruption in U.S. cities, using survey data collected from 39 cities during 40 different mayoral election campaigns. We examine the impact of the city-level corruption context alongside measures of political information, partisan and racial/ethnic representation in local government, evaluations of personal and policy satisfaction, and other individual-level attitudinal and demographic characteristics. We find that perceptions of local corruption are responsive to the local corruption context—though this relationship is heavily conditioned by political knowledge—satisfaction with local conditions, other attitudinal measures, and, to a lesser extent, co-ethnic representation in local government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While a growing body of work suggests that women representatives are less likely to be involved in corruption scandals, we know less about if changes in representation patterns also have implications for citizens' first-hand experiences with corruption in public service delivery. This study suggests that women elected representatives reduce street level bribery, in particular when the share of women increases in contexts where relatively few women are elected or when the absolute increase in women's representation is relatively large. Using newly collected data on the share of women in 128 regional level parliaments in 10 European countries and four rounds of the European Quality of Government Index (EQI) survey (2010–2021), our two-way fixed effects models show that on average, the proportion of women in regional parliaments is strongly associated with citizens' self-reported experiences of bribery across all countries and years. Furthermore, our difference-in-difference design shows that the level of bribery in public service provision dropped more sharply in regions that experienced a greater absolute or greater marginal increase in women's representation. Our results may be understood in light of women candidates placing priority on well-functioning and low corrupt public service provision and the important signals of inclusiveness, non-discrimination and decreased tolerance towards corruption that women's representation conveys to civil servants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that legal institutionalization under the Kim Jong Un regime has been designed to improve the performance legitimacy of his regime by accumulating and more competitively distributing social surplus. There are five areas of focus that can be brought to bear to evaluate economic construction during the Kim Jong Un period: (1) an emphasis on profit and emergence of de facto taxes, (2) control of bureaucratic corruption and non-tax burdens, (3) regional empowerment of economic viability, (4) legalized market activities in tandem with strengthened property and contract rights, and (5) interest in the environmental protection and sustainable development goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, people acknowledge poverty as the greatest tragedy in human history, a serious threat to sustainable living, and a barrier to the development of human capital. Realising the importance of lowering global poverty, the United Nations incorporated 'End poverty in all its forms everywhere' as the first of the 17 SDGs for Sustainable Development. This background motivates us to look into how different lower-middle- or lower-income countries are achieving the first SDG goal. Consequently, the study primarily investigates the efficiency of 43 lower middle- or lower-income countries in Asia, Africa, and America in reaching the SDG goal of 'No poverty' by using the Stochastic Production Frontier from 2019 to 2020. Concurrently, the analysis pinpoints the causes of the nation's inefficiency in accomplishing that objective. According to the study's findings the Korea Republic is the most efficient nation at reaching the objective of 'No poverty.' Guinea is the least efficient. In conjunction with inefficiency issues, the analysis demonstrates that rising CO2 emissions paradoxically promote efficiency in the battle against poverty; conversely, rising corruption increases inefficiency. Conflict significantly impedes any constructive goal, such as poverty reduction. Corruption and intentional homicides serve as proxy indicators of conflict in this context. A rise in conflict variables reduces the nation's efficacy in lowering poverty rates. The article ends by outlining future research goals and making pertinent policy recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have witnessed the emergence of many new mobile apps and user-centered systems that interact with users by offering choices with rewards. These applications have been promising to address challenging societal problems such as congestion in transportation and behavior changes for healthier lifestyles. Considerable research efforts have been devoted to model the user behaviors in these new applications. However, as real-world user data is often prone to data corruptions, the success of these models hinges on a robust learning method. Building on the recently proposed Latent Decision Threshold model, this article shows that, among the existing robust learning frameworks, the L0-norm-based framework can outperform other state-of-the-art methods in terms of prediction accuracy and model estimation. And based on the L0-norm framework, we further develop a user screening algorithm to identify potential bad actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]