Rumbi Mufuka for GlobalAtlanta
Transparency International, a non-governmental and anti-corruption agency, released its annual Corruption Perceptions Index on Nov. 5.
The organization has some 90 chapters worldwide that work with the governments, civilians, businesses and the media to promote transparency in elections, public administration and procurement.
For the survey, corruption is defined as the abuse of public office for private gain. Questions in the survey include the frequency of kickbacks in procurement, bribes and the embezzlement public funds.
Using a scale from one to 10, the index ranked 163 countries by their perceived levels of domestic corruption in the public sector.
Countries with scores closer to one are considered more corrupt and countries with scores closer to 10 are less corrupt.
While no country made a perfect score, Finland, Iceland and New Zealand tied for scores closest to 10 with 9.6 points. Haiti ranked last with 1.8 points.
Among the world powers, Japan and Russia showed improvement moving from 21st to 17th and 126th to 121st, respectively.
Italy slipped from 41st to 45th and the United States regressed from 17th to 20th.
Canada, 14th; France, 18th; Germany, 16th and the United Kingdom, 11th, maintained their rankings.
A strong correlation between corruption and poverty is apparent in the rankings. Most of the world’s poorest countries received low scores.
Founded in 1983, Transparency is based in Berlin.
To view the complete report visit click here.
For more information about Transparency International visit their website.