Transparency International’s (TI) methodology was recently applied at the local level in Estonia in order to analyze levels of corruption in that country’s regions. The results are that :
Estonian residents perceive corruption the most urgently in Northern Estonia…Ranking next in terms of corruption perception was Southern Estonia, Eastern Estonia and Western Estonia.
This is good news for at least two reasons. First, Estonia’s government now has concrete data that it can use to target its anticorruption resources. Second, and from my point of view a much more welcome development is the application of TI methods at a sun-national level of analysis. Although knowing a country’s corruption score is helpful, especially if it is available over a number of years, that single score fails to capture the whole picture inside a given country.
TI has provided a great service by continuing to commission and compile an annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), but those who take this a step further and investigate corruption within their state do an even greater contribution toward decreasing corruption.
More of this kind of research is hopefully on the way in other Eastern European states.
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