The phenomenon of corruption ranges from the single act of a payment contradicted by law to the endemic malfunction of a political and economic system. Analysts have seen the corruption phenomenon either as a structural problem of politics or economics, or as a cultural and individual moral problem. The definition of corruption consequently ranges from the broad terms of “misuse of public power” and “moral decay”, to strict legal definitions of corruption; as an act of bribery involving a public servant and a transfer of tangible resources.

The Center for Strategic Studies (CSS) polls over the past decade have consistently shown that corruption is one of the three issues citizens believe the government should act upon immediately ,. According to Transparency International’s 2005 Corruption Perceptions Index, Jordan ranked 37 with a score of 5.7 on a scale of zero to ten; with ten being clean and zero being highly corrupt. Iceland scored the highest at 9.7. The index defines corruption as the abuse of public office for private gain and measures the degree to which corruption is perceived to exist among a country’s public officials and politicians. Only 159 of the world’s 193 countries are included in the survey, due to an absence of reliable data from the remaining countries. Transparency International regards 5.0 as the threshold value for distinguishing those countries that do not have a serious corruption problem from

 those that do. Jordan's index score has improved from the 2004 index of 5.3.

CORRUPTION SURVEY 2006

During the period 7-21 October 2006, the CSS conducted a survey on the phenomena of corruption in the Jordanian public and private sectors. The survey aimed to explore the attitudes and perceptions of two sample groups of respondents (the public and the opinion leaders) to corruption; its significance and importance; its prevalence in government ministries, offices, formal institutions and public services establishments. It aimed to understand the respondents’ evaluation of the role, performance and effectiveness of a number of institutions in the public sector and in civil society; in the areas of control, procedural follow-up and disclosure of corrupt practices- such as bribery, embezzlement, fraud, and favoritism/wasta. . The survey tried to discern the attitude of the public toward tolerance or rejection of such corrupt practices.

The survey covered two sample groups. A random public (national) sample of 1148 people over the age of 18 were interviewed face-to-face in Jordan’s 12 governorates (Amman, Balqa', Zarka, Madaba, Irbid, Mafraq, Jerash, Ajloun, Karak, Tafileh, Ma'an and Aqaba). The interviews were conducted in randomly selected homes, and the respondents in each unit were also randomly selected. Following data collection and questionnaire screening, 1139 entries were tabulated and analyzed. The other sample in the survey consisted of 626 opinion leaders (leaders of political parties and trade unions, academics, writers and journalists, high-ranking officials, businesspeople and professionals) who were interviewed by phone.

The results of the 2006 survey were, as far as applicable, compared to those of a similar CSS field study on corruption in Jordan conducted in February 2002. That survey followed much the same methodology and covered a public sample of 1200 people in the country’s 12 governorates.

To more download file