One characteristic of Central and Eastern European democracies in transition is the lack of stability in terms of accountability and transparency in practices of political party financing. This key volume provides a thorough and well-structured post-communist study of political finance, election campaign and party funding issues within this region, focusing specifically on Central and Eastern European countries. It outlines best practices for political party and election campaign financing, discusses the shortcomings of political funding schemes and highlights the scandals that emerge under investigation. Providing an illuminating analysis of how current regulations of political finance succeed in controlling the rise of political corruption, the volume will be indispensable for anyone interested in the efficiency of regulation in party funding.

Anti-corruption programmes, projects and campaigns have come to constitute an essential aspect of good governance promotion over the last two decades. The post-communist countries in Eastern Europe have presented one of the first key targets of transnational anti-corruption efforts, and indeed most of these countries have shown an impressive record of respective measures. Yet path-breaking institutional and policy developments have not set in before the mid-2000s both at the international level and in most Eastern European countries. Are these the beginnings of a mutually synergetic success story? In order to answer this question, we need to better understand the complex interplay between the international and domestic domains in this policy field and geographic region. This book provides in-depth and comparative insights about this interplay, with a particular focus on the involvement of domestic social movements, governmental political machines and international legal mechanisms. We find that, on all three levels of analysis, political and material interests of relevant actors are complemented and at times contradicted by normative claims. Moreover, at the interfaces of the three levels, coincidental and spontaneous developments have largely outweighed systematic implementation and coordination of appropriate anti-corruption strategies. This book is based on a special issue of Global Crime.

Based on two international conferences at Princeton University and the Central European University, this is a handy guide to the problem of corruption in transition countries, with an important comparative content. Political Corruption in Transition is distinguished from similar publications by at least two features: by the quality of the carefully selected and edited essays ans by its original treatment. Instead of the usual preaching and excommunications, this Skeptic`s Handbook represents down-to-earth realism. Combines general issues with case studies and original research. The geographic coverage is wide, though it is ideas rather than a geography that drive the volume`s organization.

Why has political corruption emerged as a major obstacle to successful democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe? Exploring the origins, scope, and impact of political corruption in the region's post communist states, Tatiana Kostadinova identifies the factors that favor illicit behavior and considers how the various forms of malfeasance are threatening democracy.

This book examines the relationship between corruption scandals and transitional processes in post-Milošević Serbia after 2000. The study challenges the view that corruption has always been understood as a conflict between private interests and the public good, as these concepts are defined in Western democracies, and explores how anti-corruption discourse has been used for political mobilisation. Through an examination of high-profile political scandals in Serbia, the author shows how the meaning of corruption changed over time. In the early 2000s, corruption focused on the legacy of Milošević’s rule and was identified through the public’s limited access to the privatisation process. By the end of the decade, conceptualisations of corruption in public debate were so diversified that each anti-corruption measure undertaken by the state was interpreted as an act of corruption by other voices in the discourse. The book will appeal to students and scholars interested in corruption studies, discourse analysis and Balkan politics.

Focusing on the gap between democratic ideals and performance, three European academics study the common experience and even more common perception of the corrupt behavior of bureaucrats in post-communist Ukraine, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. The authors conducted focus-group studies, one-on-one interviews, and large-scale surveys to reveal plentiful details about the ways ordinary citizens cope in their day-to-day dealings with low-level officials and state employees, whose decisions can have a critically important impact on people's lives. c. Book News Inc.

This study provides a systematic analysis of the existing practice in the area of asset declarations in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and in some OECD member states in Western Europe and North America.