“Public Office, Private Interests: Accountability through Income and Asset Disclosure” examines the objectives, design features, and implementation approaches that can contribute to the effectiveness of an income and asset disclosure (IAD) system, and enhance its impact as a prevention and enforcement tool. It draws on detailed case studies that are published in a companion volume: “Income and Asset Disclosure: Case Study Illustrations” The companion volume “Income and Asset Disclosure: Case Study Illustrations” includes case studies of the IAD systems in Argentina, Croatia, Guatemala, Hong Kong SAR, Indonesia, Jordan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Mongolia, Rwanda, Slovenia, and the United States. Case studies were conducted through review of the legal framework, desk research and interviews with practitioners, academics, and representatives of civil society. Each case study outlines the legal framework for the IAD regime, the mandate and structure of the IAD agency, and the resources and procedures of the IAD system. The characteristics of each system are highlighted along with other findings that illuminate the challenges faced in implementing the system, the steps taken, and the progress achieved by the IAD agency in fulfilling its mandate. There are a wide variety of approaches in IAD system design and implementation and a wide variety of challenges faced by different systems. New and emerging IAD systems may face challenges associated with resource and capacity constraints, political resistance to implementation, a lack of public awareness, or limited civil society capacity to support anticorruption efforts. Many established systems may also face the need to revise the legal framework, institutional arrangements, or enforcement mechanisms once it becomes apparent that original assumptions do not deliver expected results or unanticipated challenges emerge. There is no single optimal approach to IAD system design and implementation. Context is essential. These volumes do not, therefore, attempt to lay out a standard approach for IAD administration. Rather, they identify the objectives, features, and mechanisms that can contribute to the effectiveness of an IAD system and enhance its impact as a prevention and enforcement tool.

Financial disclosure systems are a vital component of transparency. By now 161 countries around the world have introduced financial disclosure systems, becoming commonplace around the world. But, although the rules are on the books, many practitioners are still struggling with the intricacies of the rules and how to implement them in the socioeconomic, historical, and legal context of their own country. Little guidance is available to assist them. This book aims to fill that void and provide practitioners with practical scenarios to consider before deciding on a particular course of action. This book contains short chapters that elaborate each topic and provide clear guidance on the issues that policy makers and those involved in the implementation of financial disclosure obligations will need to take into account before making a decision. How do you decide who should file? And how often? On-line or in hard copy? And what exactly? Everything they own directly—or also those apartments they own indirectly? How should information in declarations be checked? Should it be shared with public? How accessible should it be? This is the sort of practical guidance that this book aims to provide.

Examines how the private sector in China manages to grow without secure property rights.

The OECD Guidelines for Managing Conflict of Interest in the Public Service provide the first international benchmark in this field. This report highlights trends, approaches and models across OECD countries in a comparative overview that also presents examples of innovative and recent solutions.

Conflict of interest occurs at all levels of governance, ranging from local to global, both in the public and the corporate and financial spheres. There is increasing awareness that conflicts of interest may distort decision-making processes and generate inappropriate outcomes, thereby undermining the functioning of public institutions and markets. However, the current worldwide trend towards regulation, which seeks to forestall, prevent and manage conflicts of interest, has its price. Drawbacks may include the stifling of decision-making processes, the loss of expertise among decision-makers and a vicious circle of distrust. This interdisciplinary and international book addresses specific situations of conflict of interest in different spheres of governance, particularly in global, public and corporate governance.

This volume is about political corruption and the use of public office for private gain in India. A merit-based bureaucracy was launched in the nineteenth century to control corruption. This system with its pay structure that rewarded civil servants for honest effort was seen as the best solution to political corruption. It was based on the assumption that if merit was made the basis of administration, it would exclude private interest. However, the merit-based civil service system failed to restrain corruption because the ruling politicians had preferences on how to use a public bureaucracy and these preferences translated into an incentive structure, which governed the behaviour of civil servants. The author proposes an alternative paradigm—the New Public Management Modelߞwhich is being implemented in Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and Sweden.