Combating Corruption in Africa through Institutional Entrepreneurship: Peering in from Business-government Relations

Abstract

Corruption remains a significant barrier to the socioeconomic development of Africa, despite efforts by various local, national and international stakeholders to combat it. Mishra and Maiko (2017), in their article which was published in Africa Journal of Management, suggest that business schools could serve as institutions of change by incorporating students-elders partnerships in their curricula to develop ethical business leaders who will help fight corruption. In this article, I respond to Maiko and Mishra by refining their idea to make it more feasible within the current African context. I also outline why their idea might not be effective for combating systemic corruption in Africa, and propose an alternative focused on training business students to become institutional entrepreneurs in Africa's political arenas. This article is intended to start a dialogue that will facilitate the development of novel and effective ways of using business and management education to combat corruption in Africa.

Responsible Firm Behaviour in Political Markets: Judging the Ethicality of Corporate Political Activity in Weak Institutional Environments

“…Though they could voluntarily disengage from the polity, as suggested by Weber (1997), doing so will disadvantage them if other firms continue to engage with politicians (Grimaldi 1998). This is similar to the disadvantage that firms face when they are loners in the fight against corruption (Liedong 2017;Luiz and Stewart 2014), but it more importantly shows how rationality does not prevail against norms and bandwagons regardless of the logical and cognitive views held by actors.…”

“…Consequently, they are unable to support their candidates, leaving them to rely on personal income (CDD Ghana 2018). This creates opportunities for interests (including firms) to capture the political process through "plutocratic funding" (Arthur 2017; Bagbin and Ahenkan 2017), giving rise to corruption (Liedong 2017;CDD Ghana 2018). A former Minister of State remarked "check all the corruption-related cases…it is linked to campaign financing.…”

“…It would also ensure transparency and reduce the incidence of bribery and corruption. Development agencies and NGOs should thus pay attention to CPA regulation, particular party financing, as this is a big source of the corruption and related developmental problems recorded in developing countries (Liedong 2017). In Ghana, this is very true (see Houlton 2012).…”

“…According to Christensen (1997, p. 88), "there is an urgent need for study of the ethics of engaging in corporate political activity." CPA may improve firm performance (Hillman et al 2004;Lux et al 2011;Rajwani and Liedong 2015), but it may also create an unfair business environment that negatively affects consumer welfare and overall socio-economic development (Barker 2008;Mantere et al 2009), especially in developing countries where it is largely unregulated (Liedong 2017). Despite these potential problems (Lawton et al 2013), the ethicality of CPA has received little research attention (Neron 2016).…”

Corporate Political Strategies in Weak Institutional Environments: A Break from Conventions

“…Indeed, while this may be the case for India, China and other advanced emerging countries, it may not be the same for frontier countries that are still battling with basic institutional voids. In most African countries, there is hardly an interface for deploying an information strategy (Liedong et al 2017), neither are the electoral laws effectively enforced to make political campaign financing transparent (Liedong 2017). These lapses limit the scope of political strategization.…”