Droughts and corruption

Abstract

Natural disasters are challenges for good governance. That conclusion follows from recent research investigating the effects of natural disasters on one important force hostile to good governance: public sector corruption. However, a specific analysis of droughts is so far neglected in the still-young relevant strand of the literature. The present paper fills that gap by analyzing the short- and long-term influence of droughts on public sector corruption within a unified panel estimation approach for 120 countries during the period 1985–2013. Relying on a meteorological drought measure, the Standardized Precipitation Index, we show that more severe drought exposure is followed by more corruption. The effect holds for subsamples of developing and developed countries. The robustness of the results is supported by a variety of stability tests. Furthermore, we provide initial evidence on the transmission paths of drought-induced corruption, which differ depending on the countries’ level of development. Whereas droughts increase corruption risk in developing countries by triggering significantly larger aid inflows and less democratic accountability and transparency, corruption in developed countries rises as a consequence of governmental drought relief payments.

Tropical Storms and Temporary Migration in Vietnam

“…As a consequence, disaster relief comes, if at all, with significant time‐lag. Moreover, disasters open a window of opportunity for corruption, thus, at least parts of disaster relief likely end up in the wrong pockets (Nguyen 2017; Wenzel 2020). Therefore, the actual disaster relief policy is likely insufficient to prevent further emigration from storm‐affected communes.…”

Corruption, homelessness and disasters

“…The findings of this impressive literature hold across a range of data sources and time periods, as well as experimental and quasi‐experimental settings. Moreover, scholars have deepened our understanding of the different pathways at work: Wenzel (2020), for example, showed that after severe droughts, corruption preys on larger aid inflows in the developing world, while corrupt officials tend to target governmental relief payments in the developed world. In summary, there is good evidence that corruption is a direct and immediate threat to relief efforts.…”

Transparency in humanitarian logistics and supply chain: the moderating role of digitalisation

“…Globally, the disaster relief agencies (DRAs) are fundamentally responsible to provide all these services during the disaster relief operations (DROs). However, recent research shows that many countries, including Pakistan, fail to provide effective and timely humanitarian logistics mainly due to poor coordination, mismanagement and corruption (BouChabke and Haddad, 2021;Gammelgaard, 2015;Khan et al, 2019;Wenzel, 2021).…”

“…However, recent research shows that many countries, including Pakistan, fail to provide effective and timely humanitarian logistics mainly due to poor coordination, mismanagement and corruption (BouChabke and Haddad, 2021; Gammelgaard, 2015; Khan et al. , 2019; Wenzel, 2021).…”