| Popis: |
In this research, my goal is to improve our understanding why public corruption remains a persistent problem in cities with effective democratic institutions, specialized anti-corruption agencies, and free media. The practical aim is to improve our understanding of which anti-corruption elements work effectively and how to maximize anti-corruption efforts. More specifically, this study explores what role free media plays in contributing to an anti-corruption environment, under what conditions media’s coverage of corruption is related to specific corruption outcomes in cities, and what elements of specialized anti-corruption agencies contribute to their effective or ineffective functioning. The local media and anti-corruption agencies in three different cities in different countries were used as cases in the most different systems design comparative approach. The cities were Chicago (USA), Sydney (Australia), and Riga (Latvia). The study utilized the anti-corruption agency (ACA) assessment framework designed by Transparency International (TI) to assess the agency effectiveness. This research also used Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) in examining media’s role in contributing to or militating against an anti-corruption environment in the selected cities by choosing to report corruption in certain ways. The research generated new knowledge about (anti)corruption in cities. The anti-corruption agency assessment revealed significant differences among the anti-corruption agencies in the three cities and highlighted the most important elements of effective anti-corruption agencies. Qualitative Comparative Analysis of media’s corruption reporting conditions revealed that, in the three cities, media’s coverage of corruption can be both conducive to the anti-corruption efforts in the city and it can be counterproductive to these efforts depending on the specific reporting circumstances. The most counterintuitive finding in this study is that free media in democracies, at least in the three countries studied here, can contribute to creating an unfavorable anti-corruption environment by doing its corruption watchdog job – publishing articles on corruption. The way media publishes the news articles describing corruption and anti-corruption can determine the impact of the corruption reporting on people’s (anti)corruption perceptions and motivations to fight corruption. |
