and experience of corruption
Two Eurobarometer surveys were carried out in preparation for the EU Anti-corruption
Report in early 2013: the 1) Special Eurobarometer
and a 2) a business-focused ‘Flash
survey’
For most countries, the ranking of the CPI index
published by Transparency
International tends to correspond to answers given by the Eurobarometer respondents.
Taking together the Special Eurobarometer data, firstly on general perceptions of the
prevalence of corruption and secondly on actually being expected to pay a bribe (personal
experience in bribery), it is clear that Member States can be characterised in different ways.
A survey conducted among the general population in all Member States every two years, based on face-to-face
interviews with a sample of 1000 or 500 respondents (depending on the size of the population). A total of 27 786 persons
(representative sample) participated in this survey in late February and early March of 2013. The survey dealt inter alia
with corruption perception generally, personal experience with corruption as well as attitudes towards favours and gifts.
While the Eurobarometer surveys are run every second year since 2007, the Commission decided in 2013 to tailor
questions to the needs of this report. Therefore, any comparison with previous years should be undertaken with caution.
Full report is available at http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb_special_399_380_en.htm#397.
A phone-based survey, so-called Flash Eurobarometer, covered six sectors in EU, and was launched for the first time
in 2013, carried out between 18 February and 8 March. Businesses from the energy, healthcare, construction,
manufacturing, telecommunications and financial sectors (all company sizes) were requested to provide their opinion.
Full report is available at http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/flash_arch_374_361_en.htm#374
Corruption Perception Index (CPI) is published every year by Transparency International:
http://cpi.transparency.org/cpi2013/.
Answers confirm a positive perception and low experience of bribery in the case of
Denmark, Finland, Luxembourg and Sweden. Respondents in these countries rarely
indicated that they had been expected to pay a bribe (less than 1% of cases) and the number
of people who think that corruption is widespread (20%, 29%, 42% and 44% respectively) is
significantly below the EU average. In the case of the UK, only 5 persons out of 1115 were
expected to pay a bribe (less than 1%), showing the best result in all Europe; nevertheless, the
perception data show that 64% of UK respondents think corruption is widespread in the
country (the EU average is 74%).
In countries like Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Estonia and France, while more
than half of the respondents think corruption is a widespread phenomenon, the actual number
of people having had to pay a bribe is low (around 2%). These countries also appear among
the good performers on the Transparency International Index. Austria shares similar
features with this group with the exception of a somewhat high number of respondents (5%)
who reported to have been expected to pay a bribe.
In some countries a relatively high number of people indicated that they had personal
experience with bribery, but with a clear concentration on a limited number of sectors,
including Hungary (13%), Slovakia (14%) and Poland (15%). In these countries, one
sector, namely healthcare, provides the bulk of instances of bribery. There is evidence that
structural problems in healthcare provide incentives to pay a bribe for medical staff. Indeed,
in all the countries mentioned, the detailed answer show that healthcare is referred to by the
highest number of individuals, while all other institutions or sectors (e.g. police, customs,
politicians, public prosecutors’ services, etc) were named by less than 1% of respondents.
Corruption in a broader sense is perceived as widespread in these countries (82% in Poland,
89% in Hungary and 90% in Slovakia).
In certain countries, including Portugal, Slovenia, Spain and Italy, bribery seems rare but
corruption in a broader sense is a serious concern: a relatively low number of respondents
claimed that they were asked or expected to pay a bribe in the last 12 months. While personal
experience of bribery is apparently rare (1-3%), the perception is so heavily influenced by
recent political scandals and the financial and economic crisis that this is reflected in the
respondents’ negative impression about the corruption situation overall (90, 91, 95 and 97%
respectively).
As for countries lagging behind in the scores concerning both perceptions and actual
experience of corruption, these include Croatia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Bulgaria,
Romania and Greece. In these countries, between 6% and 29% of respondents indicated that
they were asked or expected to pay a bribe in the past 12 months, while 84% up to 99% think
that corruption is widespread in their country. Croatia and the Czech Republic appear to make
a somewhat more positive impression with slightly better scores than the rest of the countries
from the same group.
Countries not mentioned above (i.e. Latvia, Malta, Ireland, Cyprus) do not show results that
diverge considerably from the EU average on any of these aspects.
At European level, three quarters of respondents (76%) think that corruption is
widespread in their own country. The countries where respondents are most likely to think
corruption is widespread are Greece (99%), Italy (97%), Lithuania, Spain and the Czech
Republic (95% in each). A quarter of Europeans (26%), compared with 29 % showed by
the 2011 Eurobarometer, consider that they are personally affected by corruption in 7
their daily lives. People are most likely to say they are personally affected by corruption in
Spain and Greece (63% in each), Cyprus and Romania (57% in each) and Croatia (55 %); and
least likely to do so in Denmark (3%), France and Germany (6% in each). Around one in
twelve Europeans (8%) say they have experienced or witnessed a case of corruption in
the past 12 months. Respondents are most likely to say they have experienced or witnessed
corruption in Lithuania (25%), Slovakia (21%) and Poland (16%) and least likely to do so in
Finland and Denmark (3% in each), Malta and the UK (4% in each).
Around three quarters of Europeans (73%) say that bribery and the use of connections
is often the easiest way of obtaining certain public services in their country. This belief is
most widespread in Greece (93%), Cyprus (92%), Slovakia and Croatia (89% in each).
Similarly to 2011, around two in three Europeans (67%) think the financing of political
parties is not sufficiently transparent and supervised. Most likely to hold that view are
respondents from Spain (87%), Greece (86 %), and the Czech Republic (81%), while those
least likely to hold this view are respondents from Denmark (47%), the UK (54%), Sweden
(55%) and Finland (56%). Just under a quarter of Europeans (23%) agree that their
Government’s efforts are effective in tackling corruption; around a quarter (26 %) think
that there are enough successful prosecutions in their country to deter people from corrupt
practices.
For the business-focused Flash survey the country results show striking variations: a
difference of 89 percentage points between the highest (Greece: 99%) and lowest (Denmark:
10%) levels of perceived corruption. (The same result is reflected in the ‘Special
Eurobarometer’ presented above: 20% vs 99%.) Indeed, all but one of the respondents from
Greece are of the belief that corruption is widespread in Greece.
At European level, more than 4 out of 10 companies consider corruption to be a problem
for doing business, and this is true for patronage and nepotism too. When asked
specifically whether corruption is a problem for doing business, 50% of the construction
sector and 33% of the telecoms/IT companies felt it was a problem to a serious extent. The
smaller the company, the more often corruption and nepotism appears as a problem for
doing business. Corruption is most likely to be considered a problem when doing business by
companies in the Czech Republic (71%), Portugal (68%), Greece and Slovakia (both 66%).
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