Drivers of petty corruption and anti-corruption interventions in developing countries – a semi-systematic review

Combatting corruption in the developing world has been a formidable challenge and taken a prominent place in the agenda of the international development community for the last two decades. Nonetheless, the results and outcomes of conventional anti-corruption interventions continue to be modest at best. This is often reflected in the so-called implementation gap, whereby countries adopting sound legal and organisational anti-corruption frameworks continue to experience very high levels of corruption.

This literature review is part of a pioneering research effort commissioned by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) through its East Africa Research Fund (EARF) that explores the utility of behavioural economics for the study of petty corruption.

The review has been conducted following a rigorous methodological approach and it aims to contribute evidence conducive to the feasibility of developing of anti-corruption interventions based on behavioural principles.