POL353 Public Administration in Southeast Asia – Corruption Analysis
Question 1
As of 2025, public sector corruption remained prevalent in Southeast Asia, with citizens of some regional states expressing frustration at the persistent trends of poor governance, weak institutions and limited accountability. Even Southeast Asian states that registered an improvement in the Corruptions Perceptions Index (CPI) 2025 as a result of structural reforms continued to score low in the CPI.
Based on the CPI 2025, choose two Southeast Asian states as case studies on corruption in the public sector — one state should show a decline in its corruption score while the other should show an improvement.
Identify what accounts for the decline of your first case study by discussing the forms and drivers of corruption, and show why this appears to be a perennial problem in your chosen state. Your analysis must clearly apply at least TWO key theoretical frameworks or core concepts covered in this course.
Thereafter, examine what specific initiatives the government and relevant stakeholders have implemented to prevent and combat corruption in your second case study. Conclude your argument by presenting a critique of how this state’s success could be considered a ‘limited success’.
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Case Study 1 – Indonesia – declining corruption performance
The case analysis of Indonesia implies that it can be considered as a declining case in respect to corruption performance. The public sector corruption in Indonesia can be linked directly to political patronage, rent seeking, bribery and abuse of public office especially in areas where political and business interest overlaps. The corruption opportunities have also increased mainly because of decentralised systems at national levels whereby oversight and institutional capacity can be uneven. The two significant theoretical frameworks that can be considered are principal agent theory which indicates that the corruption within the public officials is highly likely when there are opportunities to pursue private interests because monitoring and accountability by citizens are insufficient. The second theory is collective action theory which indicates that corruption is very difficult to eliminate when citizens and officials perceive corrupt behaviour widespread and expect others to participate. In these types of situations, an individual might find it difficult to refuse a bribery arrangement.
Case Study 2- Singapore – Improving corruption performance
An analysis of the Singaporean economy indicates that it is completely opposite to Indonesia as it has a relatively strong corruption control system that is based on the principles of a strong enforcement, institutional capacity and the low tolerance for public sector misconduct. The agencies like the corrupt practices investigation bureau Ensures complete enforcement of the prevention of corruption act, investigation of corruption allegations and preventive measures within public administration. Along with this, the other key important aspects are merit based public administration, clear rules governing conflicts of interest and high level of political commitment to maintaining integrity. The strong enforcement therefore helps in suppressing corruption and the centralised strong governance model in Singapore is difficult to transfer to SE Asian states with weaker institutions. However, continued vigilance is important because corruption risk can change as government business relationships and economic activities evolve.
The comparative analysis as performed above clearly reflects that corruption is not simply a problem of unethical individuals. It is also identified that corruption can emerge from principal agent problems and collective action dynamics as evident in the case of Indonesia. Contrary to this, Singapore demonstrates credible enforcement, institutional capacity and administrative integrity can substantially help in constraining corruption within the economy.
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The comparative analysis of two SE Asian states to analyse the corruption driver, anti-corruption reforms, governance and the limit of reform success above indicated significant findings. If you need a similar kind of corruption analysis of any country in detail, you can get in touch with our public administration experts by visiting our assignment help Singapore page. You can also explore the solved assignment answers from SUSS by our experts before deciding to order your assignment.
