The term corruption is not new to the world.Patterns of its influence upon the society in different forms and shapes exist everywhere in the world.Predominantly, it affects across the under developed and developing countries.Corruption has diversified origins,forms and effects.A short term effective anti corruption notion is to simply end the corrupt practices in its all forms. Corruption must be ended, but the question is how it should be ended in a corrupt political, social and economic system?Is democratization of these previously colonized countries a solution?
Can it be removed or controlled by way of Economic or political liberalization? Is it a matter of size of the state? Or how its eruption can be controlled through good governance? In a democratic state the basis of government is the idea of having legitimacy from its people, but several experiments were made with Pakistan to produce a form of government during last 64 years. Political system and form of the government mostly remained controversial and corrupt since the martyrdom of Liaquat Ali Khan in 1951. Interestingly, it has been observed that corrupt practices have now become perceived as ‘lifestyle’ in Pakistan
There are two aspects of corruption. One is Corruption of Politics and the other is Politics of Corruption. Corruption remained a major challenge for Pakistan always either in the democratic or the military form of governments.Although democracy is functioning in the country but is insufficient mean for the elimination or minimization of corruption. A significant number of Pakistanis believe that the primary responsibility for corruption lay in the hands of government officials.The basic actors of corrupt practices are internal as well as external worldwide.For them who believe that Economic and political liberalization can eliminate corruption from the society, it can be argued that Economic or political liberalization is rather beneficial for the developed economies.Due to the nature of complexity and conflicting trends in the international politics, corrupt practices in the public sector can’t be simply removed by way of economic or political liberalization.
Another approach suggested by another school of thought says that it is a matter of size of the state. They believe that size of the state reduces the size of the potential corrupt 'take' and enables the public sector to move towards the contemporary ideal of an efficient state. However, state is basically governed through some constitutional and structural arrangements thus; the prime factor in the elimination of corruption is good governance for:
Transparent processes for policy formulation and Policy implementation.
Decision making and decision enforcing.
Information flows.
Effectiveness of leadership and the nature of its relationship with the people of the state.
Good governance is not only concerned with the organizational activity of the government, but also a source of achieving levels of economic, human and institutional development which “benefit the population as a whole” and promote the “education and employment opportunities” which in turn enhance the ability of the population to demand, and participate effectively in, good government. In a country like Pakistan the most active contributors in corruption are principal organs of the state. The Parliament, Executive, Judiciary and the people all are equally responsible in contributing and promoting corrupt practices. A list of recent scandals Like NICL, HAJJ Scandal, Still Mills, and Rental Power plants are some case studies of Political backing, conflicting interests, promotion of influence and other forms of demoralizing acts which generally promote Corruption in the country.
There are many problems in evaluating corrupt practices and making counter strategies against them throughout the world. There is no single or unified strategy to fight corruption globally. The only framework for making counter strategy against all the corrupt practices may be defined as “good governance” which can be achieved through the process of transparency and across the board accountability. In addition to good governance in under developed and developing countries, professionalism needs to be enhanced and skilled as part of measures to counter corruption and its impacts. Judicial transparency, Public awareness and honesty, Education and literacy and above all, the Political will, are some pre-requisites for good government and good governance.
