Integrity Pacts

This guidance seeks to capture and explore the innovative approaches that African governments have developed to address the demand and supply sides of corruption more effectively and sustainably. It is designed to help government institutions, in particular national anti-corruption agencies, engage with the private sector more effectively to prevent corruption.

The document highlights good practices identified through interviews, desk research and a 2021 Southern African Development Community (SADC) training on “Emerging anti-corruption issues and private-sector engagement for SADC anti-corruption agencies”.

Africa offers many examples of innovative, unique and context-sensitive approaches to engage the private sector in anti-corruption efforts. Ghana’s National Anti-Corruption Action Plan, for instance, offers an award scheme and is looking into providing tax benefits to companies that enforce anti-corruption measures and demonstrate leadership in the fight against corruption. Other agencies and governments in the region, such as Morocco, are currently discussing implementing a reward system for compliant companies that can be considered when companies bid for public tenders.

These examples demonstrate how African governments proactively seek to tackle corruption and collaborate with the private sector.

From the initiatives captured, three common strategic approaches can be identified to underpin effective and impactful engagement:

• Raising awareness, guiding and working with the private sector to more effectively address corruption risks.
• Identifying and providing incentives to companies investing in their compliance programmes.
• Demonstrating leadership by actively participating in Collective Action and public-private partnerships.

This document is a follow-up of a practical global guide published in July 2022 and was produced with the support of the Siemens Integrity Initiative.

It is freely shareable under a Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence. Please credit the Basel Institute on Governance.

The European Commission’s Handbook of good practices in the fight against corruption maps a variety of anti-corruption practices in EU Member States that have proved to be useful in solving problems related to corruption, and which can inspire similar initiatives elsewhere.

Key among these is Collective Action, which the Handbook explains and endorses in detail. It explains the key characteristics of Collective Action initiatives compared to accountability initiatives and lists several typologies and mechanisms.

The handbook states that potential results of engaging in Collective Action are:

• Increasing trust
• Ensuring integrity as a social norm
• Reducing control and sanctioning costs

The Handbook is a collaborative effort between Ecorys and Local Research Correspondents on Corruption in each Member State. It was authored by Mike Beke, Oksana Huss, Brigitte Slot and Jan Wynarski for the European Commission, Directorate-General Migration and Home Affairs.

This practical guide is designed to help governments, and in particular National Anti-Corruption Agencies, engage with the private sector more effectively to prevent corruption.

It explains how governments can engage with the private sector to prevent corruption in three ways:

• Collaborate and consult on corruption prevention activities in the private sector - by setting up events and platforms, providing advisory support and engaging the private sector in developing National Anti-Corruption Strategies.
• Support and incentivise the private sector to engage in corruption prevention activities and initiatives - by creating tangible business benefits for companies investing in compliance, incentivising companies to externalise their compliance programmes, and supporting compliance certification.
• Demonstrate leadership by becoming an active participant in Collective Action - by establishing Collective Action as the go-to approach for engaging with the private sector, by implementing integrity tools in public procurement, and by fostering compliance in state-owned enterprises.

Each point is supported with examples of such actions around the world. Many of the examples were provided by a core group of members from the Network of Corruption Prevention Authorities (NCPA), who worked together with the Basel Institute on Governance to develop this guidance. The Basel Institute’s participation in developing these guidelines is funded by the Siemens Integrity Initiative.

The guidance will be updated on a regular basis to continue the discussion around government and private-sector engagement on issues of corruption.

This document is freely shareable under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Please credit the Basel Institute on Governance and Network of Corruption Prevention Authorities (NCPA).

Transparency International’s practical guide to civic monitoring of public contracting projects emerges from the Integrity Pacts – Civil Control Mechanism for Safeguarding EU Funds project.

Under this project, between 2015 and 2021, 15 civil society organisations monitored 46 public contracting procedures in the EU.

The goal was to understand how to systematically embed integrity pacts into the monitoring of EU-funded contracts. This guidebook is designed to support advocates and implementers in advocating for, setting up and implementing integrity pacts.

It covers three broad areas:

• Achieving broader recognition and adoption across the EU
• Designing fit-for-purpose integrity pacts
• Ensuring effective monitoring

This concise brief sets out key considerations for European authorities interested in implementing Integrity Pacts to reduce the likelihood of corruption and fraud in public contracting, as well as improve contracting outcomes and public trust. The sections cover:

• Benefits of Integrity Pacts
• What an Integrity Pact entails
• Getting started with an Integrity Pact

Many of the considerations can also be applied to non-EU contexts.

This publication has been developed in the framework of the project Integrity Pacts – Civil Control Mechanism for Safeguarding EU Funds, Phase 2 funded by the European Commission.