Small changes in corruption rates in the Caucasus

On October 26 Transparency International released the results of the 2010 Corruption Perception Index (CPI). The CPI is a measure of domestic, public sector corruption in 178 countries, rating them on a scale from 10 (very clean) to 0 (highly corrupt). Nearly three quarters of the countries in the index score below five and the South Caucasus countries are no exceptions.


Georgia ranks best in the South Caucasus on place 68 with the score 3.8, an insignificant change from 2009 (place 66 with a score of 4.1). Georgia’s 2010 score is comparable to those of Italy, Brazil and Cuba. Out of all post-Soviet countries, only the Baltic States rank better. Still, it is far from the top-ranked countries with scores of more than 9.

Also Armenia maintains a stable ranking in the CPI, moving from place 120 in 2009 to 123 and a score of 2.6 in 2010, sharing place with Madagascar, Niger and Eritrea.

Looking at Azerbaijan’s ranking, it moved from place 143 in 2009 to place 134 in 2010. It does, however, not indicate a significant decrease in corruption as the scores only improved from 2.3 to 2.4. It rather shows that more countries in the index performed worse this year than in 2009. The Azerbaijani scores are comparable to those of Ukraine, Sierra Leone, Bangladesh and Honduras. Of the post-Soviet republics, Russia, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan did worse than Azerbaijan.

Denmark

 9.3

New Zealand

 9.3

Estonia

 6.5

Italy

 3.9

Georgia

 3.8

Brazil

 3.7

Cuba

 2.6

Eritrea

 2.6

Madagascar

 2.6

Niger

 2.6

Armenia

 2.6

Uganda

 2.5

Azerbaijan

 2.4

Bangladesh

 2.4

Sierra Leone

 2.4

Russia

 2.4

Uzbekistan

 1.6

Somalia

 1.1
Scores for selected countries according to the 2010 CPI.

You can access the full CPI report here. To learn more about perceptions and attitudes toward corruption in Armenia, visit the CRRC Armenia website to get free access to the USAID Mobilizing Action Against Corruption (MAAC) survey dataset and reports. You will also find several posts on corruption in the South Caucasus here on the blog.
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