Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense that is undertaken by a person or an organization that is entrusted in a position of authority to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's gain. Corruption may involve many activities which include bribery, influence peddling, and embezzlement and it may also involve practices that are legal in many countries. Political corruption occurs when an office-holder or other governmental employee acts in an official capacity for personal gain.
Corruption is perceived as most common in kleptocracies, oligarchies, narco-states, and mafia states, however, more recent research and policy statements acknowledge that it also exists in wealthy capitalist economies. In How Corrupt is Britain, David Whyte reveals that corruption exists "across a wide range of venerated institutions" in the UK, ranked as one of the least corrupt countries by the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). In a 2022 speech on "Modern Corruption," USAID Administrator Samantha Power stated: "Corruption is no longer just about individual autocrats pilfering their nation's wealth to live large", but also involves sophisticated transnational networks, including financial institutions hidden in secrecy. Responding to Whyte's book, George Monbiot criticized the CPI for its narrow definition of corruption that surveys mostly only Western executives about bribery. Similarly, others point out that "global metrics systematically under-measure 'corruption of the rich' - which tends to be legalized, institutionalized, and ambiguously unethical - as opposed to 'corruption of the poor'".
Corruption and crime are endemic sociological occurrences that appear regularly in virtually all countries on a global scale in varying degrees and proportions. Recent data suggests corruption is on the rise. Each nation allocates domestic resources for the control and regulation of corruption and the deterrence of crime. Strategies undertaken to counter corruption are often summarized under the umbrella term anti-corruption. Additionally, global initiatives like the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 16 also have a targeted goal which is supposed to reduce corruption in all of its forms substantially. Recent initiatives like the Tax Justice Network go beyond bribery and theft and bring attention to tax abuses.
