UK House of Lords requests Edmund Malesky's research on corruption
In a recent debate about the Bribery Act of 2010, the UK House of Lords solicited expert analysis from Edmund Malesky and Nathan Jensen. Their statement was entered in as written evidence:
"We find that this convention, and more importantly the underlying domestic laws such as the 2010 United Kingdom Bribery Act, are very effective in reducing bribery behavior relative to countries that haven’t enacted bribery laws. In short, strong domestic laws that criminalize bribery and enforce these laws, reduce bribery. There are two major caveats however.
First, we find increased bribery behavior by countries that didn’t join the convention. Second, we observe no change in bribery for countries that enacted bribery laws but did not effectively enforce them. Together, these two caveats imply that firms from countries with weak bribery laws may be increasing their bribery.
In sum, anti-bribery legislation across the world generally has positive effects. Additional countries have continued to join the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention and existing signatories have begun to strengthen their laws. As this convention expands to more countries and early signatories strengthen enforcement, we believe this is an effective step in reducing business bribery. Although central to this effectiveness is to encourage additional countries to enact and enforce antibribery laws."