Financial Transparency Coalition

This blog post is the second post in a series on the connection between extractive industries and corruption in developing countries. You can read part one here. In a blog post last week I discussed the relationship of extractive industries and corruption, noting that while they are related, the presence of extractive industries alone does not inherently lead to their political exploitation. Rather, it is the effect that these industries have on other economic and political conditions that can drive corruption. Conceptually, we can think about this in terms of a model presented by Tsegaye Lemma, a policy analyst with the...

This blog post is the first post in a two-part series on the connection between extractive industries and corruption in developing countries. Natural resources, particularly fuels and ores, are often associated paradoxically with stagnant economic growth. More intuitively, natural resource wealth is also often associated with poorer governance, most notably corruption. Understanding why this is the case, however, is not necessarily intuitive. To that end, I’ll explore the correlational relationship between natural resource wealth and corruption in this post and show a model for examining these issues. Next week, I’ll use these theories to talk about some specific hypotheses explaining...

Undoubtedly, the world has made progress on financial transparency to reduce illicit financial flows in recent years, and the evidence suggests we will continue to do so, at perhaps an even faster rate, in the near future. Yet as these efforts ramp up, threats to efforts to stem illicit financial flows will emerge from technological advancements in currency, most notably Bitcoin. So far, most nations have pursued a piecemeal and largely unilateral approach to regulate digital currency, but this must change. To truly deal with the threat digital currency imposes on continued illicit financial flows, we need an international...

Since Edward Snowden leaked the details of the National Security Administration’s top secret mass surveillance programs, Americans have been talking a lot about the tradeoffs between liberty and security. There are, of course, varying perspectives on the issue. Some, like Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) argue the government’s actions in this area threatens to “give us an always expanding, omnipresent surveillance state that—hour by hour—chips needlessly away at the liberties and freedoms our Founders established for us.” Others, such as NSA head General Keith Alexander argue the program has permitted the intelligence community to “better connect the dots and learn...