Financial Transparency Coalition

What do you do when your eldest son, already well-known for his reckless spending and extravagant lifestyle, becomes the focus of a corruption investigation in France? Well, if you’re the world’s longest-ruling leader, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea, you brazenly attempt to thwart justice and the rule of law by appointing him to a position at UNESCO, a position that comes with a convenient perk: diplomatic immunity.

When we talk about economic growth and corruption, it is often in one direction: corruption hurts economic growth. One of the major reasons for this is that corruption increases risk and uncertainty for businesses and investors and provides a distinct disincentive for their investments. Lower investment levels lead to less economic growth. Less frequently, we say economic growth is an antidote to corruption. But this is also almost certainly true. The reasoning is somewhat complex and indirect, though. Economic growth does not directly ameliorate corruption. Rather, economic growth leads to better access to education, awareness of rights, empowerment of citizens,...

“If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it,” was the press headline when Severn Suzuki addressed heads of states in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. She was twelve years old, at what was then the world’s biggest-ever political gathering. In an impassioned critique of unfettered industrialism, Severn lamented the decline of the natural world, and the many injustices that man has wrought upon it. “I’m fighting for my future,” she said.

Beyond enabling tax dodging, tax haven secrecy facilitates transnational crime, financial fraud and international terrorism, writes Robert Morgenthau, the legendary former Manhattan District Attorney, in the New York Times.