Financial Transparency Coalition

Big step forward for the World Bank today. After an arguably rocky history with the topic of illicit financial flows, one which is full of fits and starts, the World Bank has taken a large stride into the foray with a new, 196-page report: Barriers to Asset Recovery. The study explicitly concerns reforms that will “enable the recovery of stolen assets” as the result of corruption. It is a topic which has been given a fair amount of attention lately, particularly in the wake of the Arab Spring. Ben Ali of Tunisia, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, and Muammar Qaddafi...

You go to a DMV to get a driver’s license. You submit an application and take an eye exam, you pay the relevant fees, take a written exam, and then an official grades your score. If you pass, you get to take a driving test and another official evaluates your performance. Upon successful completion of these steps, someone takes your picture and 5-8 business days later your license arrives in the mail. Well, that’s the way it is for some people. But if you were unlucky enough to be taking your driving test in a country where corruption runs rampant,...

Pirates are a problem. Every year they cost the world between $7 and $12 billion in ransoms, insurance premiums, security equipment, naval forces, prosecutions, anti-piracy organizations, and economic losses to regional economies. And these economic costs don’t include the human ones, which are also sizeable. Every year seafarers are attacked with automatic gunfire and RPGs, beaten, and held in extended confinement as hostages. Pirates sometimes use these hostages as human shields against naval vessels and often abuse their captives, both physically and psychologically. Paul and Rachel Chandler, a retired British couple who were on the “trip of their lifetime,”...

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI) and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are trying to gut the world's flagship anti-corruption legislation, but "we must stand firm in our values, our principles, and our promises," writes Ann Hollingshead I’m a little annoyed. I say “a little” only out of a desire to stay civil. Today the House Judiciary committee held a hearing on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), the flagship U.S. legislation that makes it illegal to bribe a foreign official. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Department of Justice (DOJ) have jurisdiction over the FCPA, which was unique worldwide for almost...