The contribution of lobby regulation initiatives in addressing political corruption in Latin America

• Published date: 01 November 2014
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.432
• Date: 01 November 2014

■Special Issue Paper

The contribution of lobby regulation

initiatives in addressing political

corruption in Latin America

Luiz Alberto dos Santos

1

*and Paulo Mauricio Teixeira da Costa

2

1

Executive Office of the President of Brazil, Brasília, Brazil

2

Ministry of Planning, Budget and Management, Brasília, Brazil

For most of its history, Latin America has lived under authoritarian and elite rule where public decisions were often

crafted in the shadows by cabinets and parliaments to the benefit of a small minority. Recently, the development of

participatory political systems has brought some transparency to the policy-making process. Such scrutiny reveals

evidence of the capture of aspects of policy-making by private interests that use obscure strategies to achieve their

political goals. As a consequence, a widespread movement for regulating the role and tactics of interest groups

emerged, which is seen as a necessary step to address the root causes of political corruption.

This article provides an overview of efforts to regulate lobbying in Latin America. It explains attempts at regulation in

four countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Peru), evaluates the level of success of these efforts, and assesses

prospects for the future regarding reducing corruption through the instrument of lobby regulations. The authors

argue that such regulations alone cannot eliminate political corruption. However, lobby regulations can contribute

to increased transparency and aid in developing an anti-corruption culture. It will be shown that lobby laws in Latin

America exhibit many of the problems long identified with similar regulations across western democracies. Copyright

© 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

INTRODUCTION

As the introductory article to this issue of the

Journal points out, what is encompassed under the

rubric of political corruption and the forms it takes

vary from country to country and partly depends

on political culture. A useful shorthand definition

of corruption is that of Transparency International

(2011), the world’s leading NGO working to combat

corruption, which views it as the ‘abuse of entrusted

power for private gain’. Thus, political corruption

involves using public resources for private benefit:

public officials (elected and appointed) exploiting

the resources of their office, usually as a quid pro

quo for financial benefits. Chris Edwards (2006: 1)

provides a more extensive definition of political

corruption as a practice that:

....occurs when legislators and bureaucrats use

their discretionary power over budgets, regula-

tions, procurement, and taxation to reward

themselves and private interests, while subvert-

ing the general welfare. Officials are motivated

by bribes, campaign contributions, favorable

investment opportunities, promises of jobs for

themselves and family members, and other

payoffs.

For generations, scholars have considered Latin

America as a textbook case of endemic corruption

of all types, including political corruption. The sub-

continent seems to fulfill every ‘corruption variable’

(Caldas and Pereira, 2007: 28), including immature

democratic institutions, inefficient bureaucracy and

law enforcement apparatus, an over-regulated econ-

omy, cleavage between relatively low private and

high public sector wages, economic reliance on nat-

ural resources, and the hangover from early colonial

formation—including class divisions and elitism

accompanied by a feeling of political entitlement, plus

other cultural factors. These features do not necessar-

ily lead to corruption, which, as indicated above,

is perceived and practiced in each country in a

specific way and could be defined accordingly.

During authoritarian times, there was no way to

measure the perception of corruption, as corruption

*Correspondence to: Luiz Alberto dos Santos, Executive Office of

the President of Brazil, Brasília, Brazil.

E-mail: luizsan@planalto.gov.br

Journal of Public Affairs

Volume 14 Number 3 pp 379–391 (2014)

Published online 6 January 2012 in Wiley Online Library

(wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/pa.432

Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.