In projecting Nepali political parties as the most corrupt institutions in the country, Transparency International did the people of Nepal no favors.
Transparency International (TI), an international non-governmental organization (NGO), leads a global movement against corruption. It has charter members in over 100 countries, including in Nepal. Transparency International Nepal (TIN) has a long history of dedicated and committed public service against corruption.
In early July, TIN released a hard hitting report with political parties topping the chart on the corruption index. It held a press conference to showcase the results. The TIN findings spread like wildfire in the local press. In a country deeply frustrated with the political process, the report provided a convenient hypothesis for why our political process was failing: It was failing because political parties were corrupt. [break]
Almost of all the national dailies carried the story in their front page. The digital and electronic media reported on it extensively. “Political parties most corrupt in Nepal: TI survey,” ran the headline in Republica (July 10). “Transparency International report shows Nepali political parties as most corrupt,” said the headline on Image Channel (Imagechannel.com, July 10). “Parties ‘most corrupt’ institution in Nepal,” screamed the headline in The Kathmandu Post (July 9). Almost all of the media reports claimed to be reporting back from the TIN press conference.
The headlines were in fact an exaggeration of actual findings. Technically, the TIN study was reporting on the “perception” of corruption. It was not about whether political parties were actually more or less corrupt than other institutions. It was merely a perception.
TIN derived its results by asking the following question: “To what extent do you see the following categories to be affected by corruption?” It then listed a dozen institutions and asked respondents to categorize each institution on a scale ranging from “Not corrupt at all” to “Extremely corrupt.”
Seventy percent of the respondents labeled political parties as extremely corrupt.
The Nepal study, which the media so gleefully reported, wasn’t even a Nepal specific report. It was part of a global TI study that included surveys of more than 114,000 respondents in 107 countries. The survey in Nepal included approximately 1,000 respondents spread across 50 municipalities.
In the global report, TI was far more precise in its discussion of corruption. “Around the world, political parties, the driving force of democracies, are perceived to be the most corrupt institutions,” it wrote, clearly indicating that the corruption it was reporting was “perceived.”
Nepali media reports had clearly exaggerated the finding when they claimed that TIN had found that political parties were the most corrupt. But TIN issued no rebuttal, no correction. It let the exaggeration and misstatements remain. An organization that so diligently hosts a press conference to discuss its report should at least have held a rejoinder press conference when its findings are so grossly misstated.
The critique of TIN’s study is not merely about survey semantics or definitions of perception versus reality. TIN’s approach to measuring the perception of corruption is analytically faulty. The results overstate the “perception” of corruption in Nepali political parties. It also includes in that measure a sense of the frustration that Nepalis currently have with the political process.
TIN’s survey included no question or control variable that extracts the impact of the negative opinion that Nepalis have of political parties from the measure of the “perception” of corruption.
Ask a Nepali if political parties are corrupt: “Yes, they are extremely corrupt,” most will answer. Ask a Nepali if political parties are likely to cheat you: “Yes, they are all cheats,” most will answer. Ask a Nepali if political parties are likely to eat the food on your plate when you haven’t eaten for days: “Yes, they are all selfish,” most will answer. Ask a Nepali if political leaders are likely to run off with your spouse, girlfriend or boyfriend: “Yes, they have no morals,” most will answer. It doesn’t matter what you ask a Nepali about political parties. So long as it is something bad, they will agree with it. That’s because Nepalis are frustrated with their political parties.
The perception of corruption in political parties that TIN reports is no more than a reflection of the frustration that Nepalis have with their political parties.
But why pick on TIN for a study that so clearly resonates with our own understanding and perception that political parties are corrupt! That’s exactly where the damage begins and why such studies do the people of Nepal no favors.
First, studies that report on corruption, real or perceived, needs to be robust to the point of being factual. Reports about high levels of corruption, especially if there might be far less of it in reality, run the danger of being self-fulfilling prophesies; of making corruption appear more widespread and therefore, more acceptable; of converting “perceived” corruption into real corruption.
Second, in the context of Nepal, such reports can retard the development of our political maturity. Reinforcing the perception that political parties are corrupt adds to the polarization between political parties and people. It provides people a convenient explanation for everything that has gone wrong, thus reducing real life complexities of political discord to the simple explanation that political parties can’t get anything done because they are all corrupt.
Civil society has a role to play in breaking our political stalemate. It must help bridge the divide between people and political parties. It must help rebuild the faith in political systems and democracy in particular. It must get people to reengage with politics, constructively and in a way that builds the pressure for positive change.
Civil society can’t do any of this if all that they are willing to do is simply mirror the perceptions, or misperceptions, of people. It must also be willing to challenge those perceptions. During this difficult phase of transition, civil society must help to reinforce the trust in a democratic political system—not merely provide people the reasons to walk away from it.
The danger in the TIN study is not that it is not believable. The danger is that it is. What then?
Before the 1992 cricket World Cup final, Imran Khan, the captain of the Pakistani team was asked how his side could possibly win against England.
“Angels will not come to play for my side,” he said, before suggesting that he had to win with the team he had, though half of them were injured by the time of the match.
It is the same with us. Angels will not come to lead us. Politicians and political parties, for good or for bad, are all we have.
Civil society has to stop selling the pipe dream of angels suddenly appearing in the outfield.
bishal_thapa@hotmail.com
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