Bettina Hollstein gives a working paper on 'Why do we criticize corruption and under which circumstances does criticism help?'

Corruption research often inquires into the motivations of corrupt actors and into the circumstances and institutional settings that promote corruption in order to find out how we can prevent corruption.

In my contribution, I want to reverse the perspective and to analyze what motivates the critique of corruption and what the circumstances and institutional settings are that help to make critique of corruption effective. I start with the assumption that the critique of social phenomena which are embedded in a society for a long time, and normalized by habitualization, is quite improbable. Therefore, I look at the elements and actors which are relevant to raising the awareness of corrupt practices. How can we explain the development of new interpretations of certain practices as corrupt and no longer as “normal”? Which situations and dynamics are relevant for institutional changes that change also the normal/regular interpretation of socially accepted norms? Why does whistleblowing become more and more accepted in specific contexts, while it is seen as a case of lack of loyalty in others?