Corruption has been a global issue since ancient times till today, and acts of corruption take place regardless of the political system we exist under, hence, corruption can be said to be a type of conventional crime. As such crimes directly affect the functions, reliability and efficiency of governments, as well as national competitiveness of a country, relating to political austerity, economic prosperity and public sentiment, it would be sufficient enough to affect social stability, the rise an
-+d decline of a nation¡¦s might, and the survival of governments. Throughout history, keeping corruption in check has always been a priority without exception by past governments in bringing peace and stability of the country; and ¡§Integrity¡¨ is the most fundamental requirement of a government. Should the administration of a government lacks the measure of integrity, the trust of the people towards the government will decline with poor governance, dishonest officials and rampant corruption, as a result, the integral administration of a government shall descend into a crisis; therefore, there is not one country around the world that is not constantly advancing its efforts in curbing corruption and governing impartially. Thus, in order to raise the integrity competence of the government, and to respond to the expectations of the public, the government convened a meeting with relevant agencies from the consensus of the meeting on the sustained development of Taiwan¡¦s economy, to jointly deliberate and enact the ¡§Anti-Corruption Action Plan¡¨, which has already been checked and ratified by the Executive Yuan on November 30, 2006. The purpose of enacting the plan was to immediately eliminate corruption and other factors that destabilize economic development, as well as to incorporate economic crimes that seriously impair the image of the government, hoping to effectively raise the integrity competence of the government and enhance national competitiveness.
Since its establishment in 1995, Transparency International, the only international organization devoted to fighting against corruption, has according to the results of various corruption studies, established a Corruption Perception Index based on countries as the assessment subjects, and published it worldwide simultaneously. After several years, this economic index has become the most widely used instrument as a measure of the corruption situation in a country. The Swiss International Institute for Management Development has since 1989 been releasing its annual research report on the economic competitiveness of countries within major economic blocs. This has led to the close attention of various governments and related civic agencies around the world, moving on to adopt this report as its benchmark in governance and operations. The information published by the abovementioned organization has more than proven that the morality of government ethics is closely correlated to the overall performance of civil servants in notion, spirit, virtue, lives and work attitude. The ¡§Integral Governance Ethics Action Plan¡¨ currently driven to be implemented will improve not only the impartial image of government departments but also has the functions of educating and guiding the society. In view of this, various countries around the world place extreme importance in enacting and actualizing its anti-corruption policies.
According to Transparency International, from their observations in the past 12 years, there has been little change in Taiwan¡¦s position on the Corruption Perception Index. On the whole, since 1995 till 2006, Taiwan¡¦s position has been hovering in the narrow range of 25th to 35th. From the viewpoint of comparison between countries around the world, Taiwan is yet to be classified a country with average integrity. However, it is worth noting that on November 6, 2006, Transparency International-Taiwan announced the findings of the 2006 Corruption Perception Index conducted by Transparency International, that Taiwan was placed jointly with Israel at 34th position with 5.9 points, as compared to 2005
, though the score has remained the same, its position has dropped by 2 places. While in comparison with Asian countries such as, Singapore (9.4 at 5th position), Hong Kong (8.3 at 15th position) and Japan (7.6 at 17th position), Taiwan was only slightly superior to South Korea (5.1 at 42nd position), indicating that the corruption situation in Taiwan remains one of the utmost issue pending improvement. Again, according to the 2006 Global Competitiveness Position officially released by the Swiss International Institute for Management Development on May 11, 2006, among the 61 economies, Taiwan was positioned 18th, dropping by 7 places as compared to its standing in 2005. The position of Taiwan in the 4 main index categories in 2006 unanimously slides down, except for ¡§Enterprise Efficiency¡¨ at position 14th, thus having certain comparative advantage. However, ¡§Economic Performance¡¨, ¡§Government Efficiency¡¨ and ¡§Infrastructure Construction¡¨ respectively positioned at 27th, 24th and 20th were on the contrary weaker; hence, there is still much room for improvement in enhancing national competitiveness. From the ranking results above, this should be a serious warning to Taiwan which has only just completed its democratic transformation, as it strives towards quality administration in the 21st century. Looking to the future, it is only with advocating integrity and anti-corruption by the different political parties and factions as well as blue and white collar classes and academic circles of Taiwan, that a united and collaborative networking relationship can be created. By striving together to build the National Integrity System of Taiwan, it is only then that Taiwan will have a chance to ascend to a country of high integral governance, and be able to play an even more active and important role in the international effort against corruption.
In conclusion, among the ¡§Rebuilding Project of the Government¡¨, an integral governance is the basic demand of the people. The strength of national competitiveness is the key to whether a country is being able to have a foothold in the international community, and raising national competitiveness begins with the strengthening of ethical administrative work, and also forms the basic foundation for the current administration to be rebuilt on. According to the statistics from surveys carried out by the Ministry of Law recently, most of the people in society subjectively feel the improvement in the ¡§Integrity of the Government¡¨, though there is still considerable expectations, and how to have the people and government band together to form a climate of integrity, is the unshirkable mission of all civil servants in Taiwan. Though ¡§Uprighting Government Ethics, Stamping Out Corruption¡¨ is the principal task of administrative revolution and administration rebuilding
,it is an even more important index parameter of national competitiveness. Essentially erecting an ¡§Integrity Pride, Corruption Ashamed¡¨ benchmark, and by resolutely upholding the ¡§dare not desire, cannot desire, unable to desire and no necessity to desire¡¨ conviction, so that corruption cases within the government organizations have no avenue of arising again, it is then that a nation of integrity and transparency can be established.
Consequently, the results of the present study can be sum up with the following conclusions and recommendations: 1. The acts of the government in stamping out corruption urgently needs to be strengthened. 2. The faith of people in judiciary officials remains low. 3. The promotion of anti-corruption by the government is still insufficient. 4. The undesirable practices of social nepotism and bribery needs further education. 5. Establish an integrated anti-corruption apparatus to give full support; to have a clean administration, clearing away all economic hindrance, lifting the national competitiveness of Taiwan, and stride into the ranks of countries with high integral governance in the world.
Keywords: Keeping corruption in check, national competitiveness, integral governance, Transparency International and Swiss International Institute for Management Development.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0214108-151858 |
| Date | 14 February 2008 |
| Creators | Liang, Kuo-chiang |
| Contributors | Samuel C.Y.Ku, none, Chin-Tarn Lee |
| Publisher | NSYSU |
| Source Sets | NSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Language | Cholon |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0214108-151858 |
| Rights | not_available, Copyright information available at source archive |
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