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FINAL VERSION

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Corruption in Romania

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Corruption in Romania can be found in the politics, military, health care and private businesses and poses concerns for foreign investors. Although there have been improvements since the fall of the communist regime in 1989, corruption remains a problem in Romania as it is especially found on all levels of public office, in the police force as well as in the judiciary system.[1] According to Transparency International's annual Corruption Perceptions Index, as of 2017, Romania is the third most corrupt country in the European Union after Bulgaria, Hungary and at the same level as Greece. The same index also ranks the country as the 59th most corrupt nation out of 180 countries.[2] Generally, despite efforts using laws and regulations to prevent corruption, enforcement has been weak.[3] Since 2014 however, the investigation and prosecution of medium- and high-level political, judicial and administrative officials by the National Anticorruption Directorate has increased [4] The National Anticorruption Directorate was established in 2002 by the Romanian government to investigate and prosecute corruption related offenses causing damage to the Romanian state.[5] In terms of scandals, the 2012–15 social unrest, the 2015 protests following the Colectiv nightclub fire, and the 2017 protests are all examples of disputes stemming from corruption.

Background

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After the fall of communism in 1989, Romania has struggled and is still struggling with its transition towards democracy and establishing a well-functioning judicial system.[6] When the treaty was signed with the European Union, former president Traian Băsescu mentioned that "Romania [was] not yet prepared to meet the European Union's standards."[7] Since entering the EU, Romania has somewhat improved transparency and accountability in the public sector, but the European Commission still considers the government's reform to be slow and weak.[8] The poor implementation of laws on the transparency of information and decision-making processes between government officials coupled with the bribes and conflicts of interests in public procurement practices makes the judicial system ineffective in fighting against corruption. [9] This has had consequences in effectively using the European Union's funds towards developing the country. Although it plays a considerable role in the country's stagnant path towards progress, corruption is only one of the issues among others. Other factors include the administrative capacity of public purchasers, the lack of stability and fragmentation of the legal framework, the quality of competition in public procurement and few others listed in the Report from the Commission to the European Parliamant and the Council.[10]

In 2012, the European Commission expressed concerns about the rule of law, pointing to the power struggle between Prime Minister Victor Ponta and President Traian Băsescu, which gave rise to what is called the 2012 political crisis.[11][12] The Commission also criticized Romania for failing to root out corruption in its state institutions.[13] One year later, the Chamber of Deputies passed without parliamentary debate several controversial amendments to the Penal Code, including that the country's president, senators, members of the lower chamber, as well as lawyers are no longer to be considered "public officials".[14][15] These actors can as a result take part in illicit interests without being held accountable for abuse of office, bribery, conflicts of interest and other corruption crimes.[16] The amendments were criticized by Romanian opposition parties and European leaders,[17] while the Constitutional Court of Romania cataloged this move as unconstitutional.[18]

The report from the US Department of State published in May 2015 demonstrates that the government of Romania still takes part in corrupt activities such as bypassing standard legislative procedures and imposing fines on infrastructure in certain sectors like the energy industry. [19] The lack of political will demonstrated by the 2012 political crisis as well as the under-funding of the National Anticorruption Directorate poses a major challenge in investigating and enforcing sanctions to bureaucratic corruption. Although the National Anticorruption Directorate has taken action in investigating corrupt cases, enforcing sanctions remains weak and staff and inspection procedures are under-resourced. As it is mentioned in the report, "conflict of interest, respect for standards of ethical conduct, and integrity in public office in general remain a concern for all three branches of government" and the National Anticorruption Directorate will further its initiatives in tackling the problem.[19]

Anti-corruption measures

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In 2014, the National Anticorruption Directorate indicted 1,138 authorities. Among them were politicians, judges and prosecutors, and businessmen. [20]

In 2015, the number of filed cases against high-level politicians and businessmen that committed corrupt acts has increased by an additional 1,250 people and has had a substantial social impact. Out of those people are Prime Minister Victor Ponta, 5 ministers and 21 parliamentarians.[21] There have been 970 final convictions throughout the year and the amount of damages recovered has increased to €194.37 million.[21]

In 2016, 1,270 more people were brought to trial, including 3 ministers, 17 parliamentarians, 47 mayors, 16 magistrates and 21 CEOs.[22] The amount of damages recovered has increased to €226 million.[21]

2017 marked the year where an additional 997 individuals were accused and found guilty by the National Anticorruption Directorate, including the former President of the Chamber of Deputies, 6 parliamentarians, 3 ministers, 49 mayors, 6 magistrates and 11 CEOs.[23] The amount of damages recovered has decreased to €159.5 million.[23]

In January 2017, the newly appointed government modified the Penal Code and Penal Procedure Code overnight as a way to fix the issue of overcrowding in prisons.[24] Opponents released accusations that the government has actually modified the Codes as a way to decriminalize political corruption, to release former politicians from prison without punishment and to stop any accusations and investigations made to current authorities. [25] 24 hours later, the biggest protest since the fall of communism was witnessed, with 300,000 civilians manifesting their opposition to the government's actions in front of Victoria Palace.[26] In February 2017, the protests held reached an unprecedented turnout of 500,000 people.[27] The anti-corruption measures taken by civilians resulted in the withdrawal of the bills and the resignation of the former minister of justice. [28] Since then, multiple protests composed of hundreds of thousands of Romanians have continued as a way to tackle corruption within the government. According to the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Commission, the promotion of integrity, accountability, and transparency by civil society organizations have made significant contributions to the decline of corruption.” [29]

See also

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Draft: Assignment week 10

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Edited Corruption in Romania:

For my edit on "corruption in Romania" I generally had to change a little bit (or a lot!) of each section since there were many sentence structure issues as well as substantial plagiarism (word to word) from the sources.

I have switched the section "background and extent" and "anti-corruption measures" to provide better flow to the article.

I have also removed certain sub-headings that were irrelevant and instead included certain information found in those to the bigger sections.

I have expanded both the "background and extent" as well as the "anti corruption measures" section to provide a deeper understanding on its background as well as information on some recent anti-corruption examples.

I had to either remove certain citations that were plagiarized or modify them extensively. I have also done additional research and included new sources to the article.

Corruption in Romania

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Corruption in Romania can be found in the politics, military, health care and private businesses.Although there have been significant improvements, corruption remains a problem in Romania. According to Transparency International's annual Corruption Perceptions Index, as of 2017, Romania is the third most corrupt country in the European Union after Bulgaria, Hungary and at the same level as Greece. The index also ranks the country on 59th place out of 180 countries. Generally, despite efforts using laws and regulations to prevent corruption, enforcement has been weak. Since 2014 however, the investigation and prosecution of medium- and high-level political, judicial and administrative officials by the National Anticorruption Directorate has increased. The 2012–15 social unrest, the 2015 protests following the Colectiv nightclub fire, and the 2017 protests are all examples of scandals stemming from corruption. For more notable corruption cases:

Further information: List of corruption scandals in Romania

Background and extent

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After the fall of communism in 1989, Romania has, and is still struggling with its transition towards democracy and establishing a well-functioning judicial system. When the treaty was signed with the European Union, former president Traian Băsescu mentioned that "Romania [was] not yet prepared to meet the European Union's standards." Since entering the EU, Romania has somewhat improved transparency and accountability in the public sector, but the European Commission still considers the government's reform to be slow and weak. The poor implementation of laws on transparency of information and decision-making processes between government officials coupled with the bribes and conflicts of interests in public procurement practices makes the sluggish judicial system ineffective in fighting against corruption. This has had consequences in effectively using the European Union's funds towards developing the country. Although it plays a considerable role in the country's stagnant path towards progress, corruption is only one of the issues among others. Other factors include the administrative capacity of public purchasers, the lack of stability and fragmentation of the legal framework, the quality of competition in public procurement and few others listed in the Report from the Commission to the European Parliamant and the Council.

In 2012, the European Commission expressed concerns about the rule of law, pointing to the power struggle between Prime Minister Victor Ponta and President Traian Băsescu, which gave rise to what is called the 2012 political crisis. The Commission also criticized Romania for failing to root out corruption in its state institutions. One year later, the Chamber of Deputies passed without parliamentary debate several controversial amendments to the Penal Code, including that the country's president, senators, members of the lower chamber, as well as lawyers are no longer to be considered "public officials". What this means is that these actors can take part in illicit interests without being held accountable for abuse of office, bribery, conflicts of interest and other corruption crimes. The amendments were sharply criticized by Romanian opposition parties and European leaders, while the Constitutional Court of Romania cataloged this move as unconstitutional.

The report from the US Department of State published in May 2015 demonstrates that the government still takes part in corrupt activities such as bypassing standard legislative procedures and imposing fines on infrastructure in certain sectors like the energy industry. The lack of political will from Romania's leaders allows corruption to keep circulating in the country. Although the National Anticorruption Directorate has taken action in investigating corrupt cases, enforcing sanctions remains weak and staff and inspection procedures are under-resourced. As it is mentioned in the report, "conflict of interest, respect for standards of ethical conduct, and integrity in public office in general remain a concern for all three branches of government" and the National Anticorruption Directorate will further its initiatives in tackling the problem.

Anti-corruption measures

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The National Anticorruption Directorate indicted 1,138 authorities such as politicians, judges and prosecutors and businessmen in 2014. The number of filed cases against high-level politicians and businessmen that committed corrupt acts has increased by an additional 1,250 people in 2015 and has had a substantial social impact. Out of those people is Prime Minister Victor Ponta, 5 ministers and 21 parliamentarians. There have been 970 final convictions throughout the year and the amount of damages recovered has increased to €194.37 million. In 2016, 1,270 more people were brought to trial, including 3 ministers, 17 parliamentarians, 47 mayors, 16 magistrates and 21 CEOs. The amount of damages recovered has increased to €226 million. 2017 marked the year where an additional 997 individuals were accused and found guilty by the National Anticorruption Directorate, including a former President of the Chamber of Deputies, 6 parliamentarians, 3 ministers, 49 mayors, 6 magistrates and 11 CEOs. The amount of damages recovered has decreased to €159.5 million.

In January 2017, the newly appointed government modified the Penal Code and Penal Procedure Code overnight as a way to fix the issue of overcrowding in prisons. Opponents released accusations that the government has in fact modified the Codes as a way to decriminalize political corruption, to release former politicians from prison without punishment and to stop any accusations and investigations made to current authorities. 24 hours later, the biggest protest since the fall of communism was witnessed, with 300,000 civilians manifesting their opposition to the government's actions in front of Victoria Palace. In February history was made for the Romanian population as the manifestation has reached a total 500,000 people. The anti-corruption measures taken by civilians resulted in the withdrawal of the bills and the resignation of the former minister of justice. Since then, multiple protests composed of thousands of Romanians have continued as a way to tackle corruption within the government. The values of integrity, accountability and transparency have therefore proved to be efficient components in fighting corruption.

See also

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Project Proposal: Possible Topics. Assignment Week 7

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Look up 3-5 potential topics related to the course that you might want to update on Wikipedia. Review the content of the article and check the Talk page to see what other Wikipedians are already contributing. Identify one or two areas from each that you could improve.

  • Corruption in Romania:
    • As mentioned in last weeks assignment, I would change the structure of the page to make each section transition smoothly.
    • I would also revise certain sections that do not have proper citations and include them in the bibliography.
  • Integrity Pact:
    • This page is too short in terms of the information given on Integrity Pacts. Hence, I would expand the research on Integrity Pacts in terms of what it is, how it can aid in tackling corruption as well as including examples of countries using Integrity Pacts.
    • As short as it is, it still lacks proper citation. For instance, the first sentence quotes a definition of Integrity Pacts without attaching any citations, which is a clear example of plagiarism.
  • State Capture:
    • The article presents factual information on state capture rather than demonstrating biases towards one stance.
    • I find the article does not have enough examples of State Capture. Additionally, the case of South Africa presents enough information on the issue (although some information needs to be updated). However, the case of State Capture in the sections of Latin America and Bulgaria are maybe one to two sentences long. Hence, I would expand on those two countries as well as adding other examples.
  • Gift:
    • Even by having such a broad term to define, the wikipedia page is very flawed. Many citations are missing, the definition of "gift" is not objective and the whole page is written as an opinion-based paper. There is even a note from wikipedia that pops-up mentioning that the article presents itself with multiple issues. Aside from stating that many citations are missing, flawed or need to be updated, the talk page does not consist of many updates and improvements achieved for this page.
    • There is maybe two sentences on gift-giving as manipulation and as it relates to bribery in two different sections. I would therefore create a different heading to further discuss the problems that can arise with gift-giving by public officials.

Choose 2-3 potential articles from that list that you can tackle, and post links to the articles and your notes about what you might improve.

Corruption in Romania and Integrity pact are two articles from the list above I can tackle. The articles both lack proper citations and need further information to be updated/included in. Additionally, there is little to no activity in the talk pages.

For the topic of "corruption in Romania", I would change the structure of the article as some sections do not tie together in a logic manner. In addition, I would also briefly discuss the protests in Romania that followed up corruption scandals and link it to the Wikipedia page "2017-2018 Romanian protests" as it extends on the subject.

In terms of "Integrity pact", the main contribution would be to further the information on Integrity Pacts. The page needs a more detailed definition of what Integrity Pacts are with their proper citations as well as a section on what its mandate is as an anti-corruption tool. Following up a section onhow it can tackle corruption, I would include a different heading that will discuss its application in certain case countries.

Article Evaluation: Assignment Week 6

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I learned a lot from the training on evaluating articles and sources. I was unaware of the extent of the analysis that needs to take place when writing a Wikipedia article. Additionally, I learned that Wikipedia is very rigid on its citation regulations. For instance, not only are there very strict regulations on copyrights and plagiarism but the Wikipedia article has to be very neutral, hence drawing from many different sources as to write unbiased information.

For my article evaluation I choose "Corruption in Romania." The contributors have done a great job in laying down crucial information about corruption in Romania. Nevertheless, the sections do not tie in effectively together. With this in mind, I would switch the section "Background and extent" at the top of the page, right after the introduction as to effectively transition from a brief summary to a history of corruption in Romania. Then, I would place the "anti-corruption drive" after the background on corruption and Romania and before notable corruption cases. I would rearrange it in such a way because the information on corruption in Romania will tie together more efficiently if we talk about its background and history, the anti-corruption measures that stems from that background and finally finishing up with the links to notable corruption cases. Additionally, I would remove the heading "enhancing civil society participation" as to simply place it as a different paragraph under "anti-corruption drive". Lastly in terms of structure, I would take the brief portion from "background and extent" that discusses the popular protests in 2017 and move it in the "anti-corruption drive" as it is a social movement aimed at decreasing corruption in Romania. Moreover, I would also elaborate in a more detailed manner on the protests of 2017 as it marks an important phenomenon in Romania's society to curb corruption.

Most citations that are present in the article are relevant and from current times. However, there are certain portions that would require references. For example, "The Romanian government continues to use emergency measures to pass legislation, bypassing normal legislative procedures, including economic impact analyses and consultations with stakeholders. Corruption at all levels remains endemic and the country's leaders have not yet displayed a consistent political will necessary to effectively tackle this issue. Romanian law and regulations contain provisions intended to prevent corruption, but enforcement is generally weak." Other sections where statistics are present also miss references. On another note, in terms of sentence structures, there are a few phrases that require minor revisions

Lastly, when I visit the "talk" section, there are unfortunately no ratings visible. However, the article belongs to certain Wikiprojects, including Wikiproject Romania and Wikiproject Politics.

link [7] and [16] https://www.state.gov/documents/organization/229187.pdf , http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-eu-31537338 were plagiarism.

  1. ^ GAN. "Romania Corruption Report". Retrieved 2018-04-18.
  2. ^ "Corruption Perceptions Index 2017". Transparency International. Retrieved 14 March 2017.
  3. ^ "Fighting Corruption with Con Tricks: Romania's Assault on the Rule of Law | Henry Jackson Society". henryjacksonsociety.org. Retrieved 2018-04-18.
  4. ^ "2015 Investment Climate Statement - Romania". The US Department of State. The US Department of State. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
  5. ^ "National Anticorruption Directorate". Wikipedia. 2018-04-07.
  6. ^ Clark, David (January 2017). "Fighting Corruption with Con Tricks: Romania's Assault on the Rule of Law". The Henry Jackson Society.
  7. ^ "Europe Union: How Fit Are Romania and Bulgaria for the EU?". Spiegel Online. 2005-04-18. Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  8. ^ "Romania praised again in EU justice monitoring report but weaknesses remain". EURACTIV.com. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  9. ^ "EUR-Lex - 52015DC0035 - EN - EUR-Lex". eur-lex.europa.eu. Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  10. ^ "Snapshot of the Romania Country Profile". Business Anti-Corruption Portal. GAN Integrity Solutions. Retrieved 17 November 2013.
  11. ^ Andrew Gardner, Toby Vogel (11 July 2012). "Romanian power struggle alarms Europe's leaders". European Voice.
  12. ^ Sam Cage, Luiza Ilie (22 November 2012). "Populism takes spotlight in Romania power struggle". Reuters.
  13. ^ "EU Commission chides Romania over state corruption". BBC News. 18 July 2012.
  14. ^ Raluca Besliu (18 January 2014). "Legally corrupt: Romanian politicians chase 'super-immunity'". Aljazeera.
  15. ^ "Transparency International Romania statement on recent immunity decision by Chamber of Deputies". Transparency International. 12 December 2013.
  16. ^ Valentina Pop (11 December 2013). "Romanian MPs decriminalise political corruption". EUobserver.
  17. ^ Luiza Ilie (22 January 2013). "Romania parliament boosts criminal immunity, may irk EU". Reuters.
  18. ^ Wendy Zeldin (23 January 2014). "Romania: Court Finds Immunity Law Unconstitutional". Library of Congress.
  19. ^ a b "2015 Investment Climate Statement - Romania". US Department of State. Retrieved May 2015. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  20. ^ "Romania anti-sleaze drive reaches elite". BBC News. 19 February 2015.
  21. ^ a b c "Raport de activitate 2015". National Anticorruption Directorate. Retrieved 25 January 2017.
  22. ^ "Raport de activitate 2016". National Anticorruption Directorate. Retrieved 3 May 2017.
  23. ^ a b "Raport de activitate 2017". National Anticorruption Directorate. Retrieved 4 March 2018.
  24. ^ "Romanians protest government plan to commute sentences". POLITICO. 2017-01-22. Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  25. ^ "Nucleara din justitie. Lista potentialilor beneficiari ai dezincriminarii mascate a abuzului in serviciu". HotNewsRo (in Romanian). Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  26. ^ "FOTO VIDEO Cel mai amplu protest din ultimii 25 de ani. Peste 300.000 de oameni au fost în stradă". www.digi24.ro (in Romanian). Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  27. ^ "Romanian government under pressure as 500,000 protest". www.aljazeera.com. Retrieved 2018-03-17.
  28. ^ CNN, Cosmin Stan and Kara Fox,. "Romanian Justice Minister resigns". CNN. Retrieved 2018-03-17. {{cite news}}: |last= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  29. ^ "evidence Project Deliverable 7 | SIOR. Social Impact Open Repository". sior.ub.edu. Retrieved 2018-04-18.
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