Department of Government Ethics

Published by Political and Economic Risk Consultancy, Asian intelligence journal announced the 2015 report on corruption in Asia on April 1st. According to the report, the Corruption Perceptions fluctuation trend (scores range from 0 to 10, with 10 representing the most corrupt) showed that Taiwan got a score of 5. Compared to last year (2014)’s score 5.31, this year’s score improved and became the best score in the past decade.

Asia Intelligence asked foreigners and citizens of Taiwan to fill out questionnaires. Sixty percent of the interviewed thought that the society had become less corrupt while thirty percent thought level of corruption had remained unchanged. Unfortunately, only less than ten percent of the interviewed thought corruption had become worse. This year, Taiwan ranked in the sixth place in the Asia Pacific region with Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, and Malaysia filling the top five places.

The result of survey indicated that Taiwan’s excellent performance was not by accident. First, the government worked hard with clear consciousness to solve the corruption issues. In 2011, the Ministry of Justice established Agency Against Corruption (AAC) that was responsible for proposing policy to prevent administrative corruption. The establishment of AAC greatly increased government’s ability to fight corruption, making more cases susceptible to prosecution and severe penalty. Since the establishment of AAC, Taiwan’s perceptions scored better than that of Mainland China and surpassed Taiwan’s past records.

Second, the result of survey also indicated that Taiwan’s checks and balances system functioned better than the past did. The democratic system ensured politicians’ scandals were revealed to the public and civil organizations pressured the government to improve governance and transparency through assemblies and social movements. As a result, the politicians had to respond to social pressure to not lose votes from election.

Although the people being interviewed thought bribery and corruption existed in invincible forms, the risk of performing corruptive behaviors was much higher because administrative control and judicial sanctions became more efficient. Besides, AAC continuously polished policies by imitating laws from uncorrupted countries such as Singapore and Sweden so that Taiwan could learn new strategies to deter corruption.

Lastly, Asian Intelligence journal also pointed out that due to the globalization of economic activities, cross-regional corruptions would definitely affect Taiwan. Therefore, AAC not only closely followed three objectives, which were "decreasing corruption rates", "increasing corruption conviction rates", and "ensuring human rights protection", but also vigorously carried out administrative transparency and participated in international exchange of clean governance policy. Through judicial system and AAC’s mutual cooperation, AAC could suppress cross-regional corruptions, stayed on track to global anti-corruption trend, aspired to become a member of highly uncorrupted countries, and finally made the wish of "Clean Government and Transparent Taiwan" come true.