Corruption: When norms upstage the law – Knowable Magazine

Corruption — the misuse of publicly entrusted power for private gain — is a recurrent feature of societies around the world. Though countries vary in the level of corruption, none has succeeded in eliminating it.

One reason corruption persists is that it is deeply embedded in the unwritten rules of society that are known as cultural norms. These expectations of how one ought to behave can lead people to behave corruptly even when they would prefer not to, says Ina Kubbe, a political scientist at Tel Aviv University in Israel who coauthored a look at the role of norms in corruption in the 2024 Annual Review of Political Science.

Knowable Magazine spoke with Kubbe about the key role of norms in fostering corruption, and how to redirect these attitudes toward reform.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Why did you choose to study corruption?

I’ve always been interested in the darker side of human behavior — how people bend rules or prioritize self-interest. Corruption fascinates me because it’s deeply unfair and harmful, shaping people’s access to opportunities and how they experience the state.

At the same time, I’ve seen that many people who engage in bribery feel they have no real choice — they’re navigating systems that make corruption a survival strategy. My research focuses on understanding these pressures and exploring effective measures to prevent corruption from feeling inevitable.

Can’t countries just pass laws to make corruption illegal?

That’s not enough. Corruption thrives not only where formal rules are weak, but also where formal rules are selectively enforced or are systematically circumvented by those with insider access.

Nigeria, for example, has a lot of laws against corruption. The institutional framework is there. The main problem is the lack of enforcement. Another example is Russia, where they also have very stringent anti-corruption laws and regulations, but we see high levels of corruption.

That shifts the focus from laws to social norms. How do norms influence the level of corruption in a society?

One has to learn how societies work and what people expect and how to behave in specific situations. I now live in the Middle East, and social norms are very, very different than in Europe.

Scandinavian countries, for example, in general have strong norms for trust between people — the civil community taking care of each other. You don’t do bad things behind people’s backs, things like that. And we also know that in Scandinavian countries, their institutions are working very well.

But in the Middle East, a lot of countries are very politically unstable, and institutions are not always working. For many people, what we label as “corruption” may be the most reliable form of governance available to them.

So, people have different norms. And one of the norms can be, for example, that you have to bribe a doctor if you want to get access to health care. And in parts of West Africa, local officials may expect a small “dash” to process routine paperwork, and not offering one can be interpreted as disrespectful.

I once spoke to a teacher who explained that parents felt obligated to bring small gifts or cash to secure their child’s school placement, and if they didn’t, the child might be treated unfairly. People are almost offended, sometimes, when you tell them that this is a form of corruption. People will say, No, this is how it works. It always works like that.

Is it hard for a society to break out of that?

It can be very hard. If there’s the expectation of bribing — using your networks, your friends, your colleagues — then everybody’s doing this, and of course, you would be foolish if you don’t use these networks too. These expectations are often more durable than laws or regulations because they are tied to group identity, reputation and legitimacy. They are enforced not by police, but by peers, families, supervisors or elders — making them powerful and hard to dislodge.

Our research, for instance, reveals that many people comply with corrupt norms not because they believe in them, but because they fear social exclusion or retaliation or that they will fail to meet familial obligations. In many cases, resisting corruption is not simply a moral act — it is socially costly, even dangerous. Personal connections are not merely shortcuts to getting what you want, but moral duties to help one’s kin, or ensure one’s survival in a system that is otherwise indifferent or exclusionary.

In Tanzania, for example, families often pool resources to send a child to medical school, with the expectation that the graduate will support the family financially. Once in the profession, these doctors face a dilemma, because official salaries are often too low to meet these family obligations. Accepting informal payments or small bribes becomes a way to fulfill these collective expectations — so the behavior is embedded in social responsibility, not just individual opportunism.

We see similar dynamics elsewhere. In parts of the Middle East, public-sector jobs are often obtained with the understanding that the employee will distribute benefits — such as facilitating paperwork or securing permits — to extended kin networks.

For women especially, these practices are often the only way to access public goods in a deeply gendered landscape.

These findings challenge behavioral models that assume individuals are always trying to maximize material gain; in many cases, people are also navigating competing logics of loyalty, fairness and survival.

And that can discourage people from reporting corruption to the authorities?

In many communities, turning to the law to report corruption is seen as breaking loyalty to one’s social group. For example, in rural India, reporting a local official for demanding bribes can be viewed as betraying the village network — people are expected to resolve issues quietly or through informal negotiation. Similar norms exist in parts of Eastern Europe, where exposing a corrupt colleague to authorities can damage one’s reputation far more than the corruption itself.

These patterns also depend on a country’s historical experience: In societies with a legacy of surveillance or authoritarian rule, people are often deeply reluctant to approach formal authorities, because involving the state evokes fear or mistrust. This combination of social and historical factors helps explain why whistleblowing programs often fail — reporting feels like both social treason and personal risk.

You’ve noted that merely exposing corruption can have the paradoxical effect of reinforcing it. How does that work?

Pointing out widespread corruption is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it can motivate reform. On the other hand, it can normalize corrupt behavior by portraying it as unavoidable. In highly corrupt environments, messages like “everyone pays bribes” do not mobilize resistance — they induce fatalism.

The evidence is clear. Studies have shown that publicizing high rates of corruption reduces people’s willingness to act against it — to report it, to resist it or to support anti-corruption reforms — especially when they believe they would be alone in doing so. Drawing attention to corruption can also demoralize people, who begin to see resisting corruption as unrewarded or futile.

This is not merely a communication problem; it’s a psychological dilemma fundamental to how society operates. Describing corruption as common may be factually accurate, but unless it is paired with messages about accountability, alternative models or successful resistance, it can entrench the very behaviors it seeks to change.

Is there any good news here?

We can change that dynamic. When people realize that their assumptions about how widespread corruption is are exaggerated, they become more willing to act differently. In a study in South Africa, informing participants that fewer people paid bribes than they thought led to measurable reductions in their willingness to pay bribes in experimental settings.

Another study in Mexico found a similar effect: When citizens were shown that other residents overwhelmingly think that bribery is unacceptable, it weakened the belief in universal corruption and decreased people’s willingness to pay bribes.

Yet these messages must be grounded in reality. Telling people that corruption is rare when it’s not may be perceived as dishonest or naïve, not as a hopeful message — potentially undermining the credibility of reformers.

So what can we do? Are there any good examples of success to point to?

Changing what people think is expected from them is a central challenge in anti-corruption work. In such cases, norm change is not only about messaging; it is about changing the incentive structures and the social signals that define respectability and success.

Peer-led interventions, where change is modeled by respected insiders, can have disproportionate impact. In Nigeria, for example, watching respected community members resist corruption in fictional narratives made audiences more likely to report wrongdoing.

Yet these interventions are rarely enough on their own, because norms are embedded in institutional environments. Unless the system supports those who comply with new norms — through protection, rewards or recognition — early adopters are likely to revert to old behaviors. Norm change is fragile unless it is reinforced by societal transformation, such as changes in political leadership, public scandals that delegitimize corrupt elites, or reforms that make clean behavior both feasible and visible.

Has anyone done this?

Yes, a few places. Rwanda, for example, tied anti-corruption to national identity through campaigns, while backing it with strict audits and high-profile prosecutions. Singapore institutionalized merit-based hiring, raised civil servant pay and consistently enforced anti-graft laws, making integrity both materially and socially rewarding. These cases show that durable norm shifts emerge when social expectations and institutional incentives reinforce each other.

Corruption has been in the news a lot lately in the United States, which used to be known for relatively clean politics. Are norms regressing there?

I have to say I’m not an expert on the US. President Trump just received a huge airplane from Qatar. We see this, and people don’t really do anything. This kind of gift should really shock us, so there we already see a shift in norms.

I see this here a lot, of course, in Israel. This is very frustrating, because every citizen deserves an honest, responsible, accountable leader. We don’t see that, and I think citizens should be mad about this. In the end, these people are elected, so they owe citizens something in return.

I think democracies are struggling a lot at the moment. But we know it helps if the country has had a democratic past. The most important thing is that citizens have had this democratic experience and can learn that they can make a change.