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Document Author(s): Barrett, Christopher B. , Gibson, Clark C. , Hoffman, Barak , Mccubbins, Mathew D.

This journal piece argues that two problems weaken the claims of those who link corruption and the exploitation of natural resources. The first is conceptual and the second is methodological. Studies that use national-level indicators of corruption fail to note that corruption comes in many forms, at multiple levels, that may affect resource use quite differently: negatively, positively, or not at all. Without a clear causal model of the mechanism by which corruption affects resources, one should treat with caution any estimated relationship between corruption and the state of natural resources. Simple, atheoretical models linking corruption measures and natural resource use typically do not account for other important control variables pivotal to the relationship between humans and natural resources. By way of illustration of these two general concerns, we used statistical methods to demonstrate that the findings of a recent, well-known study that posits a link between corruption and decreases in forests and elephants are not robust to simple conceptual and methodological refinements. In particular, once we controlled for a few plausible anthropogenic and biophysical conditioning factors, estimated the effects in changes rather than levels so as not to confound cross-sectional and longitudinal variation, and incorporated additional observations from the same data sources, corruption levels no longer had any explanatory power. This essay concludes that An appropriate benchmark of the links between corruption and natural resources, established from the existing literature (e.g., McPherson & Nieswiadomy 2000; Smith et al. 2003b; Katzner 2005), is whatwe call the conventional model. This model assumes that developing countries suffer from entrenched patronage politics, lack the rule of law, have low-paid civil servants, and “nonexistent accountability.” corruption and natural resources might be related, but not in the causal ways commonly posited in simple models. Indeed, the causal relation, if any exists, could plausibly involve corruption reducing, rather than accelerating, natural resource degradation. Perhaps this implies that good governance is not a requirement for natural resource management as the author writes: The links between national-level governance and natural resources are many and tangled. Additional work that attempts to bridge the social and natural sciences is clearly needed to better explain these important and complex relationships.

Reviewer: Shreya Mehta

Journal: Conservation Biology

Document type(s):

• Project overview document/gray literature
• Journal article
• Meta-analysis of literature

Star rating: ★★★

Regions:

• Global

Natural resource(s):

• Biodiversity
• Forest

NWP Principles - Power

• Local stakeholder input into public decisions and policy - [Critical]
• Natural resource authority and functions distribution - [Critical]

Constraints

• Governance/empowerment - [Communal]

Additional Discussion Topics

• Lessons learned (Cautionary Tale)
• Governance - [External or structural policies that influenced success or failure]