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Lessons learned from anti-corruption efforts at municipal and city level

Cities, and the public sector agencies within them, are often the main point of contact between citizens and their government. As such, cities are also typically where citizens experience corruption most acutely, with accompanying effects on trust in government. Addressing corruption risks at the municipal and city level is thus crucial. Cities across the globe have undertaken measures to reduce corruption risks and increase integrity in local public procurement and public service delivery, two areas frequently associated with high levels of corruption risk. Successful measures to tackle widespread challenges include: the implementation of municipal codes of ethics; engaging citizens in corruption risk assessments and the development of integrity plans; digitising processes (such as procurement and licensing); introducing human resources reforms and capacity building for public sector employees; and increasing access to information for citizens and implementing open data measures.

29 October 2019
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Lessons learned from anti-corruption efforts at municipal and city level

Main points

  • A thorough risk assessment and context analysis are crucial to design appropriate local anti-corruption measures.
  • Engaging relevant stakeholders (including citizens) in the risk assessment and design process is paramount.
  • Reforms to public procurement and public services as well as access to information are among the most common and most successful measures implemented.
  • Information technology greatly assists in establishing successful transparency and citizen engagement efforts, but it needs to be implemented with the consideration of local capacities.

Cite this publication


Schöberlein, J. (2019) Lessons learned from anti-corruption efforts at municipal and city level. Bergen: U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute (U4 Helpdesk Answer 2019:10)

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Jennifer Schöberlein

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All views in this text are the author(s)’, and may differ from the U4 partner agencies’ policies.

This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

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