Burdens, bribes, and bureaucrats
The Political Economy of Petty Corruption and Administrative Burdens
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6294785 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Fernando Nieto-Morales (0000-0003-4130-2745, El Colegio de México), Rik Peeters (0000-0002-9013-6192, Public Administration Division, CIDE , Mexico City), Gabriela Lotta (0000-0003-2801-1628, Fundação Getulio Vargas) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 481-497 |
| Publication date | 2024-10-04 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1053-1858 • E-ISSN: 1477-9803 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jopart/muae010 |
| OpenAlex | W4395022784 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 14 |
| References cited | 75 |
Bribery and other forms of petty corruption typically arise in bureaucratic encounters and are a common element of the everyday experience of the state in many countries, particularly in places with weak institutions. This type of corruption is especially troublesome because it creates direct costs for citizens when accessing services and benefits to which they are formally entitled. However, only a few studies deal with how situational attributes of bureaucratic interactions create incentives for citizens to pay bribes and opportunities for street-level bureaucrats to demand them. We contribute to filling this gap by providing evidence that administrative burdens increase the chance of bribery. We do so by analyzing the prevalence of (attempted) bribery in more than 63,000 interactions across 20 different types of bureaucratic encounters, ranging from paying taxes to accessing essential services, using multilevel logistic regression analysis. Our study contributes to understanding the possible consequences of administrative burdens and the factors conducive to petty corruption in specific citizen–state interactions
Bureaucracy · Business · Economics · Language change · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Public economics · Corruption and Economic Development · Law · Public Administration
Paying to Be Wrong
Bureaucratic Resistance in Times of Democratic Backsliding
Citizens' perspectives on administrative burden in digital government services
Fairness Perception, Administrative Burden, and Social Welfare Participation
Does corruption perception increase public servant corruptibility? An experimental analysis
From Passive Recipients to Active Participants
The politics of anti-corruption crackdowns in autocracies
Exploring the influence of administrative capacities on administrative burdens
Administrative Burdens as a Mechanism of Distributive Politics
Administrative burden reducing in China
Administrative Burden Revisited
Unintended, Unequal Hybrid Service Systems
I’ll Bribe You Because I Trust You
Echoes From Micro-Experience to Macro-Judgment
Is self-reported social distancing susceptible to social desirability bias? Using the crosswise model to elicit sensitive behaviors
Explaining Citizen Satisfaction and Dissatisfaction with Public Services
The Politics of Institutional Weakness in Latin America
The Quality of Government
Interaction Effects in Logistic Regression
Taxation without Representation in Contemporary Rural China
When the State Meets the Street
“Don’t Tell Them What You Told Me”
Indulgent citizens
Cops, Teachers, Counselors
Law Enforcement, Malfeasance, and Compensation of Enforcers
Corruption and Government
Rents, Competition, and Corruption
The causes of corruption
Administrative Burden
Street-level bureaucracy in weak state institutions
Alternative Politics and Attitudes toward the Welfare State
Administrative Burden in Citizen–State Interactions
Perceptions and Attitudes about Corruption and Democracy in Mexico
Is Bribery Really Regressive? Bribery’s Costs, Benefits, and Mechanisms
Exploiting the Poor
How corruption hits people when they are down
Bureaucracy intermediaries, corruption and red tape
Red tape and corruption
Presidential Address
Like counting deckchairs on the Titanic
The unequal distribution of administrative burden
Working Within a System of Administrative Burden
The Political Economy of Administrative Burdens
Greasing the wheels? The impact of regulations and corruption on firm entry
Why Do People Pay Bribes? A Survey Experiment with Resource Users
Shifting Administrative Burden to the State
The Effect of Administrative Burden on Bureaucratic Perception of Policies
Corruption consolidation in local governments
Negotiated compliance at the street level
Violence and the Costs of Honesty
Civil Service Laws, Merit, Politicization, and Corruption
Human resource management as a tool to control corruption
Gaming the system
Administrative Capital and Citizens’ Responses to Administrative Burden
Careers, Connections, and Corruption Risks
Just or Unjust? How Ideological Beliefs Shape Street‐Level Bureaucrats’ Perceptions of Administrative Burden
Creaming among Caseworkers
How Do Citizens Assess Street‐Level Bureaucrats’ Warmth and Competence? A Typology and Test
Administrative Burden
Citizen Reactions to Bureaucratic Encounters
Does Reducing Street-Level Bureaucrats’ Workload Enhance Equity in Program Access? Evidence from Burdensome College Financial Aid Programs
Children of a Lesser God
Administrative Exclusion
The Bite of Administrative Burden
Policy Work
Corruption
Taking the bite out of administrative burdens
Need or Greed? Conditions for Collective Action against Corruption
Why Anticorruption Reforms Fail—Systemic Corruption as a Collective Action Problem
Corruption and citizen participation in local government
Varieties of connections, varieties of corruption
Governing to Deliver
Selective Policy Implementation in Rural China
Patchwork Leviathan
Dealing with the Local State
Corruption and Political Development
Plata o Plomo
| Citations per year | 14 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |