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The purpose of this article is to analyse the weaknesses of governance institutions in constraining grand corruption arising from the government procurement of large foreign-funded infrastructure projects in the Philippines. The weaknesses are revealed in the description and analysis of two major scandals, namely, the construction of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant during the Marcos era and the National Broadband Network project of the Arroyo presidency.

This research employs a historical and comparative case approach to explore patterns of grand corruption and their resolution. Primary and secondary data sources including court decisions, congressional records, journal articles and newspaper reports are used to construct the narratives for each case.

Top-level executive agreements that do not require competitive public bidding provide an opportunity for grand corruption. Such agreements encourage the formation of corrupt rent-seeking relationships involving the selling firm, brokers, politicians and top-level government executives. Closure of cases of grand corruption is a serious problem that involves an incoherent and politically vulnerable prosecutorial and justice system.

This paper aims to contribute to research on grand corruption involving the executive branch in the Philippines, particularly in the procurement of large, foreign-funded government projects. It examines allegations of improprieties in government project contracting and the politics of resolving corruption scandals through the justice system.

This study aims to examine the influence of corporate governance variables on firm performance and also to find out whether the corporate governance mechanism is capable of mitigating the vertical agency crisis. Here the researcher uses corporate governance mechanisms such as board meeting frequency, board independence, percentage of non-executive directors, percentage of woman directors on board and the board size to measure the firm performance and, at the same time, tries to mitigate the agency crisis, which is measured through return on asset and asset turnover ratio.

The present study considers period from 2009 to 2020 with data corresponding to a panel of 271 non-financial firms listed in 500 NSE index, India. The study introduces a panel regression model to analyze the data collected from the sample firms.

The study detects a positive as well as a statistically significant relationship between board size and vertical agency cost. The study also observes a negative relationship between board independence and agency cost. Further, the study finds a positive relationship between corporate governance variables and firm performance, though it is non-significant.

As the study progresses, the study detects a negative relationship between non-executive directors and agency costs. This study tries to give policy prescription to the corporate policymaker regarding various measures to be taken by the firm for the improvement of firm performance and reduction of owner and manager conflict inside the company. The study fills the literature gap by revealing a significant relationship between corporate governance, vertical agency crisis and firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the five mistakes made by political leaders in Asian countries in combating corruption. These mistakes constitute the cycle of failure which must be broken for Asian countries to succeed in fighting corruption.

This paper is based on the comparative evaluation of the effectiveness of the anti-corruption measures adopted by various Asian countries.

The cycle of failure in combating corruption in Asian countries arises from their governments’ reliance on corrupt political leaders and the police, and multiple anti-corruption agencies as attack dogs or paper tigers.

This paper would be of interest to those policymakers, anti-corruption practitioners, and scholars, who are concerned with enhancing the effectiveness of anti-corruption strategies in their countries by breaking the cycle of failure.

The purpose of this paper is to compare and evaluate how the governments in six Asian countries have dealt with selected grand corruption scandals.

This paper is based on the comparative analysis of 11 corruption scandals examined in the six articles on India, Japan, Macau, Malaysia, Philippines and Singapore included in this special issue of Public Administration and Policy.

The responses of the governments in the six countries depend on the strength of their political will in combating corruption. The responses of the governments in Malaysia, Philippines, India and Japan reflect their weak political will in combating corruption and lack of accountability of the corrupt offenders. By contrast, the strong political will of the governments in Singapore and Macau is reflected in the investigation and punishment of the corrupt offenders without any cover-up of the scandals.

The findings would be of interest to scholars, policymakers and anti-corruption practitioners and activists.

The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of community-based and driven approaches during the lockdowns and early periods of the pandemic. The study examines the impact and perceptions of the state-led intervention. This would help to discover a better approach for postpandemic interventions and policy responses.

This article used the inductive method and gathered its data from surveys. In search of global opinions on COVID-19 responses received in communities, two countries in each continent with high COVID-19 infection per 100,000 during the peak period were chosen for study. In total, 13 community workers, leaders and members per continent were sampled. The simple percentile method was chosen for analysis. The simple interpretation was used to discuss the results.

The study showed that poor publicity of community-based interventions affected awareness and fame as most were mistaken for government interventions. The study found that most respondents preferred state interventions but preferred many communities or local assessments of projects and interventions while the projects were ongoing to adjust the project and intervention as they progressed. However, many preferred community-based and driven interventions.

State secrecy and perceived opposition oppression limited data sourcing for this study in countries where state interventions are performed in secret and oppression of perceived opposition voices limited data collection in some countries. Thus, last-minute changes were made to gather data from countries on the same continent. An intercontinental study requires data from more countries, which would require more time and resources. This study was affected by access to locals in remote areas where raw data would have benefited the study.

The absence of data from the two most populous countries due to government censorship limits access to over a third of the global population, as they make up 2.8 out of 7 billion.

The choice of two countries in each continent is representational enough, yet the absence of data from the two most populous countries creates a social identity gap.

The survey collected unique and genuine data and presents novel results. Thus, this study provides an important contribution to the literature on the subject. There is a need for maximum support for community-based interventions and projects as well as global data collection on community-based or driven interventions and projects.

The aim of this study is to investigate how Nigeria can seek legal assistance on recovery of its stolen assets to reduce corruption and to ensure no sheltered havens for incomes from corruption.

The research adopts a conceptual method by using existing literature with the application of doctrinal legal research technique. The research likewise uses primary and secondary sources of legislations such as legislative provisions, case laws and the provisions of Chapter V of the United Nations Convention against Corruption and the process of asset recovery. The study compares the United Kingdom, USA, Hong Kong in China, South Africa and Nigeria proceeds of corruption recovery laws to gain basic legal features that would be beneficial to Nigeria in reforming its anti-corruption laws.

The principle of territorial sovereignty under the international law makes the offence of corruption not punishable outside the jurisdiction of the state where the offence was committed. As a result, some developed states boost their economy with these proceeds and the developing states are impoverished. There is also an allegation of discrepancies in the figures of funds recovered by the anti-corruption agencies. Thus, there is the need for transparency; law on civil forfeiture of proceeds of corruption; bilateral treaties; and mutual legal assistance on investigation, confiscation among countries for tracing and returning of proceeds of corruption.

The estimates of the volume of assets looted from Nigeria vary widely because of the complexity of collecting data on proceeds of corruption as official statistics on proceeds of corruption recovered do not exist as each anti-corruption agency occasionally makes pronouncements on the volume of assets recovered without any breakdown in terms of assets seized, nature of assets and their locations and its values. Such data would aid policymakers to measure the effectiveness of the present assets legislations and to enhance its effectiveness.

Considering the clandestine manners corruption is being committed, it is tasking to correctly evaluate the amount of money stolen so, their economic impacts on the nation’s economy.

Absence of accurate data would aid policymakers to measure the effectiveness of the present assets legislations and to enhance its effectiveness.

The study offers modules on management of proceeds of corruption by establishing “Assets Management Commission” and “Proceeds of Corruption Forfeiture Funds” for reparation of victims’ of corruption. The study suggests the necessity for civil forfeiture of proceeds of corruption, which is presently lacking, and creation of Proceeds of Corruption Recovery and Management Commission to manage such proceeds and advocate establishment of “Proceeds of Corruption Forfeiture Funds” for reparation of victims of corruption.