Proxy indicators for the corrupt misuse of corporations

Mihály Fazekas, Bence Tóth (2016): Proxy indicators for the corrupt misuse of corporations. U4 Brief 2017:6. 

Mihály Fazekas and Bence Tóth’s corruption proxy challenge paper has been published on U4 Anticorruption Resoure Center’ website here:


We need more imaginative ways of addressing corruption. It is important to generate indicators that development agencies can use. U4 and DFID developed a proxy challenge competition to inspire the research community to develop reliable, intuitive, accessible and cost-effective assessment methods that are useful across country-contexts.

The abuse of companies for corrupt purposes has reached the forefront of international anti-corruption efforts. However, we lack systematic evidence on which corporate characteristics are likely to signal corruption, and in which contexts. This can bias our understanding of corruption, making it overly focused on the public sector. Monitoring company age is a specific example of how we can validate indicators, tailored to context. We find company corruption risk indicators among three company characteristics: 1. Company registration, such as many companies on the same address 2. Financial information, such as extreme profitability, and 3. Ownership and management structures, such as hidden owners.