Preventing Corruption by Strengthening Organisational Integrity

Abstract

The article describes the theoretical basis of the integrity survey conducted by the state audit office of hungary and proceeds to assess the extent to which integrity controls have been established in the hungarian public sector based on the 2013 survey. The paper underlines that compliance with the legal requirements is a necessary but not a sufficient condition of integrity. Besides the mandatory rules, soft integrity controls influencing employees’ behaviour play an important role in ensuring that a public body operates in line with its declared principles and values. strengthening integrity is an effective means for preventing corruption as well. The data of the survey show that the establishment of an integrity-oriented organisational culture is at an early stage in the hungarian public sector. The majority of the institutions have developed their own fundamental internal regulations, but less than 40 per cent of them perform risk analysis. More than 50 per cent of respondents apply a number of ‘soft’ controls. The ratio of organisations which have introduced controls specifically against corruption is rather low.