134. Oguzhan Dincer & Michael Johnston on Corruption in America
This episode features Oz Dincer and Michael Johnston, who join regular Kickback host Robert Barrington to discuss their new book 'Corruption in America', which explores corruption in various policy areas across all fifty states.
Dincer O, Johnston M. Corruption in America: A Fifty-Ring Circus. Cambridge University Press; 2025.
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42:14
133. Rebecca Dobson Phillips, Helen Taylor & Alex Jacobs on the UK's Anti-Corruption Ecosystem
Is Anti-Corruption work an inclusive movement deeply connected to its grassroots origins, or a self-serving, hierarchical entity that partially manufactures the problems for which it offers solutions?
To critically examine this dichotomy, and the UK’s anticorruption ecosystem more broadly, Kickback host Robert Barrington is joined by Rebecca Dobson-Phillips, assistant Professor in Politics at the Centre for the Study of Corruption, Alex Jacobs, director of the Joffe Trust, and Helen Taylor, a senior legal researcher at spotlight on corruption.
Anti-Corruption in a Discordant World: Contestation, Abuse and Innovation is edited by David Jackson, Inge Amunsen and Aled Williams (Chr. Michelsen Institute) and will be published by Routledge later this year. The book gathers empirical evidence on the many paths anti-corruption has taken in a discordant world and ponders how this context has distorted, deformed and enriched anti-corruption practice. It will include a chapter by Rebecca Dobson Phillips on "Corruption and Anti-corruption in Post-Brexit Britain".
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42:40
132. Nishan de Mel on Sri Lanka's governance-linked bond
This episode features Nishan de Mel, the Executive Director of Verite Research, to discuss their development of Sri Lanka’s innovative governance-linked bond, which seeks to break the country’s vicious cycle of poor governance and financial instability.
Learn more about:
Verite Research - https://www.veriteresearch.org
The Civil Society Governance Diagnostic Report, mentioned by Nishan - https://www.tisrilanka.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/GDA_REPORT_2023.pdf
And the IMF’s Governance Diagnostic Assessment - https://www.treasury.gov.lk/news/article/221
For more on issues of corruption in Sri Lanka, check out Kickback episode 106, with Sankhitha Gunaratne.
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39:28
131. Mario Hidalgo on corruption & organised crime in Ecuador
This episode of Kickback features Dr. Mario Hidalgo, from the Transparency and Anti-Corruption Laboratory at UTE university in Ecuador, to shed light on Ecuador's transition from the "Island of Peace" to a country facing widespread organised crime and violence, highlighting the significantly enabling role of corruption. The conversation also touches upon Ecuador's institutional unpreparedness, political polarisation, and the weaponization of corruption during the recent presidential elections.
Learn more about Mario's important work here: https://ute.edu.ec/laboratorio-de-transparencia-y-anticorrupcion/
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27:36
130. Daniel Paget on authoritarianism & resistance in Tanzania
For this episode, regular host Liz David-Barrett is joined by Dr Daniel Paget, an assistant professor in politics at the University of Sussex, to unpack the nuances of electoral authoritarianism in Tanzania, the aspirations of a key opposition movement, and the power of alternative theoretical frameworks for understanding the fight against domination and for democracy.
Find Daniel's paper 'The Anti-Authoritarian Populisms: Ideologies of Democratic Struggle in Tanzania, Zimbabwe and Worldwide' (2024) here: https://www.danpaget.com/recent-publication
and ‘A people power philosophy: republican ideology in opposition in Tanzania.’ (2023) here: https://www-tandfonline-com.sussex.idm.oclc.org/doi/full/10.1080/13510347.2022.2150759
DISCLAIMER: This episode was recorded several days before the arrest of Tundu Lissu.
Acerca de KickBack - The Global Anticorruption Podcast
This podcast series features in-depth interviews with a wide range of corruption experts, on questions such as:
What have we learned from 20+ years of (anti)corruption research?
Why and how does power corrupt?
Which theories help to make sense of corruption?
What can we do to manage corruption?
How to recovery stolen assets?
Colombia