Accountability, Corruption and Local Government: Mapping the Control Steps

The central purpose of this paper is to map out the Brazilian web of accountability institutions and observe how institutions establish links with each other in order to control corruption cases that reach them. Focus is on institutions that are part of the Brazilian anti-corruption agenda, which include the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office, the Federal Police, the Office of the Comptroller General, the Federal Court of Accounts, the Federal Justice and the Ministries. In the literature, the most widespread argument is that, despite recent institutional improvements, the result produced by this web in terms of coordination is still weak. This article tests this claim by looking at the program called 'Inspections from Public Lotteries'. Through a longitudinal approach, I observed the flux of control activities among the institutions, especially the establishment of investigative and judicial proceedings. Not only I explored the extent to which corruption impacts the establishment of interactions, but I also investigated how the interactions affect the speed of judicial proceedings – using logistic regressions and survival analysis. The conclusion is that the Brazilian web is able to articulate itself in order to hold public officials accountable (something new in this recent democracy), but not in a homogeneous way across all institutions (something the literature has missed). Furthermore, I demonstrate that the entire web of accountability institutions is unable to arrive at a decision in a timely manner.

本研究的核心宗旨在于梳理巴西问责制机构网络，并考察各机构间如何建立联动机制，以管控移送至各机构的腐败案件。本研究聚焦纳入巴西反腐败议程的各类机构，涵盖联邦公共检察署（Federal Public Prosecutor's Office）、联邦警察（Federal Police）、总审计署（Office of the Comptroller General）、联邦审计法院（Federal Court of Accounts）、联邦司法体系（Federal Justice）及政府各部。现有学术研究中，主流观点认为：尽管近年巴西问责制机构体系实现了制度层面的完善，但其协同运作成效仍较为薄弱。本文以"公共彩票专项督查"项目为研究对象，对上述主流观点进行验证。本研究采用纵向研究方法，追踪各机构间管控活动的流转脉络，尤其关注调查程序与司法程序的启动情况。本研究不仅探究了腐败对机构间互动建立的影响程度，还通过逻辑回归（logistic regressions）与生存分析（survival analysis）两种方法，考察了机构互动对司法程序推进速度的作用机制。研究结论显示：巴西问责制机构网络能够实现协同联动，对公职人员开展问责（这在巴西近年的民主进程中尚属首次），但各机构间的协同并未呈现统一的模式——这一发现正是现有学术研究尚未关注到的。此外，本研究还证实，整个问责制机构网络无法及时作出决策。