It’s funny when a survey is released how everyone becomes an amateur statistician. I’m guilty of it, too – the first thing I do when I get a survey is flip with a skeptical eye to the methodology page. Of course, methodology is an important element of understanding a survey’s data. But often, methodology is attacked to distract attention from the elephant in the room – the uncomfortable truth that a survey can reveal.
CIPE Egypt, in cooperation with the Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies (ACPSS), recently released a survey of nearly 800 Egyptian small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) about their experiences with corruption (results here). Corruption is endemic in all aspects of Egyptian life. Transparency International’s 2008 Corruption Perceptions Index ranks Egypt at 115 out of 180, and Global Integrity’s 2008 assessment of institutional integrity rates Egypt as Very Weak. CIPE’s survey was intended to get feedback from SMEs about the corruption they face in the course of doing business, with an eye toward opportunities for targeted reform.
I attended CIPE’s public release of the survey in Cairo (more in CIPE’s latest OverseasREPORT here). While there were more than a handful of methodological nitpickers, the majority of participants and panelists – including business associations, owners of SMEs, media, academics, and representatives of the Egyptian government – engaged in a serious discussion on the issue of corruption in Egypt and how to tackle it. The result was a remarkably open and frank discussion of a topic that was once taboo.
ACPSS Chairman Dr. Abdul Moneim Saeed set the tone for the conference from the outset, stating “there is no topic that cannot be discussed in public, including speaking about the increasing level of corruption.” (As my colleague Daphne McCurdy points out, Saeed was recently quoted in The Economist on how the private sector is driving increased transparency in how Egypt is governed.)
Giving the keynote speech, Minister of Administrative Development Ahmed Darwish publicly acknowledged corruption in the civil service and discussed his ministry’s efforts to fight it. “Good governance is the key to fighting corruption,” he declared. “We decided to approach administrative reform beginning with good governance standards. This needs integrity and transparency…”
This kind of admission on the part of government – that corruption exists, and that steps are being taken to address it – would have been unheard of just a few years ago in Egypt. And the dialogue didn’t stop with the conference. The survey and the conference discussions earned significant media coverage and sparked a national debate.
There is no comprehensive nationwide data about SMEs in Egypt, making it easy for those who want to quibble about methodology and ignore the elephant in the room. Increasingly, however, these people are on the margins. There is a real dialogue taking place in Egypt about corruption and its cost to society, and it’s taking place among those who are in a position to affect meaningful change.
Published Date: August 11, 2009