The political, economic and cultural drivers of police corruption

This is another theoretical chapter that generates a framework to thread through the context of Afghan policing. Theories related to a political economy approach to examine the interrelationship between bureaucratic agents and economic elites and the coping strategies of poorly waged public officials and police officers. This theoretical basis informs some aspects of the political and economic drivers of corruption. The political drivers specifically cover systemic corruption which is when corruption becomes institutionally embedded from the top to the lower levels. In addition, patronage, nepotism and ethnic favouritism forms a ‘moral economy’ to deter meritocratic recruitment. Moreover, state capture occurs when main parts of the state are infiltrated by narrow criminal and affiliated political interests for profit making, usually with illicit markets. The economic drivers are focused on corruption as a means of economic necessity, namely low pay, and opportunities to engage in corruption due to weak oversight or limited sanctions if detected for malpractice. The cultural drivers cover culture, motivation and the socialisation of behaviour within police forces and specific anti-corruption training that can help to mitigate police corruption.

Preventing police corruption

The second chapter opens with the rationale behind commissions on inquiry in the aftermath of a police corruption scandal to expose the truth and provide recommendations to mitigate institutional corruption. The cases of the New York and New South Wales police forces are examined with the responses of the relevant commissions. The commissions stated that the police seniors attempted to blame ‘a few bad apples’ but the commissioners exposed that it was rather ‘a rotten orchard’ that pointed at systemic corruption and high forms of police solidarity that can evade dealing with embedded corruption. The ‘slippery slope’ analogy infers that police officers socialise milder grass-eating forms of corruption – such as accepting minor gratuities – to more severe meat-eating corruption such as engaging in vice areas within a self-perpetuating system in which all parties benefit in corrupt transactions. The chapter closes by analysing a range of cases that have trialled pay reform, rotation strategy and anti-corruption training initiatives to mitigate police corruption.

Security sector reform, post‑conflict reconstruction and police corruption in post-conflict states

The third chapter thematically engages with the intertwined initiatives of post-conflict reconstruction, statebuilding, peacebuilding and security sector reform. A few short examples of United Nations interim administrations in Cambodia, Kosovo and East Timor are provided that reformed main state institutions from scratch. The forthcoming sections examine post-conflict policing contexts in Haiti and Iraq in order to determine some similarities and differences to Afghanistan. Some comparisons include the focus to fight an insurgency with a paramilitary police force, particularly in post-9/11 settings to conform to reshuffled counterinsurgency strategy. This has created confusion with European efforts of police training in both Iraq and Afghanistan which are at odds with paramilitary policing. The chapter will illustrate that longer-term training programmes and mentoring can help mitigate police corruption and confusion with mandates which partially worked with UN involvement in Haiti. The final part analyses several developing contexts that share high levels of police corruption, brutality and criminality.

Definitions and typologies of police corruption

This chapter examines the pre-existing definitions of what corruption entails starting from the abuse of public office for private authority to forms of political and divisional advantage. Definitions of police corruption follow to analyse a variety of activities that qualify as police malfeasance related to famously cited criminological literature concerning typologies. The typologies list the activities that range from corruption of authority, kickbacks and finally planting of evidence (that includes drugs). Integrity violations are then examined to cover a broader range of police malpractices such as moonlighting and criminal activity in private time. Moreover, the debate of bending rules which includes the use of the ‘magic pencil’, perjury or excessive means of coercion for a noble and/or justified outcome as part of departmental advantage is reached.