1. What is the Global Corruption Barometer? Why is it unique?
2. Who conducts the survey?
3. Who is surveyed in the Barometer?
4. When was the survey conducted and how?
5. Which countries/territories are included in the 2009 Barometer?
6. Which countries/territories are new to the 2009 Barometer?
7. Which countries/territories are not included in the 2009 Barometer, but were included in the last edition?
8. Can my country be included in a future edition of the Barometer?
9. Can different editions of the Barometer be compared?
10. How can the Barometer be used?
11. How does TI ensure the quality of the Barometer?
12. How is the Barometer funded?
13. How does the Barometer differ from the TI Corruption Perceptions Index?
14. How does the Barometer differ from the TI Bribe Payers Index?
15. How does the Barometer differ from the TI Global Corruption Report (GCR)?

Transparency International’s Global Corruption Barometer (the Barometer) is the only worldwide public opinion survey on views and experiences of corruption. As a poll of the general public, it provides an indicator of how corruption is affecting individuals on a national level and how efforts to curb corruption around the world are viewed on the ground.

The 2009 Barometer, the sixth edition, reflects the responses of 73,132 people in 69 countries, and offers the greatest country coverage to-date.

The Barometer includes a variety of corruption-related questions including which domestic institutions are seen as most corrupt and how respondents rate their government in the fight against corruption. It also provides insight on people’s experiences with bribery, gathering information on how frequently citizens were asked to pay bribes when interacting with different public services. For the first time, the Barometer asks the general public about the level of state capture – illicit influence on public policies and regulations through bribery – and the willingness of consumers to pay a premium for clean corporate behaviour.

Most national surveys were carried out on behalf of TI by Gallup International, as a specially commissioned part of its ‘Voice of the People Survey’. Gallup draws on its in-country affiliates to translate and carry out its contribution to the Barometer. To improve the coverage in 2009 TI was able to commission 15 further polling organisations to carry out the Barometer in 18 countries that could not be covered by Gallup: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Chile, El Salvador, Georgia, Ghana, Hungary, Israel, Liberia, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mongolia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Uganda, and Zambia. Data for Belarus was donated to TI by an academic institution.

As a public opinion survey, the Barometer reflects the views of a representative sample of each country’s population aged 16 and over. In order to ensure accurate representation, some country samples were weighted by age, gender and income. Some samples are national and others urban. To ensure that country samples are representative of national and global populations, country samples were weighted according to the relative size of their population.

Fieldwork was conducted between October 2008 and March 2009. In each country, the polling method was based on local conditions. Methods included face to face, telephone and online interviews.

Countries/territories included in the 2009 edition are: Argentina, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, Finland, FYR Macedonia, Georgia, Ghana, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Kosovo, Kuwait, Lebanon, Liberia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, Venezuela and Zambia.

Countries included in the 2009 Barometer but not in the 2007 edition are: Azerbaijan, Belarus, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, El Salvador, Hungary, Iraq, Israel, Kenya, Kuwait, Lebanon, Liberia, Mongolia, Morocco, Sierra Leone, Uganda and Zambia.

Countries included in 2007 but not in 2009 are: Albania, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, France, Germany, Guatemala, Ireland, South Africa, Sweden, and Vietnam.

Because TI commissions Gallup International to carry out most of the fieldwork for the Barometer through its network of affiliates around the globe there are cases where, due to financial, organisational or political reasons, affiliates are unable to conduct the survey in a specific country in a particular year. Countries cannot be included in the survey unless TI is able to commission another company to reliably and affordably carry out the Barometer Survey.

There are no restrictions on which countries/territories can be included. In 2009 as in previous editions of the Barometer, TI was able to commission the survey in some countries where Gallup International was unable to. Funding permitting, TI hopes to continue to add countries to the Barometer in years to come.

Yes. Where questions have been repeated in multiple editions, the Barometer allows direct comparisons and trends over time to be established. The Barometer is now in its sixth edition and therefore offers the possibility of assessing changes over time in terms of the institutions the public deems most corrupt, effectiveness of governments’ efforts to fight corruption, and percentage of citizens paying bribes generally or to obtain specific public services. Previous editions have also explored changes in people’s expectations as to how corruption will evolve over time.

For previous editions of the Barometer visit: www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/gcb

The Barometer is a rich source of empirical data regarding public views of and experiences with corruption.

Policy makers can use the Barometer to better understand to what extent public institutions and services are seen as corrupt, expand their knowledge of the form and frequency of petty bribery, and to see the demographic distribution of bribe extortion and perceptions of the integrity of domestic institutions. It contains information that is highly useful for policy reform and for designing further research.

Civil society, researchers, anti-corruption stakeholders and journalists can use Barometer data to assess where corruption is present, raise awareness about the extent of bribery in one or several countries and to promote targeted change in a particular country or institution.

Researchers can use the Barometer to explore determinants and consequences of corruption and bribery in a wide range of countries. It is unique in the research community in terms of its focus and breadth of country coverage.

The Barometer questionnaire is reviewed by TI’s Index Advisory Committee, which consists of leading international experts in the field of corruption, econometrics and statistics. Members of the Committee make suggestions for improving the Barometer. TI’s management, however, takes final decisions on survey design and publication. Gallup International, which conducts the survey in most countries on behalf of TI, checks the data as part of its due diligence in conducting its ‘Voice of the People Survey’. Gallup also carried out quality control for the data collected in 18 countries by other polling companies.

TI is funded by multilateral and bilateral development agencies and other government bodies, by international foundations, corporations and individuals. Since 2006, Transparency International’s corruption measurement instruments have been supported in part by Ernst & Young. In 2009, the Barometer also received funding from the government of Brunei Darussalam and the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation. TI’s acceptance of financial support does not imply an endorsement of the policies of any company, government or institution and does not involve any of its supporters in the management of its projects. For details on Transparency International’s sources of funding, please see http://www.transparency.org/support_us.

The Barometer assesses the general public’s views of corruption, while the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) draws on expert views. While the Barometer also addresses individual experience of petty corruption, the CPI reflects the perception of informed observers on corruption in the public sector and politics more broadly. Despite these differences, there is considerable correlation between the two surveys each year. For more information on the CPI, please see:

www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi.

The Barometer is a public opinion survey, while the Bribe Payers Index is drawn from a survey of business executives. The Barometer offers the views of the general public on corruption and its impact on their lives, including personal experience of bribe demands. The 2008 BPI assesses the international supply side of bribery by ranking 22 of the world’s wealthiest and most economically influential countries according to the likelihood of their firms to bribe abroad. For more information on the BPI, please see the Transparency International Bribe Payers Index 2008: Overview Report:

http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/bpi

The TI Barometer explores citizens’ opinions and experiences with corruption while the Global Corruption Report, published by Cambridge University Press, is an in depth-assessment of the state of corruption around the world. The next edition of the GCR, to be launched in autumn 2009, will focus on corruption in the private sector. For more information on the GCR, please see http://transparency.org/publications/gcr