Transparency International
About Transparency International
What is Transparency International?
Transparency International, the global civil society organisation leading the fight against corruption, brings people together in a powerful worldwide coalition to end the devastating impact of corruption on men, women and children around the world.
TI’s mission is to stop corruption and promote transparency, accountability and integrity at all levels and across all sectors of society.
Transparency International challenges the inevitability of corruption, and offers hope to its victims. Since its founding in 1993, TI has played a lead role in improving the lives of millions around the world by building momentum for the anti-corruption movement. TI raises awareness and diminishes apathy and tolerance of corruption, and devises and implements practical actions to address it.
Transparency International is a global movement working in over 100 countries to end the injustice of corruption. We focus on issues with the greatest impact on people’s lives and hold the powerful to account for the common good. Through our advocacy, campaigning and research, we work to expose the systems and networks that enable corruption to thrive, demanding greater transparency and integrity in all areas of public life.Politically non-partisan, TI does not undertake investigations of alleged corruption or expose individual cases, but at times will work in coalition with organisations that do.
TI has the skills, tools, experience, expertise and broad participation to fight corruption on the ground, as well as through global and regional initiatives.
Now in its third decade, Transparency International is maturing, intensifying and diversifying its fight against corruption.
What is corruption?
We define corruption as the abuse of entrusted power for private gain.
Corruption erodes trust, weakens democracy, hampers economic development and further exacerbates inequality, poverty, social division and the environmental crisis. Exposing corruption and holding the corrupt to account can only happen if we understand the way corruption works and the systems that enable it.
Corruption can happen anywhere: in business, government, the courts, the media, and in civil society, as well as across all sectors from health and education to infrastructure and sports.
Corruption can involve anyone: politicians, government officials, public servants, business people or members of the public.
Corruption happens in the shadows, often with the help of professional enablers such as bankers, lawyers, accountants and real estate agents, opaque financial systems and anonymous shell companies that allow corruption schemes to flourish and the corrupt to launder and hide their illicit wealth.
Corruption adapts to different contexts and changing circumstances. It can evolve in response to changes in rules, legislation and even technology.
To Fight Corruption, We Must Embrace Transparency
Transparency is all about knowing who, why, what, how and how much. It means shedding light on formal and informal rules, plans, processes and actions. Transparency helps us, the public, hold all power to account for the common good. Seeking and receiving information is a human right that can act as a safeguard against corruption, and increase trust in decision makers and public institutions. However, transparency is not only about making information available, but ensuring it can be easily accessed, understood and used by citizens.
But transparency is only the first step to curbing corruption
We have learned from over twenty-five years of experience that corruption can only be kept in check if representatives from government, business and civil society work together for the common good.
We focus on issues with the greatest impact on people's lives.
To end corruption we must first understand it. That’s why we look at what causes corruption and what works against it.
At TI, we have pioneered tools and methodologies to measure corruption as a vital first step to exposing and ultimately reducing it. Our research team conducts rigorous and independent assessments of corruption around the world. At the global level, we produce comparative data measuring the prevalence of corruption, citizens’ experiences and attitudes towards it. We also explore how corruption spreads across borders and in different sectors of the economy. At the national, local and even sector level we investigate the specific manifestation of corruption, its causes, its consequences and what works to reduce it.
We advocate for power to be held accountable.
Corruption is widely understood as a root cause of many of the biggest challenges facing the world today. Transparency International is a diverse movement with one global voice. Together, we strive towards a world where the power to make decisions affecting people’s lives is held to account and serves the common good.
To achieve this, we address loopholes in legislation and regulation, push the powerful to act with integrity and seek redress for those who are robbed of a chance to live in an equitable and just society.
