The Pre-conditions for Entrenching Transparency in Local Governance

by Kim, Hyoung-Kook, MA

Abstract This paper makes an attempt to solve two policy puzzles about the relation between two variables, i.e. political decentralisation and transparency, mainly focusing on Korean decentralisation experiences. The first puzzle is to what extent political decentralisation is associated with the reduction of corruption. The second one is, otherwise, what conditions should be pre-equipped for ensuring local transparency in decentralisation reform. In this study Korean empirical cases not only failed to demonstrate a positive correlation between two variables but also show that decentralisation spawns new types of corruption, instead. The experiences also suggest that decentralisation per se can hardly be a sufficient condition for enhancing transparency. The study classifies Korean corruption cases into 3 dimensions and provides a range of policy suggestions for each corruption dimension. The six pre-conditions for entrenching local transparency are derived from the policy suggestions, which is deeply related to the principles of good governance such as participation and engagement, Informed and transparent decision, supervision with effective scrutiny, developing capacity and professionalism, equality and inclusiveness, and developing and demonstrating values. In addition, local good governance for transparency can be achieved through the collaborations between local authorities and other stakeholders such as local NGOs based upon the principles of good governance above.