POWRE: Institutions of Corruption or the Corruption of Institutions? Fraud in the European Union

这是一个关于欧盟腐败和欺诈的研究项目。它旨在为与几位欧洲学者和机构合作进行实质性的比较研究奠定基础。它从三种分析方法中提出假设，第一种强调个人代理和激励，第二种强调制度结构，第三种强调文化影响。研究的问题是，寻租政府及其主要支持者是否故意容忍国际组织中的欺诈和腐败，或者这些现象是否是国家或地区文化习俗“输出”到更大的国际舞台的结果。该项目包括在意大利佛罗伦萨的欧洲大学研究所进行10个月的研究，在美国进行两个月的准备和完成工作，在布鲁塞尔、巴黎、罗马和柏林四个欧盟地点采访官员、商人、公务员和政治家。该项目的目标和重要性是方法论、分析性和经验性的：为什么会发生欺诈和腐败？我们如何衡量它们？哪些理论方法在解释这些现象时最有用，它们的一般有效性如何？虽然对腐败和欺诈的研究在社会科学中不是一个新的领域，但它还没有受到严格的分析方法的影响；事实上，以前几乎所有的研究都是道听途说和针对具体国家的。回答有关欺诈和腐败的问题所涉及的一个关键困难是，主要由于所调查主题的性质，我们没有有用的方法工具来评估欺诈和腐败的程度以及评估自变量。本研究的一个主要目的是为一些欧盟国家以及后者专门为处理欺诈和腐败而设立的内部机构的精英级别访谈创建一个调查工具。另一个目标是制定和确定指标，这些指标将有助于在各种方案和经济部门背景下衡量欺诈和腐败，并可在国际上使用。从面谈和各机构的报告中获得的资料将用于制定一套跨国指标和测量工具，以指导长期、系统的研究方案。这项研究还将有助于确定国际组织是否通过促进或允许欺诈和腐败来破坏其本身的目标，在此过程中降低组织的经济效率，提高贸易壁垒，并最终使跨国合作的进一步尝试失去信誉。该项目的目标与POWRE计划相关，因为研究者需要获得一些新技能，开发新的方法，并在几个国家和国际机构框架和系统中进行一些探索性调查。预计这项研究将导致几项具有合作性质的研究工作-在不同的机构之间和跨国之间。POWRE资助将使研究人员能够发展一个重要的新研究领域，并通过原创性研究项目有效利用其任期后的休假，从而加强其对政治学和科学知识领域的贡献。这项资助对于提高她作为初级女教师和女研究生的导师和顾问的能力也很重要。

This is a research project on corruption and fraud in the European Union. It is designed to lay the groundwork for a substantial comparative study involving collaboration with several European scholars and institutions. It develops hypotheses from three analytical approaches, the first stressing individual agency and incentives, the second institutional structures, the third cultural influences. The research question is whether fraud and corruption in international organizations are deliberately tolerated by rent-seeking governments and their key constituencies, or whether the phenomena are the result of national or regional cultural practices "exported" to the larger international arena. The project involves 10 months of research at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, two months of preparatory and completion work in the United States, interviews with officials, businesspersons, civil servants and politicians in four EU locations: Brussels, Paris, Rome and Berlin.The project's goals and importance are methodological, analytical and empirical: why do fraud and corruption occur? How can we measure them? Which theoretical approaches are most useful in explaining the phenomena, and what of their general validity? Although the study of corruption and fraud is not a new field in the social sciences, it has yet to be subjected to rigorous methods of analysis; indeed, nearly all previous research has been anecdotal and country-specific. One key difficulty involved in answering questions about fraud and corruption is that, largely due to the nature of the subject being investigated, we do not have useful methodological instruments to assess levels of fraud and corruption and to evaluate the independent variables. A major purpose of this study is to create a survey instrument for elite level interviews within some EU states as well as the latter's internal organs specifically created to deal with fraud and corruption. Another goal is to develop and identify indicators which will facilitate the measurement of fraud and corruption in a variety of program and economic sector contexts, and which can be used cross-nationally. The information gained from the interviews and the reports of the agencies will be used to develop a set of cross-national indicators and measurement instruments to guide the longer-range, systematic research program. This study will also help to determine whether international organizations undermine their own goals by promoting or allowing fraud and corruption, in the process lowering the organizations' economic efficiencies, raising barriers to trade, and eventually discrediting further attempts at multinational cooperation. The goals of this project are relevant to the POWRE Program since the investigator will need to acquire some new skills, develop new methodologies, and undertake some exploratory investigations in several national and international institutional frameworks and systems. It is expected that the research will lead to several research efforts of a collaborative nature - between different institutions and cross-nationally. The POWRE grant will enable the investigator to develop an important new area of research, and make productive use of her post-tenure sabbatical leave through an original research program, thus strengthening her contribution to the field of political science and scientific knowledge. The grant is also important for increasing her capacity to serve as a mentor and advisor to junior women faculty and women graduate students.