Comments on: Bribery in HE Institutions

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 23:42:19 +0000

That corruption is widespread is well known. What is not clear is how accurate these self-reports are. It is possible that Osh GU ranks high because there are more reports. While self-reporting is one measure, it is not necessarily an accurate measure of the actual level of corruption.

That said, no one on these lists should feel proud.

By: CXW

CXW — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 14:43:17 +0000

On this one, Ata Rakin/Celtic Sufi :), agreed on all counts. WRT to the naive idea of simply upping pay, it is well worth reading the full article the quotation came from, not least due to the problems the author had even talking to univeristy staff about the issue.

And this is before the impact of all this, plus plagiarism in the form of bought written to order essays, is considered on educational standards and norms.

Thanks for your continued input - it is greatly appreciated.

By: Ataman Rakin

Ataman Rakin — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 14:31:05 +0000

“However, the evidence is at best unclear whether increasing public sector wages alone can reduce corruption.”

No, it won’t.

The thing is culturally entrenched. First, everone who has a salary or other assets has up to a dozen of relatives and even neighbours depending on them; and in societies where one’s survival largely depends on such solidarity networks it is very difficult to refuse to give in to social pressure. Second, many civil servants (incl. lectures at universities) actually had to bribe to get, or keep, their positions and want the investment back.

As CXW/sivkoburko says, the Kyrgyz case is certainly *not* unique but can be found, to one degree or another, all over the so-called third world incl. neighbouring countries.

Besides that, Kyrgyzstan just has an overkill of HE Institutions (a legacy of the Akayevs) most of whom are dramatically under-funded. I mean, even Batken and Sülükta, of all places, have run-down university branches! So what does one expects?