Events

This seminar brings together David Szakonyi and Tom Mayne, chaired by Liz Dávid-Barrett, to examine how leaked and sensitive datasets - often originating from media organisations - can support research into corruption and illicit finance. Drawing on GI ACE projects using leaked banking data from the DRC and mapping enabler networks, the seminar discusses both the opportunities and challenges of working with such materials. Delivered in collaboration with the Illicit Finance Data Lab (ACDC & OCCRP).

A roundtable exploring how consultancies, legal firms, and intermediaries enable cross-border illicit influence, featuring leading GI ACE scholars and partners.

This seminar examines real estate-linked money laundering in the Global South, focusing on Brazil, Kenya, and Indonesia, revealing how rapid urbanization, particularly in touristic destinations, has enabled different actors to exploit weak enforcement systems. The research documents severe consequences, including distorted housing markets, while demonstrating that current international AML framework for the real estate sector fails in emerging markets.

This webinar will launch the new research paper Shadow Economies: The Rise of Illicit Networks and Alternative Markets in Sanctions Circumvention. The study examines how illicit financial flows linked to…

This seminar presents emerging insights from RUSI’s Interrogating Corruption Risk in Voluntary Carbon Markets project. Drawing on early evidence and case studies, the discussion explores how market volatility, weak oversight,…

Financial institutions serve as the circulatory system of modern economies but, when corrupted, also as the lifeline of illicit wealth. By collating insights from dozens of journalistic reports in the Congo Hold-Up investigation, a new briefing by the Anti-Corruption Data Collective (ACDC) and the Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa (PPLAAF) examines how BGFIBank in…

Illicit Financial Flows have long been recognized for their destabilizing impact on economies, yet their role in enabling corruption and institutional capture, related to sanctions evasion and sustaining military conflicts has received less mainstream attention in comparison to issues like tax evasion or organized crime. How state capture and corrupt practices within governments and institutions…

In this session Jan Meyer-Sahling discusses his work exploring ethical leadership training as a tool to combat corruption, drawing on evidence from Nepal and Bangladesh. The findings demonstrate that ethics training, often overlooked in the Global South, can drive behaviour change, reshape attitudes, and support the modernisation and professionalisation of public services. Much of this…

Sector-Based Action Against Corruption: A Guide for Organisations and Professionals is a book by Mark Pyman and Paul Heywood. It sets out their SFRA approach to tackling corruption, encompassing four core elements. First, they argue corruption problems should be tackled at the level of the specific sector (like health, policing, or agriculture). At this level,…

State capture is an extremely harmful variant of corruption. Its distinctive and complex characteristics erode democratic institutions and norms, while concentrating power and influence in the hands of narrow interest groups – in business, politics, or organised crime. This session explained how the concept has evolved, its mechanisms, and potential recovery strategies. It showcased a…

The GI-ACE programme has a number of projects looking at corruption in public procurement, government responses to crises, and how civil society can contribute to the contract monitoring processes that drive transparency. In November, researchers from across GI-ACE project teams shared the stage with Global Integrity's COVID-19 Transparency and Accountability Project (CTAP) team to discuss…

Video recording here   Join us for a conversation on the relationship between state structures and organised crime in developing states on 16 September at 10:00 EDT, co-hosted by SOC-ACE, a research programme funded by UK AID. In this event, researchers Dr. Erica Marat and Dr. Gulzat Botoeva will be joined by Alexei Trochev and…

Video recording here   A joint event on ‘Illicit financial flows and Russia’s foreign policy: Frameworks to detangle the dangers’ will be held on 15 June at 14:00 UK time, co-hosted by Global Integrity & the German Marshall Fund of the United States. This hybrid event will be held at Open Gov Hub in Washington DC…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On March 3,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On February 24,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On February 3,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On January 20,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On February 10,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On February 17,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On January 27,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On January 13,…

This event launches a Chatham House paper of the same name. It details the laundering of monies and reputations by elites from Eurasia’s kleptocratic states, and the material and reputational damage rendered to the UK’s sovereignty and democracy. The UK’s financial and professional services have long provided a comfortable home to dirty money.  The rapid…

Register for this event now! Corruption persists because it suits the interests of powerful players, and because anti-corruption initiatives often fail to unlock the political-economy drivers that hold corruption in place. Join the conversation! This session will focus on the value, and limits, of locally-led approaches to unlocking the complex challenge of corruption. The speakers will draw the…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On December 2,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On November 18,…

Register for this event now! Starting in November, each ACE research team will share how their research projects have aligned with the founding principles of the GI-ACE programme: developing anti-corruption interventions that are problem-focused, politically viable, have engaged practitioners throughout the research process, and provided avenues through which to measure the effects of the reforms. On November 11,…

This discussion during the 2021 ICRN Conference is aimed at bridging the gap between investigative journalism and academia in the fight against corruption. The panel debate on the overarching theme: How can academia and journalism cooperate in disseminating knowledge about corruption?

The FCDO-funded Anti-Corruption Evidence programme works to deepen engagement practitioners and stakeholders have with research. Recently, Gerhard Anders and Matthew Page held private sessions in Nigeria and Malawi to present their research findings on what works and what doesn’t in law enforcement practice with senior policymakers and law enforcement officials. The event will focus on lessons learnt, best practices and the way forward for law enforcement tackling high-level corruption. This event will share how their research was received, with helpful advice on how to conduct and engage with policymakers.

The Cities of Integrity project at GI-ACE has developed a series of animated videos illustrating the specific issues of corruption in urban planning and its consequences for cities and their publics. These animations have been used in their workshops, social media, and direct engagement with particular groups such as early career planners. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with the animators, the research team, and a representative from the Zambian Institute of Planners. We will discuss the advantages and limitations of using animated film in workshops and communications around integrity-strengthening as a response to corruption in planning. The Cities of Integrity team will reflect on their experience working with the production house in translating their research into accessible language and visuals and hone in on the question of impact together with the Zambian Institute of Planners as a key stakeholder.

A Disruptive Fridays discussion with GI-ACE researcher Jacqueline Klopp, the New Statesman’s International Correspondent Ido Vock and UK-based investigative journalist Franz Wild hosted by the Disruption Network Lab.

Event time: March 26, 2021 12 EST

Register for the event here: http://gint.info/KloppDisruption

Crossing borders is a strategy used by many vulnerable populations in an age of inequality and climate crisis. Borders are governed by complex rules and bureaucracy that present ample opportunities for corruption, producing hardship and rights abuses that often have significant gender dimensions. Applying a gender lens, this conversation will draw on new research that looks at how COVID restrictions at borders are impacting small scale cross border traders in East Africa. What happened to bribery and harassment with Covid restrictions and how are these dynamics gendered? What can Covid impacts tell us about how corruption operates more generally at these borders and about strategies traders use to keep their businesses alive when facing shocks? As economic activities resume Post-Covid, what have we learned to improve trader conditions, build social resilience and reduce extraction from vulnerable populations at these borders?

Event time: March 25, 2021 8:00 EST

Register for the event here: http://gint.info/KloppOECD

There is a growing recognition that the enablers of large-scale (‘grand’) corruption lie in transnational financial networks. Literature suggests that a large proportion of illicit flows from Nigeria are invested in the UK. But illicit flows are, by their nature, illegal and deliberately hidden from view, making them a particularly challenging object of research. By presenting the findings of three Global Integrity Anti-Corruption Evidence (GI-ACE) projects that analyse UK-Nigeria business connections from different perspectives, this discussion will examine and problematise the international financial architecture that allows for proceeds of grand corruption looted from Nigeria to be laundered in the UK. It will furthermore discuss the role of Western professional service providers in facilitating kleptocratic practices.

Event time: March 24, 2021 15:00 GMT

Register for the event here: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJArcu2hpjgsEt0ATyUc8pqtZrsb2JW-w6yK

As part of FCDO’s Anti-Corruption Evidence Programme, SOAS and Global Integrity researchers will discuss why and how gender matters to our corruption research, both in terms of agency (how we focus on empowering actors) and impact (taking gender into consideration for public service delivery).

Our research teams will present challenges and opportunities they have faced in incorporating gender in research design, and explore why many researchers still stray away from working with “gender” when designing research. Does this difficulty stem from the fact that sectoral specificities with complex power imbalances make it difficult to focus on gendered dynamics and solutions? Or is that, despite the discussions and guidelines on gender mainstreaming, we still don’t have a shared understanding of the value of gender? Most important, are there things we are not studying that we might if we had a gender angle.

Event time: March 23, 2021 10:00 EST

Register for the event here: https://gint.info/GenderedDesigns