The dynamics of anti-corruption: a multi-level framework for intervention design

Summary

Corruption persists because feedback between individual behaviour, social norms, and institutional rules creates self-reinforcing dynamics. Although laboratory experiments provide growing evidence on anti-corruption interventions, this literature remains fragmented, failing to explain why enforcement succeeds in some contexts and fails in others. To address this gap, this paper develops a Dynamic Corruption Equilibrium (DCE) Framework. Drawing on a Bibliometric-Systematic Review of 132 experimental studies, it identifies six intervention classes across institutional, social, and individual levels, with behavioural dispositions acting as cross-cutting moderators. While existing studies examine these interventions in isolation, overlooking cross-level interactions and behavioural heterogeneity, the DCE Framework integrates insights from complex adaptive systems theory and institutional economics to conceptualise corruption as a dynamic, multi-level system. By specifying three mechanisms: cross-level feedback loops, conditional pathways, and system bistability, the framework explains how corruption equilibria become self-reinforcing or shift, offering a diagnostic lens for analysing intervention effectiveness within complex institutional environments.