Abstract:

The phenomenon of corruption is a problem which has high negative externalities at the economic, sociological, and global levels. Throughout history, corruption has expressed itself differently but has been present in nearly every society. It continues to affect many developed and developing societies today. The widespread public externality caused by corruption has been studied in various scientific fields, such as economics, finance, sociology, and psychology. The majority of the literature reveals that corruption negatively affects economic growth and development. Measuring corruption, a socioeconomic problem that is illegal, is difficult because there are challenges in identifying its determinants. The aim of this study is to conduct an empirical analysis of corruption with selected determinants. In the present study, the following the determinants of corruption were used: economic freedom, GDP, human development index, tax burden, and inflation. Data was obtained from the period between 2003 and 2021 from the D-8 countries (which consist of Indonesia, Bangladesh, Iran, Egypt, Malaysia, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Turkey), before panel data analysis was conducted. In the analysis, corruption was used as the dependent variable, while general government expenditure, economic freedom, GDP, human development index, total tax revenue as a percentage of GDP, and inflation were used as explanatory variables. The results of the analysis revealed that economic freedom, human development index, and the governments total tax revenue as a percentage of GDP positively affect the corruption perception index. The rate of inflation, GDP, and government spending did not have a significant relationship with corruption.

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