Perceptions and realities of corruption in South Africa

Corruption is a growing concern in South Africa, and cases of alleged corruption of government officials are detailed in the news media on a regular basis; identically, the Afrobarometer survey has been tracking public attitudes towards corruption since 2000. The aim of this paper is to utilise the Afrobarometer data to shed light on this issue.

The paper states it is clear that corruption is considered an important problem by South Africans. In this respect, it notes that many people believe there are high levels of corruption in various parts of government. At the same time, the incidence of bribery appears to be relatively low when compared to the perceived corruption figures.

The document suggest potential explanations for this difference between perceptions and reality of corruption. These include the reluctance of people to admit to paying bribes, which could make incidence of bribery under-reported, and the consideration of other misuse of state resources rather than considering only bribery.

Equally important, the author demonstrates that in the fight against corruption, opinions on the performance of government appear to have remained fairly constant over the past ten years, whereas the role of the media is considered more important now than it was a few years ago.

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Perceptions and realities of corruption in South Africa