Anti-corruption education
Teaching youth
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-Nelson Mandela

Nearly half of the world's population (almost 3 billion people) is under the age of 25, according to the World Population Foundation. The importance of engaging youth in anti-corruption cannot be overestimated. It can help change attitudes and mores and build zero-tolerance for corruption where the problem is seen as an acceptable fact of life.

No one is too young to be affected by corruption. A 2009 survey by Transparency International, found that from over 70,000 people surveyed in 69 countries, 16 per cent of respondents under 30 were asked for a bribe in the previous 12 months, compared to 13 per cent for the whole sample.

Anti-corruption education promotes values, attitudes and expectations that condemn corruption, and build the knowledge and skills to resist it. It develops people's understanding of their rights and responsibilities for preserving the public good.

Teach the young that corruption is wrong and you have a chance to break the cycle. Even better, give them the ways and means to stand up to corruption. A generation of people who know what to do when faced with an ethical dilemma or an upfront bribe are more effective in preventing corrupt and unethical behaviour by public servants or in business than the most sophisticated codes of conduct, laws and regulations. The best anti-corruption laws and institutions need people who do not tolerate corruption and who actively fight against it.

There are many ways to teach the anti-corruption curriculum. It can be incorporated into civics or citizenship classes but it is also a key component of history, politics, religion, life skills, peace education, economics or ethics. Although most of the curricula may not explicitly refer to corruption, they are all implicitly linked to it. They include concepts such as the public good and social justice, which apply to countries rich and poor and are key to understanding the need for fighting corruption.

Universities also include anti-corruption in their governance and ethics classes. From public administration, business, law and economics schools to technical and engineering professions, anti-corruption is now becoming a standard part of the curriculum.

With the aim of making anti-corruption the bedrock of a future generation of leaders, this July, Transparency Lithuania organised,a Summer School on Integrity for university graduates. Taught by a group of experienced anti-corruption campaigners and professionals, this is the first academic programme in the post-Soviet region aimed at directly addressing the subject of corruption and how to fight it.

Lithuania’s anti-corruption body, for example, dedicates only 2 to 3 per cent of its annual budget to anti-corruption education. In 2009, the same body conducted anti-corruption lectures in 12 out of 900 secondary schools. Inspired by this gap and what it considered an overall lack of anti-corruption education programmes in the region, TI Lithuania established the summer school in cooperation with Mykolas Romeris University.

The school seeks to teach students about the causes of corruption and practical ways new democracies can become more transparent and accountable in both the public and private sectors. On this, its inaugural year, the school will host 70 young leaders from Armenia, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Russia, Ukraine and the United States.

Young people constitute a country's future political and economic leaders. Their education should be an important component of anti-corruption strategies. TI chapters around the world engage young people and future business and political leaders in the fight.

• The Lebanese Transparency Association’s Youth Civil Society Leadersprogramme has trained more than 500 young activist leaders to address corruption and bad governance.
• Between 2004 and 2009, Ghana Integrity Initiative, organised 74 anti-corruption workshops to educate citizens in good governance and accountability issues.
• Transparencia Mexicana, held its third Transparency and Accountability Week in almost 1,000 high schools reaching 800,000 people across the country, in partnership with the NGO Mexicanos Primero and Mexico’s Ministry of Education.
• More than 2,000 anti-corruption activists attended the annual Convention of the Committee of Concerned Citizens and Youth Engagement and Support, whose members are the driving force of TI Bangladesh’s social movement against corruption.
• TI Korea (South)’s 2009 Youth Integrity Index survey showed a slight improvement in overall integrity from past years – although 20 per cent of students aged 12-18 said they consider wealth more important than living honestly.
• Transparency Vanuatu carried out a major programme of civic education workshops reaching more than 1,700 people among the country’s 80-plus islands.

TI Summer School on Integrity
Teaching Integrity to Youth
Confronting Corruption in Education

TI Summer School on Integrity
E-mail: tischool@transparency.lt
tel: +370 5 212 69 51
www.tischool.lt