grand forms of corruption, as well as state capture<sup>9</sup> by elites and private interests (see Figure 9). The indicator appears to have stabilized at low levels – in contrast with other regions such as EAP or ECA, which have witnessed improvements. Recent survey data on citizens’ corruption perceptions also point to the resilience of corruption in SSA: more than half of respondents reported a perception that corruption was on the rise in the 2019 Transparency International Global Corruption Barometer for Africa (GCB), which covers 35 African countries, and 59% of respondents believed that their government was “doing a bad job at tackling corruption”.

**Figure 9. Trends in control of corruption**

<!-- Start of picture text --> Control of Corruption (percentile rank: 0 to 100)<br>70<br>60<br>50<br>40<br>30<br>20<br>10<br>0<br>EAP ECA LAC MENA SA SSA<br>2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020<br><!-- End of picture text --> _<mark>Source:</mark>_ <mark>Worldwide Governance Indicators (WB).</mark> _<mark>Definitions:</mark>_ <mark>Percentile rank ranges from 0 (lowest) to 100 (highest).</mark> _<mark>Regions:</mark>_ <mark>EAP (East Asia & Pacific); ECA (Europe & Central Asia); LAC (Latin America & Caribbean); MENA (Middle East & North Africa); SA (South Asia); SSA (Sub-Saharan Africa).</mark> _<mark>Note:</mark>_ <mark>All three variables from Worldwide Governance Indicators, scores between [-2.5, 2.5].</mark> Petty corruption is quite prevalent in public administration and services, and negatively affects the quality of and access to public services. According to the 2019 GCB, one in four individuals surveyed had paid a bribe in the previous year for access to public services, such as health care or education; in practice, this means that about 130 million people were likely to have paid money or done favors in exchange for access to services.<sup>10</sup> Petty corruption skews politicians’ and bureaucrats’ incentives to deliver public services: it is indeed associated to poorer management and lower quality of public services (World Bank 2004).<sup>11</sup> Petty corruption also has regressive effects, as poor users pay a larger share of their incomes on bribes and are also more likely to be discouraged from seeking public services.<sup>12</sup> De facto in SSA, the 2019 GCB survey data indicates that the poorest are twice as likely to pay a bribe as the richest individuals. This is particularly delegitimizing when such corruption is embedded in security agencies such as the police and military as it represents a failure of the very basis of any social contract, which is basic security.

> 9 State capture is perpetrated by interconnected corrupt economic and political actors targeting state assets and (ab)using weak institutions for their private benefit. Raballand et al. 2022.

> 10 Transparency International, 2019, _Global Corruption Barometer: Africa 2019_ .  Berlin: Transparency International.

> 11 In a similar vein, vote-buying tends to be associated with lower levels of investments in public services. Khemani, Stuti. 2015. “Buying votes versus supplying public services: Political incentives to under-invest in pro-poor policies”. _Journal of Development Economics_ , n°117, pp. 84-93.

> 12 See for example Kaufmann, Daniel, et al. 2008. _How Does Bribery Affect Public Service Delivery? Micro-Evidence from Service Users and Public Officials in Peru_ . World Bank Policy Research Working Paper.

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