文档介绍：Graft Breeds Graft
Following Xi Jinping’s pledge in January to “fight tigers and swat flies”?meaning corrupt officials at all levels ? a handful of high-profile prosecutions have indeed given a modicum of weight to his words. However, political scientists warn that the sheer extent of corruption in China continues to outpace all attempts at a crackdown.
Toxic Legacy
According to a recent study conducted by Professor Tian Guoliang, director of the Central Party School’s publishing house, the average “latency period” between a corrupt official’s first offense and their exposure has increased dramatically, from less than a year in the 1980s to an average of years in the 1990s. The average is, ac- cording to Tian, currently years.
Tian blames this discrepancy on the increasingly sophisticated methods by which officials can abuse their positions for material gain. “In the 1980s and 1990s, the rules were pretty simple ? cash and services,”Tian told our reporter. “To crack a corruption case, you just needed to find and open an offending official’s safe, and all the money would be there.”
Nowadays, anti-corruption campaigners and investigators have revealed, few officials take cash bribes. Instead, they prefer stocks, discounted real estate holdings, free luxury cars, expensive “gifts” for their families or vouchers redeemable at luxury stores. Few of these items l