9/25/2023 0 Comments Josh marshall twitter ukraineNobody should set unrealistic expectations that postwar reconstruction will be perfectly free of corruption. Other influencers-both Biden’s domestic political opponents and the Kremlin’s propogandists-would make hay of the opportunity to advance their own political interests. politicians would quite reasonably express concern about risks to U.S. support to push this public approval level down below its August level of 51%. It would be all too easy for evidence of significant corruption related to U.S. public opinion were earned through the sacrifice and valor of the Ukrainians, who launched a historic counteroffensive starting in late August. A poll conducted in October found that 66% of Americans support providing weapons to Ukraine, up from 51% in August. Third, it may not take more than one or two major corruption scandals to harm bipartisan support in the United States for giving Ukraine billions in assistance. Pumping hundreds of billions of dollars in reconstruction funding into this governing system that still suffers from significant corruption is a sure way to seed a new oligarchy, and risk of failure of the reconstruction effort. Costs for large state construction projects are inflated by 30%, including a 10% kickback for policymakers. Oligarchs still monopolize the commanding heights of the Ukrainian economy (media, energy, construction, transport, etc.). Power is concentrated in the Office of the President, and the broader governing system allows for informal decision-making that favors powerful interests and bypasses democratic accountability. Three of the five specialized anti-corruption bodies (independent agencies that prevent, investigate, prosecute, rule on, and recover assets related to grand corruption) lack permanent leadership, and all five could use more resources and stronger authorities. As a result, the journey from Soviet kleptocracy to a modern political-economic system is far from complete. However, some of these new anti-corruption institutions are experiencing growing pains, while other important areas of the state-from the judiciary to the security service-remain unreformed. Their public transparency and specialized anti-corruption accountability systems are held up as world-leading models of muscular reform. Second, Ukraine has instituted a stronger program of anti-corruption reforms over the past eight years than any other country in contemporary history. This same social resilience will be key to building back better as a European Ukraine. By contrast, Ukrainians fight with confidence that they are defending the democracy and rule of law they have built over the past eight years. Since then, Russian forces have been bogged down by debilitating corruption, causing Russian spies to steal bribe money meant to buy a Ukrainian coup, Russian supply chains to be gutted, and Russian soldiers to suffer weak morale. Less than two days later, the Russian military started building up on Ukraine’s borders as an alternative means to undermine Ukrainian sovereignty, once strategic corruption had been rendered less effective. A couple of weeks after President Joe Biden was inaugurated, Ukraine sanctioned Medvedchuk’s close associates, forced their pro-Russian news channels off the air, and seized assets owned by Medvedchuk and his family. Putin spent two decades trying to control Kyiv by enriching pro-Russian oligarchs in Ukraine, such as Dmytro Firtash and Viktor Medvedchuk, who would, in turn, go on to bankroll political parties and buy up half of Ukrainian television news channels. Countering Strategic Corruptionįirst, strategic corruption is a leading vector of malign Kremlin influence, whereas fighting corruption since 2014 is how Ukraine has built the great nation that has impressed the world on the battlefield this year. Infusing strong approaches to anti-corruption into the recovery process is vital for Ukraine, for three reasons: the strategic imperative, the reform imperative, and the political imperative. As scholars at the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF) and the Brookings Institution-two institutions historically involved in the original Marshall Plan-we feel an obligation to offer independent policy ideas for how the governments of the G7 and other donor countries can incorporate anti-corruption into the process of funding the recovery and reconstruction of Ukraine. The need for transparency, accountability, and integrity is a critically important part of discussions about how to fund Ukrainian recovery that commenced at a conference in Lugano in July and will continue with a follow-on conference in Berlin on October 25. Incorporating anti-corruption into a Modern Marshall Plan for Ukraine calls for swift and extensive planning.
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