Normative Beliefs and Values as Determinants of Petty Corruption

Corruption is believed to be an important problem in many countries, including Russia — according to national polls and official statistics. In the literature, there is no agreement on determinants of corruption, while current studies have been largely focused on system-level and institutional explanations of corruption. However, it is not the countries that are corrupt, as engagement in petty corruption is a direct result of individual choices. This study takes a new look on the determinants of corruption, as most papers have only used macro-level predictors of corruption and therefore, grand corruption. In the current study more emphasis is put on petty corruption, and values as guiding principles that reflect individual differences in attitudes and behavior within certain social environment. The data for this project is drawn from LCSR Russian Regional Survey 2019-2020 and analyzed using ordinal logistic regression modelling. The findings of this study indicate that the effect of emancipative values is not uniform. It has also been found that effects of values should be studied within social context and existing normative framework. This paper argues that engagement in bribery is linked with expectations about behavior of other people, attitude to corruption, as well as a psychological state of moral disengagement, that accompanies breaking social norms. Future studies using larger sample of regions or country-level comparison should help verify presented findings.