Top 17 Most Corrupt Countries in the World

Published on February 20, 2014 at 4:05 pm by David Nixon in Lists

What are the most corrupt countries in the world? Corruption is one of the biggest sins of modern society, a plague which affects every single country in the world, to some extent or another. How much a country develops is strongly correlated with its level of corruption, which can affect the distribution of wealth, the use of resources for various industries, and the level of transparency of public offices. In some countries, corruption has reached such a level, that hardly any activity performed by governments can be characterized as being clean.

But the first step in fighting corruption is understanding not only what it is, but acknowledge where it hits the hardest. Following, we would like to present you with a list we have compiled of the top 17 most corrupt countries in the world, based on the annual review released by Transparency International. Transparency International, a German research and evaluation agencies ranks 177 areas and territories across the globe according to their perceived level of corruption. Each territory receives a score that ranges between 0 – highly corrupt – and 100 – very clean, called the Corruption Perception Index or CPI for short. So far, no country has received either of these 2 extremes. According to the German agency, corruption can be defined as the use of public power solely for personal gains.

In comparison to how the following countries scored last year, the most notable differences are Syria and Libya. Syria, who is currently deep in the midst of a brutal and dramatic civil war, lost 8 points from its CPI, as it was revealed how government official have been profiting from the local food crisis.

Libya, on the other hand, faces heavy turmoil as the post-revolutionary aftermath, also dropped in the countdown, by 6 points, surpassing Iraq.

All of the territories on our countdown are located in Asia, South America, or Africa, which have been deemed as the most corrupt regions in the world.

Curious to see which are the most corrupt countries in the world? Let’s take a look at the countdown.