with China in history as well as in the current period. Readers may have ... but they will all be better informed upon reading this book. This work deserves ... Democracy, Inequality and Corruption: Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines. Compared.
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mostly in Vietnamese and English languages, to provide persuasive evidence for his arguments. The selection of the two case studies, namely bilateral economic ties and the South China Sea dispute, is also logical as these are the two most salient issues which have thus far precipitated both cooperation and tension between Vietnam and China. Empirically, Le compiled various tables and figures to help readers gain a better understanding of the overall patterns and key developments in Vietnam’s relations with China over time. There are, however, some inconsistencies in citing Vietnamese authors by the surname and first name. Perhaps, a note on names and citations at the beginning of the volume would guide the non-Vietnamese readers to a correct attribution of Vietnamese authors. Overall, this is a well-thought out and well-written piece of work which adds new substance to the existing body of knowledge about Vietnam’s relations with China in history as well as in the current period. Readers may have some disagreements and reservations about the author’s arguments and evidence, but they will all be better informed upon reading this book. This work deserves much praise and can hopefully serve as a role model for other Vietnamese scholars in conducting similarly rigorous research. Reviewed by Thuy T. Do Senior Lecturer, Department of International Politics and Diplomacy, Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam, Vietnam
Democracy, Inequality and Corruption: Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines Compared. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 293 pages. ISBN 978-1107-43532-2. Paperback, $29.00. Jong-sung You. 2015. Corruption has attracted scholarly attention because of its negative consequences for political stability and socio economic development. But beyond the general agreement that corruption produces adverse effects, there are few studies that clearly identify the causes of corruption. Democracy, Inequality and Corruption by Jong-sung You is an ambitious work that aims to reveal exactly how inequality generates corrupt dynamics. By dissecting the postindependence histories of Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines, You shows that inequality creates a large population of poor and a group of powerful economic elites who distort public institutions and democracy in their attempt to reap private benefits. The Philippines, a country that once was more economically developed and more democratic than Korea and Taiwan, epitomizes this tale. Through a rigorous cross-country comparison, the book unveils how different types of corruption—clientelism, patronage, and state capture—have ramifications on the loss of state autonomy and the manipulation of electoral institutions. Supporting You’s central argument that large-scale inequality leads to political, bureaucratic, and corporate corruption in both liberal and illiberal political regimes are two main propositions. The first proposition states that inequality favors the emergence of clientelism through political graft, encourages state capture through collusion in state-business relations, and disrupts public
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policy-making processes. The second proposition is that democracy has a negative effect on efforts to reduce corruption if there is high inequality. These propositions were formulated in light of the observation that Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines developed different levels of corruption over time. Of the three, the Philippines is currently the most corrupt country yet it has a longer history with democracy than Korea and Taiwan. In the 1950s, the Philippines even had lower levels of inequality than Taiwan. What then accounts for the different levels of corruption when these countries became more democratic? Through a comprehensive comparative historical analysis, the book places inequality as a central determinant for the variation of corruption among the three countries. This analysis is meticulously built by advancing in Chapters 1 and 2 a theoretical framework based on the principal-agent-client model. In this model, politicians misrepresent public interests through clientelism and patronage. In addition, corrupt economic elites buy off bureaucrats and politicians causing state capture. Elaborating on the effects of inequality on corruption, Chapter 3 triangulates several data sources (e.g., Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, Control of Corruption Indicator) to measure corruption in each country from the 1940s to the 2000s. The author then dissects clientelism, patronage, and state capture connecting these mechanisms of corruption with high inequality. Chapter 4 shows how land reform led to the redistribution of income and wealth in Korea and Taiwan and how the lack thereof perpetuated inequality in the Philippines. The remaining chapters of the book test the relationship between inequality and the three types of corruption. Chapter 5 examines whether underdevelopment and economic inequality contributed to the perpetuation of clientelism under authoritarian and democratic systems. Chapter 6 focuses on the sources of patronage in the Philippines and the practice of meritocracy, which reduced patronage in Korea and Taiwan. Chapter 7 assesses industrial policy in the three countries and shows that family conglomerates in the Philippines eventually grew and became strong enough to control the government. Conversely, Korean chaebols were less effective in state capture while Taiwanese small businesses did not attempt to capture the state. This book definitely makes an unprecedented contribution to our understanding of the negative effects of inequality in the political arena. First, it makes a forceful argument that without redistribution of wealth and income, democracy might reinforce previously existing corrupt practices because clientelism limits the ability of voters to punish malfeasant politicians. Second, the book considers a wide range of corrupt practices, differentiating itself from studies that consider corruption only as the consequence of political and bureaucratic impropriety. Third, the book sheds light on how to interpret, albeit cautiously, the rapid economic growth in East Asia as an engine for fast development. As You implies, high growth coexists with corruption which then negatively affects economic growth. Despite its carefully constructed argument to account for the variation in levels of corruption across the three cases, the book lacks an alternative explanation to the main narrative. The developmental state literature interprets the relatively low corruption levels in Korea and Taiwan as the result of the
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particular conditions under which these countries industrialized. These special conditions—dependency on external aid support, existence of a constant military threat from abroad, and persistent scarcity of natural resources—deterred officials from rent-seeking practices (Doner, Ritchies, & Slater, 2005). The absence of an alternative narrative or factors to elucidate the different levels of corruption become evident in the thin explanation that You provides to justify the variation of levels of corruption between Korea and Taiwan. Another minor limitation is related to the shift from clientelism to programmatic politics, which according to the author, is determined by the level of inequality. You argues that inequality reinforces corruption in democracies more than it does in illiberal and dictatorial regimes. While attempting to establish the connection between inequality and corruption in democracies, the book overlooks democratic electoral dynamics and, as such, ignores possible electoral mechanisms that could abate clientelism in democracies. A growing literature suggests that the push for programmatic politics, despite persistent inequality, comes with increasing electoral competition, which then creates higher electoral volatility and, in turn, forces incumbents to attract these volatile votes with programmatism (Stokes, 2007). The book dismisses the possibility that an incumbent might abandon clientelism and introduce programmatism in the pursuit of political survival. Last, although the book considers path dependence as a crucial mechanism to maintain the institutions and dynamics that cause corruption in the Philippines, path dependency in the book is under theorized. A process such as the maintenance or change in the levels of corruption should have been systematically analyzed across the three countries in light of elements of path dependence such as positive feedback mechanisms or the lack thereof (G€ obel, 2013). Democracy, Inequality and Corruption brilliantly fulfills its objective and should be applauded for its implications for policymaking and research in fields related to socio economic development and democratic deepening.
References Doner, Richard, Ritchies, Bryan K., & Slater, Dan. (2005). Systemic vulnerability and the origins of developmental states: Northeast and Southeast Asia in comparative perspective. International Organization, 59, 327–361. G€ obel, Christian. (2013). Warriors unchained: Critical junctures and anticorruption in Taiwan and South Korea. Z Vgl Polit, 7, 219–242. Stokes, Susan. (2007). Political clientelism. In Carles Boix & Susan Stokes (Eds.), Comparative Politics Handbook of Political Science (pp. 604–627). Oxford University Press: Oxford.
Reviewed by Helder Ferreira do Vale Faculty, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, South Korea
