Measuring Corruption Risk in Public Procurement over Emergency Periods

Abstract Times of crisis provide fertile ground for corruption because of looser regulatory frameworks, weaker oversight, and skyrocketing financing levels. Public procurement systems are particularly vulnerable to corruption risks over emergency periods as they are at the frontline of many country responses to crises. In this paper, we propose a curated selection of red flag indicators of corruption risk over crises and discuss a general measurement framework for their computation. The proposed approach exploits the time discontinuity introduced by a crisis and allows us to characterise and differentiate companies and/or contracting authorities with different degree of risk through statistical testing. The suggested framework is intended to accommodate the changing and far-reaching corruption risks induced by crises and mitigate them effectively.