Thriving or Declining? Unraveling Corruption, Environmental Quality, Energy Consumption, and Economic Growth in ASEAN Countries

The current study is carried out to explore the link between Corruption, Environment quality. Energy consumption and economic growth in selected Asean countries. In addition to that, the present study aims to highlight the direct impacts of corruption upon environmental degradation, energy consumption, and economic progress. For this purpose, the analytical framework has been particularly used. Theoretically, environmental quality is expected to be directly influenced by corruption using taxation and regulations, while corruption affects economic growth which in turn affects the quality of environment. Therefore, economic growth is negatively influenced by the levels of corruptions. The higher the levels of corruption the lower will be the GDP level of an economy. This lower GDP level then influences the environmental quality, and thus confirms the EKC hypothesis. This paper has employed cointegration model for analyzing the association between environmental quality, energy consumption, corruption, and economic growth for the data involving 5 ASEAN countries i.e. Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Philippines, and Indonesia for the years 1960-2021. The literature review has shown no empirical study that have employed cointegration model for examining the effects of corruption on energy consumption, environmental quality, and economic growth. The findings of the study are in line with the proposed hypothesis. The study which is among the pioneering studies will be helpful for policymakers and researchers.