Anti-Corruption Governance, Institutional Trust, and Administrative Reform: A ComparativeAnalysis of Finland and Brazil

Abstract

Corruption remains one of the most persistent challenges to democratic governance, public administration, and institutional legitimacy. Although anti-corruption reform is frequently framed as a matter of legal enforcement, this article argues that corruption control depends more broadly on institutional trust, bureaucratic professionalism, political accountability, and administrative transparency. Through a comparative institutional analysis of Finland and Brazil, the study examines how different governance systems produce divergent anti-corruption outcomes despite formal commitments to integrity, legality, and democratic rule. Finland represents a high-trust administrative state characterized by low corruption, strong bureaucratic professionalism, transparent public institutions, and dense accountability norms. Brazil represents a democratic system with advanced legal institutions and significant anti-corruption capacity, but also persistent vulnerabilities arising from political fragmentation, patronage networks, uneven enforcement, and institutional distrust. Drawing on governance theory, comparative public administration, institutionalism, and political economy, the article demonstrates that anti-corruption effectiveness depends on the interaction between legal enforcement, administrative culture, party-system incentives, judicial independence, and citizen trust. The findings show that Finland’s integrity system operates through preventive institutional norms, while Brazil’s system relies more heavily on reactive legal prosecution and investigative institutions. The article contributes to politics and governance scholarship by developing a comparative framework linking corruption control, institutional trust, bureaucratic capacity, and democratic legitimacy.