What opportunities consistent with the rule of law exist for creative solutions to environmental problems?

2.

Improving the quality of regulations	· Consolidate and simplify requirements · Write regulations in "plain English." · Regulatory impact assessments
Facilitating permitting	· Streamline approval processes · Harmonise requirements across programmes · Develop multimedia and facility-wide permits · Environmental permitting Clearinghouses · Multi-media permitting
Increasing Flexibility	· Testing innovative approaches with the private sector · Rewarding leaders
Offering compliance assistance and incentives	· Use market-based incentives to encourage pollution prevention and increase operational flexibility. · Compliance incentives for small business (incentives for auditing, disclosure and correction) · Incentives as a consequence of on-site visit assistance · Establishment of small business compliance assistance centres · environmental leadership programme · guidebooks, hot-lines, training
Improving environmental information	· Right to access to environmental information · Improving environmental information · Environmental forecasting · Public electronic access · Easier information access · Environmental accounting
Strengthening partnerships	· Stakeholder involvement · Partnership programmes · Regulatory negotiation and consensus-based rulemaking
Environmental management systems (EMS)	· Promoting the use of EMS · Training of firms and public authorities · Sponsoring training on EMS
Benchmarking and Performance Measurement	· Comparing experiences · Exchanging information · Introduction of quality competition · Development of performance and enforcement indicators
Reducing formal (reporting and paperwork) requirements	· Improving reporting · Reduction of paperwork burden · Electronic data transfe

 

 

3. What does “corruption” mean in the context of Ukrainian anti-corruption legislation?

3. Law “On preventing the corruption” of October 14, 2014 provides the legal definition of corruption in article 1 and defines it as the use of a person referred to in Article 3 of this law of the authority granted to him authority or the related opportunities in order to obtain undue advantage or the adoption of such benefits or acceptance of a promise / offer of such a benefit for himself or others or under promise / offer or to provide undue advantage to a person referred to in Article 3 of this Law, or at its request by another natural or legal person to persuade that person to the unlawful use of the authority granted or related opportunities. It should be noted that the violation that has the characteristics of corruption is defined as “corruption offense”. Such terms are usually used in the other legislative acts concerning the issue.

However it should be stated that the list of subjects in article 3 of the Law is restrictive and can be generalized as subjects of authority.

It should be noted that this is the latest law which directly concerns the issue of corruption. The previous Law “On the principles of preventing and fighting the corruption” which is still active in some articles concerning the financial control used the same definition which is wider than the initial definition, which existed in the Ukrainian legislation. In the law of 2009, of the same name, the legislator used the definition of corruption as “the use by a person of a granted to him authority and the related opportunities in order to obtain undue advantage or acceptance of promise / offer of such benefits for himself or other persons”. As we can see, the definition that existed seems rather restrictive. Another issue with the initial legal norm was that it prevented MPs and other executives from the scientific or other creative activity, motivating that it would be deemed as corruption. However, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine in its decision № 21-рп/2010 deemed the aforementioned provision as unconstitutional.

 

4. What circumstances lead to corruption?

4. International Monetary Fund divides factors that promote corruption into direct and indirect. To direct factors they put regulations and authorizations that provide the State and its officials with overwhelming amount of power. Another direct factor is taxation – if the laws can be misinterpreted, they demand frequent personal contact and the wages of tax administrators – more generally when the control of such activities by authorities is weak. Corruption is highly influenced by different spending decisions, provision of goods and services below the market prices and other discretionary decisions of the state.

One of the factors of huge importance is political corruption the origins of which can be traced in the procedures concerning the financing of the parties.

As for the indirect factors, there are such as quality of the bureaucracy, level of public sector wages, penalty systems that can be simply too weak to influence the existing corrupt practices and the lack general lack of transparency. One of interesting indirect factors that promote corruption is the lack of examples of leadership.

Some define 10 possible causes for corrupt practices

1) Personal greed that leads to an unfettered desire for money or power, with no regard whatsoever to moral boundaries. The underlying anthropological cause is the innate human impulse to own external goods, when it is not subject to personal integrity. Is personal integrity less valued than it used to be? Is there a need for religious or other types of motivation that were once stronger

2) Decline of personal ethical sensitivity, either due to lack of education or negative learning experiences, developed by downplaying perverse conduct in the past. Should ethical education be put under review? Is it time for a personal reassessment with sincerity and repentance, to learn more about its influence in promoting positive learning?

3) No sense of service when working in public or private institutions. This is seen, for instance, in those who use politics for their selfish interests, instead of serving the common good through politics. How can we promote politicians and leaders with a true service-oriented spirit

4) Low awareness or lack of courage to denounce corrupt behavior and situations conducive to corruption. That is the case of someone who is aware of corruption and stays quiet. They simply cover for the corrupt individuals, perhaps thinking that it is not their problem, or perhaps out of cowardice, so as not to make their lives more complicated. Would it help to promote a culture of denouncing corruption?

5) Cultural environments that condone corruption. Such as defending or even admiring crooks (“you have to be pretty smart to evade taxes”). Or rationalizing false arguments with no moral basis (“everyone does it”; “take advantage while you can”; “life is short”). Who ought to promote that culture? Social leaders? Everyone?

6) Lack of transparency, especially at the institutional level, but also in less formal organizations. Knowing that what you do is seen by everyone, wouldn’t that deter acts of corruption?

7) Regulations and inefficient controls. Increased regulations and control mechanisms are probably not the answer. They are costly and tend to stifle initiatives and administrative dynamics. But why not have better regulation and more effective control in areas prone to corruption. Is that so difficult?

8) Slow judicial processes. In some other countries, we would have to add “and unreliable” to that statement. Swift processes can have a greater exemplifying effect than those that, by the time the sentence comes, the crime already is nearly forgotten. Justice requires appealing processes and warranties, but not if it means slowing down the administration of justice. Do we need more judges, but also better processes?

9) Lack of moral criteria in promotions. Corruption is prevalent when there are no criteria for proven integrity and responsibility in the promotion. Such criteria are ignored when someone is promoted simply because of their loyalty to whoever is in charge or those in control of the party. Or if it is only their strategic or organizational skills that are evaluated. Obviously, someone can be wrong when making a promoting someone, but there should be no problem distinguishing between a simple mistake and culpable ignorance due to negligence or a lack of ethical assessment. Is it an issue of ethical shortsightedness?

10) Downplaying or reacting mildly to corruption charges. Little power of decision within organizations to penalize acts of corruption to set examples creates an environment conducive to perpetuating corruption.

5. Development of international anti-bribery law

5. On December 19, 1977, four years after Watergate first exposed corporate corruption, President Jimmy Carter signed the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act into law. It became the first national statute criminalizing the bribery of foreign officials. Initial enforcement of the FCPA was inconsistent -- four cases were settled by the SEC in the next three years. Stanley Sporkin, the former head of

enforcement at the SEC said that cynics of the measure were accusing the government of playing "Don Quixote and tilting at windmills. While the law may not have been taken seriously when it was first enacted," Sporkin said, “it is clear that it has assumed a prominent place among our federal criminal laws.”

Under Ronald Reagan, the 1980s witnessed few FCPA prosecutions and serious debate over the very existence of the law. So in 1988, Congress amended the FCPA to expand its jurisdiction not only to American companies, but to foreign companies that commit offenses within the U.S. The amendment also required the President to pursue an international anti-bribery agreement with the member countries of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

In 1993, former World Bank employee Peter Eigen gathered a group of lawyers, politicians and bank officials to start Transparency International (TI), an NGO devoted to fighting international corruption. After seeing firsthand the rapid growth of international markets and the corrosive effect corruption was having, Eigen took early retirement to devote his career to fighting bribery.

Twenty years after the United States became the first country to criminalize foreign bribery, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) adopted an anti-bribery convention, making it illegal for all member countries to bribe a foreign official.

In 2002 the new law, Sarbanes-Oxley Act, required that the CEOs and the CFOs of any publicly traded company sign off on financial reports and thus assume personal responsibility for the accuracy of their accounting. It also outlined the criminal penalty for false record- keeping and penalized companies for targeting whistleblowers. The act has boosted the number of FCPA investigations.

The international laws of more general character, important for Ukraine are Civil Law Convention on Corruption and Criminal Law Convention on Corruption of 1999 of Council of Europe and U.N. Convention Against Corruption of 2003.