Love the Tender: ProZorro and Anti-Corruption Reforms after the Euromaidan Revolution

ABSTRACT

ProZorro’s experience shows how state-of-the-art systemic reform can take place in a neopatrimonial setting. Politics matter for the establishment of a new institution but to function efficiently, the new institution must attain legitimacy. ProZorro’s ability to demonstrate early results lowered uncertainty and legitimized the new institutional solution. Its subsequent fine-tuning and expansion was a result of co-productive efforts between state and non-state stakeholders, which helped to maintain its functional superiority. The ProZorro case is juxtaposed with a brief analysis of key anti-corruption reforms that were launched in similar conditions, and yet either backslid or brought partial results.

Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to Dmitry Gorenburg, Timothy Frye, and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful critique and suggestions, and to interviewees and friends in Ukraine for their time and kind help. None of them is responsible for the final result.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.