In its annual survey on global corruption, which was released on February 10, Transparency International offered a sobering snapshot of governance in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Collectively, the region has made scant progress during the past five years in combating corruption. Based on the Corruption Perceptions Index’s 100-point scale, the average score inched from 38.7 in 2020 to just 38.8 in 2025. This stasis is not altogether surprising given the index measures public attitudes and perceptions, which evolve slowly and do not necessarily reflect real-time changes in government policy or practice, let alone actual levels of corruption—something that is extraordinarily difficult to measure accurately. At the level of individual countries, however, the story becomes more nuanced: states such as Bahrain, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia have improved markedly in the rankings, whereas others have failed to make headway or even regressed.
While the picture provided by TI is useful, it remains incomplete. Indeed the situation on the ground may be more encouraging than it appears at first glance. Many countries in the MENA region have established special agencies in recent years to fight corruption, taking cues from governments in East Asia, such as Hong Kong and Singapore, which made significant progress in their own, decades-long anti-corruption efforts. A recent study by the Middle East Council on Global Affairs takes a careful look at the performance of these Arab anti-corruption agencies, benchmarking them against similar agencies in other regions.[1] While experience varies significantly by country, many of these new agencies have made solid, if incremental, progress over the past decade, gaining citizen trust and steadily improving their operations. They have revised and updated their underlying legal frameworks to ensure consistency with the United Nations Convention Against Corruption and other relevant international standards with respect to active and passive bribery, embezzlement, illicit enrichment, maladministration, influence peddling, abuse of office and money laundering. There may be scope to improve certain elements, such as enhancing witness protection, but with limited exceptions, their basic legal frameworks are sound.
There is a growing public awareness of and acceptance of the role of these agencies. In many countries, the number of complaints being directed towards them has increased steadily over time and is now consistent with global norms. Several of these agencies are implementing major public-awareness and education initiatives. They have developed partnerships with local civil society organizations, which monitor their operations and provide technical analysis and support. A few countries, such as Jordan, Oman and Iraq, have made significant strides in asset recovery. There is also a gradual improvement in their operations, and the number of investigations and sanctions has generally trended upwards over time.
Nonetheless, across the region, skepticism of government efforts to tackle corruption is widespread—particularly among the youth. Polling data from the Arab Barometer indicates that corruption is perceived as one of the most important challenges confronting individual countries. It is the primary concern in Iraq and Algeria, and among the top three in Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Palestine, Sudan and Tunisia. Anger over corruption was a major driver of the Arab Spring uprisings a decade and a half ago and served as the principal flashpoint for later protests in Iraq, Lebanon and Sudan in 2019. In the wake of these upheavals, activist networks were demobilized, and there remains an overwhelming desire among young people across the region to emigrate, “indicative of a deep sense of resignation.”
Despite the progress made, there remain areas where more focus is needed. Agency independence is a mixed bag throughout the Middle East and North Africa, with some institutions enjoying significant legal and operational autonomy, whereas others have less. The uneven application of the rule of law remains a problem in many countries, driven by both formal obstacles to prosecuting the rich and powerful and informal norms. Weak coordination—a chronic problem throughout MENA—can also hinder the anticorruption effort. Some countries, such as Jordan and Iraq, are quite good at reporting on the progress of their anticorruption efforts, whereas others, such as Egypt and the UAE, provide scant information.
Perhaps the most significant challenge is that many MENA anticorruption agencies are chronically underfunded and understaffed vis-à-vis their counterparts in other regions. On average, the MENA countries in the Middle East Council sample spent approximately $2.08 per capita on their dedicated anticorruption agencies, whereas the non-MENA countries spent approximately $6.23 per capita, or nearly three times as much.
Anticorruption agencies are rarely a panacea in the fight against corruption. They can be ignored, marginalized, pressured and starved for resources. It can be difficult to gain traction in stopping some of the more complex ways in which corruption is practiced within the Middle East and North Africa—such as regulations that favor insiders and well-connected firms, pressures to take on silent partners in boards and business ventures, or the use of wasta, or connections, in public employment.
Yet anticorruption agencies are not irrelevant either. Many have been granted significant authority and autonomy. They occupy the apex of their country’s anticorruption effort and have been empowered to perform a range of important functions. And they are making slow and steady progress. Just this month, for example, Saudi Arabia’s anticorruption agency, Nazaha, announced arrests in 11 cases involving bribes or theft totaling $4.4 million. Given adequate financial and human resources and enough space to operate, MENA’s anticorruption agencies should be able to make a significant dent in a problem that has vexed the region and hindered the effort to develop and diversify many of its economies.
Beyond these agencies, regional governments will need to embrace the fact that a robust anticorruption effort requires diligence across the public sector. State ministries need to carefully review their purchasing procedures to root out procurement fraud. Regulatory agencies need to make sure that their procedures are simple and transparent, and their employees are not being bribed to dispense special treatment. Revenue agencies need to make sure that taxes and fees are applied consistently and collected fully. And control authorities, such as supreme audit agencies, must be diligent in their duties.
Progress is possible. The United Arab Emirates is currently the highest-ranked MENA country on Transparency International’s index, with a global score that places it in the company of Japan, the United Kingdom and Austria, and ahead of the United States and France. With the right combination of policies and diligent implementation, there are no inherent reasons why other MENA countries cannot rise to a similar level.
