U4 – Anti-Corruption Resource Centre (Norway)

Corruption threatens economic growth, social stability and poverty reduction particularly in developing countries which lose billions through corrupt acts such as bribery, embezzlement, misappropriation or other diversion of property or abuse of functions. Corruption erodes public trust in government, it leads to sub-standard services and it wastes scarce public resources. Corruption, however, also may occur at project or programme level of donor agencies. SDC is therefore committed to improving its knowledge base for anti-corruption work.

U4 aims to provide enhanced knowledge, understanding and learning across the anti-corruption agenda for practitioners from development agencies and, more broadly, for a wider public. The operating principle of U4 is to make available as much as possible of its products as a global public good.

The development impact of the contribution will be to substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all their forms via training, applied research and other services (i.e. helpdesks) and hence to reduce the negative impacts of corruption on economic growth, social stability or poverty.

Direct target groups are staff of the U4 partner agencies, in particular SDC and the Swiss Administration. U4 aims to provide resources and services that are directly relevant to the practical and policy challenges facing these key development actors. U4 services will be relevant to SDC’s coordination offices and Regional Cooperation / Cooperation with Eastern Europe (online training, in-country training), Global Cooperation (specific sector issues) and Humanitarian Aid (fragile states).

Given that U4’s research is publicly accessible, indirect beneficiaries are the broader community of development practitioners in governments, NGOs, and academic institutions around the world.

• U4 publications are operationally relevant and of high-quality.
• U4 website and communication activities are informative, relevant and broadly known.
• U4 training & other learning opportunities provide high-quality, targeted information.

U4 – Anti-Corruption Resource Centre

Phase 1 01.04.2015 - 30.09.2019   (Completed)