Top Down vs. Grassroots E-Government: A Comparative Analysis of the Effectiveness of E-Procurement against Corruption in Malaysia and Korea

Purpose: Democratization and social structure have been identified as critical factors affecting E-Government’s corruption fighting capacity. To determine how E-Government functions differently against corruption in democratic egalitarian vs. authoritarian inegalitarian nations, this study examines the factors behind Korea’s successful anti-corruption E-Procurement program KONEPS and Malaysia’s less successful E-Perolehan program. Originality: Despite the contributions of large sample empirical work, no in-depth case analysis has yet shown how democracy and egalitarian social structure increases E-Government’s effectiveness against corruption, which is important for those interested in reforming under-utilized or ineffectively applied E-Government systems. Methodology: This longitudinal case study unpacks the causal mechanisms between cause and outcome, comparing and contrasting the development of E-Government, in particular, E-Procurement in two East Asian NICS: the consolidated egalitarian democracy of South Korea and single party, inegalitarian Malaysia. Result: Democratization and an egalitarian social structure provided incentives for citizens and politicians to back E-Government as a graft-fighting tool. Korean civic groups pressed to stop corruption and helped design KONEPS to reduce bureaucratic discretion over the selection of tender winners and release of annual purchasing plans and detailed bid information. In contrast, the Malaysian state introduced E-Government to bolster the ruling UMNO’s image and intentionally maintained E-Perolehan’s information asymmetries and bureaucratic discretion to preserve lucrative corruption schemes. Conclusion and Implication: Malaysia’s newly elected opposition party politicians have a strong incentive to use E-Perolehan against corruption by releasing more information regarding procurement plans, contract details and selection criteria while eliminating bureaucratic discretion over the selection of tender winners.