Seven years after the fall of the Taliban regime, Afghans—and the international community—are still struggling to construct a state with a functioning government, licit economic growth, and improved social conditions. While the country has seen significant advancements since 2001, particularly in terms of health, education, and other socioeconomic factors, few would argue that the situation in Afghanistan is progressing well. Security has deteriorated in recent years, opium cultivation continues at high levels, and most Afghans lack access to basic necessities such as electricity and clean water.

The weak state of Afghanistan’s government is at the forefront of the nation’s challenges. President Hamid Karzai regularly comes under attack from both his countrymen and internationals for overseeing an administration and civil service riddled with corruption and inefficiency. Transparency International recently ranked Afghanistan 172 out of 180 countries in its 2008 global corruption index. Afghans themselves commonly perceive that corruption has increased within government ranks in the past five years.

Corruption is endemic throughout the developed and developing world, but it is particularly damaging in Afghanistan, where the lack of a credible government threatens the country’s already volatile security situation. As Afghans lose confidence that their government can provide them with basic services, they are more likely—particularly in rural areas—to look to the Taliban for support and subsistence. International donors such as the United States and World Bank exacerbate the problem by channeling two-thirds of their aid money outside of government systems. The result is that the Afghan government loses out on the ability to build capacity and monitor cash flows, and government officials receive little recognition when successes do occur.

No consensus exists on the best way to combat corruption. Some call for a change of leadership, which may occur if security constraints do not preclude presidential elections in 2009. Others demand a systemic overhaul of the sclerotic international aid system. But such drastic reforms are unlikely to transpire in the near future. In reality, the best hope for realizing a functioning Afghan state is an approach that creates and strengthens mechanisms for the prevention, detection, and prosecution of corruption.

Public administration reforms, which attempt to obviate corruption and increase transparency and efficiency by establishing effective national systems through incremental steps, are being enacted and refined. The first phase of reform in 2002 focused on stemming low-level corruption such as bribery, which affects nearly all Afghans. Afghans often must pay tips—“shirini,” in Dari—to civil servants in order to receive services, from passports and visas to electricity. In Afghanistan’s border provinces, customs officials allow goods to flow out of the country untaxed in exchange for bribe money.

Initial reforms increased government pay scales, under the belief that raised salaries for public officials—who traditionally earn far less than other professionals—would alleviate their desire to collect bribe money. When disappointing results ensued, new measures were designed to improve the civil service, prioritizing competence and performance over pay increases. Officials now suggest creating a National Civil Service Training Institute—a controversial proposal, as US$1.6 billion has already been spent on technical assistance since 2002 with, arguably, little to show for it.

Reforms had more success in the health sector, where the Ministry of Public Health controlled design and management of its health programs and contracted delivery to non-governmental organizations. As a result, quality of care improved in contracted healthcare facilities, and healthcare services can now be accessed by over 85 percent of the population, compared to just 9 percent in 2004. Most importantly, the ministry receives credit for success.

Prevention is, however, only one component in an overarching strategy. President Karzai and international donors have supported systems for detection and prosecution far less. Oversight mechanisms that would ensure greater detection—including Parliament, the media, and civil society organizations—are still in nascent stages in Afghanistan. Parliament’s review and approval of the national budget are intended to prevent high-level forms of corruption surrounding misuse of funds. But many parliamentarians lack experience with public finance data and have difficulty discerning critical information. In additional, much of the aid money Afghanistan receives flows outside of the national budget, leaving the government unable to account for it. Media and civil society are increasingly defending public accountability, but both face a dearth of resources and security constraints. Local decision-making organizations exist; their relationship with the formal government network is nebulous.

Meanwhile, no reliable measures for prosecuting corruption currently exist. Only half of the 1350 official judge positions of the Supreme Court are currently occupied; of these judges, one-third have a university-level education. Legal information is scarce, and judges, let alone laypersons, understand little about the rule of law. Laws that are enacted are difficult to enforce, due to a fledgling police force that itself is viewed as corrupt and ineffectual. Many attribute the poor state of the Afghan police force to the fact that it has received far less funding, training, and attention than the Afghan army.

A long-term approach to government reform must give equal attention and resources to prevention, detection, and prosecution of corruption in concert. Short-term gains such as those in the health sector will not be sustainable without a way for Afghans to voice their complaints or bring law-breakers to justice. Simultaneously, international donors supporting these efforts must remain realistic about the slow pace—and, initially, the scale—of change. Corruption at the highest administrative levels may receive the most international attention, but is more difficult to combat with the government in such a fragile state. A “bottom up” approach, therefore, is likely to have more success, and to foster an environment intolerant of all forms of corruption in the future.