Social sustainability in Romania, corruption in the Balkans

The Balkans have been dens of corruption for decades, owing much of it to their shared history of being vassal states to larger empires since medieval times. Their most recent venture into being run by puppet governments, the Warsaw Pact, saw much of the Balkans under oppressive Soviet regimes, the Romanian Ceausescu regime being particularly notable for it's rampant corruption. Romania is not the most corrupt government in Europe, based on the perceptions of the population, Russia takes that dubious honor. Even in the EU, Bulgaria is more corrupt according to most measures, but what makes Romania special is the massive anti-corruption demonstrations in lieu of bills and decisions by the government to reduce the severity of abuse of office and change its legal definition within its borders. The populace is irritated and has been for years, and will continue to take action in more and more serious ways until it is addressed, so what can we do to help the problem?

I want to tackle this problem at the local level. It'd be more effective to start at a higher office, but the problem with corruption in Romania is not solely governmental, a large portion is social as well. It's a holdover from the Communist era, where favors and bribes were used to get goods you wanted. For example, if you wanted a tasty meal at a restaurant, you might want to send the cook a few cigarettes so you have something that doesn't taste like rubber. Say I was the mayor of a Romanian city, what could I do? First, is use money wisely. Many anti-corruption groups do not get the funding they need to perform their duties, so a monetary and strategic cooperation between anti-corruption branches and city government would be crucial. Opening avenues for reporting corruption and offering incentives to do so would be a priority. Next, removing from office anyone found guilty of any form of corruption, as many politicians still run and win elections, get appointed to political positions, etc. even with previous convictions of serious crimes. At the mayoral level, there is not much of this to do, but even a little bit would help. Thirdly, giving citizens the ability to safely report and deal with corruption locally with city assistance and cracking down on bribery in business and commerce would help deal with much of the underlying cultural remains of corruption.

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