This is a summary of some of the main arguments and findings of the book ¿Corrupción pública o privada? La dimensión ideológica de los discursos anti-corrupción en Colombia, Ecuador y Albania (Bogotá: Tirant lo Blanch, 2020). The book compares the official anti-corruption discourses of president Juan Manuel Santos (2010-2018) in Colombia, president Rafael Correa (2007-2017) in Ecuador and prime minister Edi Rama (2013-present) in Albania. It shows that although these three countries face very similar levels and perceptions of corruption their governments articulate this phenomenon differently due to their distinct ideological positions. While the neoliberal governments of Santos and Rama defined corruption primarily as abuse of public office and locate it mainly in the public sector, or in its interaction with the private one, the government of Rafael Correa, which embraced the 21st Century Socialism, defined corruption primarily as a problem of the private sector that captures and distorts the public sector.
This paper analyzes the transformation of the signifier “corruption” in the Albanian public sphere during the period 1991–2005 from a discourse analysis approach. The aim is not to trace corruption in its presence and consequences, but to show how different articulations of corruption supported different agendas. More specifically, this paper aims to show how the corruption discourse that dominated Albanian public discussion during the period 1998–2005 served to legitimize a neoliberal order by articulating corruption as inherent to the public sector and to state intervention in the economy. This meant that corruption could be eliminated through neoliberal policies such as privatization and deregulation. Through a discourse analysis of corruption it is possible to politicize the concept of corruption instead of reducing it to a static and inherent feature of Albanian culture and society.
Dissatisfaction with politics and political parties has given rise to a strong antipolitics discourse in Albania. Growing numbers feel unrepresented and see politics and political parties as the source of, rather than the solution to, the country’s problems. In this article the author argues that the crisis of representation in Albania does not result simply from the inability of political parties to represent different social groups but from their inability to articulate and constitute them politically. The two major political parties have articulated “the people” against an external threat usually represented by their political opponent. Under these conditions, different social categories such as farmers, urban, rural, rich, and poor were increasingly reduced to moments within “the people” as a whole rather than the starting point from which “the people” were constituted. Therefore, the political process became both conflictual and unrepresentative of different social groups. The less representative political parties became, the more society as a whole and different groups within it defined themselves against political parties and politicians, hence the antipolitics discourse.
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