The problem with these laws is that often they do not reflect the limitations of the institutions that enforce them, be they the police force and public prosecution service or a noncriminal administrative agency. Many recent anticorruption initiatives have also overlooked complementary legal reforms that can prevent or expose corrupt acts.

Anticorruption and ethics laws generally encompass a variety of statutes that prohibit bribery, nepotism, conflicts of interest, and favoritism in awarding contracts or providing government benefits. Such laws often also require public servants to disclose their incomes and assets. When drafting such acts, the instinct is to list every activity that could conceivably be considered corrupt and then write language making each illegal. The result is often a broadly drawn provision setting out a general standard, such as the provision found in several nations’ laws that make the "abuse of public office for private gain" a crime.

Such sweeping language does address bribery, nepotism, and conflicts of interest, but bureaucratic and political rivals can also invoke it to question perfectly innocent actions by those holding public office. Accordingly, those who draft anticorruption legislation should ask several questions: What is the capacity of the institutions that will enforce the law? Are the police, prosecutors, courts, and other enforcement agencies staffed by honest, technically competent professionals? Are they independent of the executive? To whom, and in what ways, are they accountable?

The answers to these questions will often not be reassuring. In many countries enforcement institutions lack skilled professionals. Moreover, the employees of such institutions are often easily manipulated for political purposes. World Bank surveys have found that the poor rate the police and other enforcement agencies as some of the most corrupt and least trusted government agencies. Reformers may believe that anticorruption work cannot proceed until enforcement agencies are strengthened. But while capacity building is essential for the long-term sustainability of an anticorruption program, it takes time.

Those writing anticorruption statutes must take into account the weaknesses of the agencies that will enforce the law they are drafting. In most cases that means writing a law that is easy to understand, simple to apply, and demands little or no judgment in determining its applicability. Laws written this way are said to contain "bright-line rules" as opposed to those containing standards that are open to interpretation by enforcement agencies.

If hiring a relative were against the law and an official’s nephew suddenly appeared on the payroll, the ethical breach would be obvious. By contrast, if the law contained an exception for "qualified" individuals, endless arguments about the nephew’s qualifications could ensue, muddying the question. With bright-line rules citizens, the media, and watchdog groups can readily determine whether the government is serious about enforcing anticorruption laws.

Countries with weak enforcement institutions should consider including the following bright-line rules in their anticorruption laws:

No statute can avoid some open-ended provisions. If a section in an anticorruption law must leave something open to question, one way to reduce enforcers’ discretion is to establish a procedure for obtaining advance rulings. Employees concerned about doubtful cases can then ask representatives of the enforcement unit for an advance ruling on the legality of a proposed action. Gradually, the accumulated opinions will develop into a body of law to guide both the courts and those subject to ethics guidelines.

Statutes outlawing bribery, nepotism, and other corrupt acts should be complemented by laws that help bring corruption to light. Freedom of information laws are one example. Such laws require the government to disclose information about its activities at the request of any citizen and watchdog groups can use them to monitor government behavior.

Similarly, in recent years several countries have adopted whistle-blower protection laws, which encourage government employees to reveal corrupt acts they have uncovered in the course of their work without fear of retaliation.

Libel law reform can also be an important part of anticorruption legislation. Some countries’ laws make it a crime to publish anything that brings the government into disrepute or insults a government official. Under such laws a journalist who accuses an officeholder of accepting bribes or otherwise acting corruptly can be fined and jailed regardless of whether the allegation is true or false. To ensure that fear of prosecution does not deter the press from exposing corruption, many industrial nations make it difficult for government officials to obtain compensation if they are libeled by the press.

National legislation alone is not a panacea; international cooperation is also required. In cases involving large sums of money, recouping stolen funds is often problematic because corrupt officials can stash assets abroad. Treaties should be considered that would permit a requesting country to overcome bank secrecy laws and other obstacles to recovery. Transparency International’s Source Book (2000) lists dozens of other systemic reforms needed to root out corruption.