The Economics of Police Corruption: Incentives, Institutional Failures, and Policy Solutions

Nitiphong Songsrirote

Authors

Nitiphong Songsrirote Mahasarakham Business School, Mahasarakham University https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4327-2770

Keywords:

Police Corruption, Economics, Incentives, Institutional Failures, Policy Remedies

Abstract

Corruption inside the police force is a lasting issue that diminishes the power of law, trust of the public, and economic development. The present systematic review gathers the peer-reviewed studies published from 2020 to 2025 that map the economic and institutional forces driving police corruption. Sticking to PRISMA guidelines, an all-embracing search of international databases provided 1,079 records, out of which 43 studies were finally selected as meeting the inclusion criteria for further analysis. The studies were compared altogether, which used econometric analyses, behavioral experiments, and dynamic modeling, and identified three closely linked roots of police corruption: inadequate performance-related pay, institutional norms that breed a “survival attitude,” and strategic opposition from the powerful. A very important result is that, for example, big pay raises or the installation of technological monitoring are all useless without wide-ranging institutional reform. The review presents a comprehensive integrated conceptual framework of systemic corruption equilibrium and offers a future research agenda directed at causal identification, longitudinal analysis, and context-sensitive policy design, which is particularly pertinent to Thailand and the ASEAN region, among others.

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