One of the largest anti-corruption operations in European history, Mãos Limpas, or Clean hands, carried out in the 90s, helped to dismantle several schemes involving both the payment of bribes by private companies interested in securing contracts with state-owned companies and public bodies and the diversion of resources to finance political campaigns.
But for political scientist Alberto Vannucci, one of the greatest scholars of Operation “Clean Hands” in Italy, judicial investigations cannot end corruption in a country when it is systemic.
“Judicial investigations, even when successful, can put some corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and businesspeople in jail, but they cannot end the deep-rooted causes of corruption,” said the professor at the University of Pisa.
According to him, the Clean Hands Italian government still ended up allowing the emergence of more sophisticated corruption mechanisms in the country.
The operation investigated six former prime ministers, more than 500 parliamentarians and thousands of other agents.
The main parties of the time – First Italian Republic, Christian Democracy (DC) and the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) – ended or were profoundly modified by it.
The operation also resulted in the rise of “new” politicians such as former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was involved in several scandals and ended up resigning.
“Mãos Limpas can be considered an incredible achievement in the short term, but a failure in the long term,” said Vannucci in an interview with BBC Brasil.
According to him, in general terms, judicial inquiries, even when successful, can put some corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and businesspeople in jail, but they cannot end the deep-rooted causes of corruption.
“The lack of transparency and accountability in politics and state bureaucracy, weak social and political control over the exercise of power, erroneous and immoral political elite selection mechanisms: these and other factors of corruption cannot be eradicated by judges”, explained.
To make matters worse, in Italy now, corrupt politicians, public servants and businesspeople have learned the lesson of Clean Hands and are not making the same mistakes as those who were arrested.
“In recent years, they have developed more sophisticated techniques to practice corruption with a greater chance of going unpunished, such as concealing bribe payments, or multiplying conflicts of interest, as (the former prime minister) did. Berlusconi (by creating tensions with the Judiciary)”, says Vannucci.
For him, “even when they find evidence of bribery and prosecute politicians, judicial investigations only scratch the surface of illegality, they can barely modify the invisible structure of the unwritten norms of systemic corruption”.
And he adds: “when a significant part of members of the elite develop a belief that “corruption is the normal way of doing things”, the practice of corruption resists investigations and scandals”.
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