Survey: 78 Percent of Koreans Consider Corruption Level Serious

It was discovered that eight out of 10 Korean people view the level of corruption in the country as serious, and that the regional monopoly by a specific political party is the main reason of corruption.

In addition, a survey found that people generally think the country’s integrity rating is only half that of a developed country.

On June 16, the Council for Transparent Society and Agreement announced that it found the above results in a public awareness survey conducted on 2,000 adult men and women aged over 20 from 16 areas nationwide, and 501 experts, including professors and lawyers.

According to the results of the survey by the council, 78.9 percent of the public and 77.6 percent of the experts answered that the corruption level in Korea is “serious.”

In particular, 30.9 percent of the public replied that Korea’s corruption level is “very serious,” and 48.0 percent consider it as “serious,” while a mere two percent of the public view it as “not serious.” The above result shows that most of the public is having a consciousness of crisis regarding the level of corruption.

When asked to evaluate Korea’s integrity rating with the level of corruption in a developed country equivalent to a score of 100, both public and experts gave scores of less than 60 to Korea.

In addition, 40 percent of those surveyed replied that it will take more than 10 years for Korea’s integrity rating to reach the level of a developed country, and over 20 percent said that it would take more than 20 years or it would never happen regardless of time.

weappon@donga.com