Narrow Results

This chapter aims to assess the effect of corruption on the relationship between financial development and economic complexity in MENA. To this end, we estimate a panel data model on 21 MENA countries between 1995 and 2020 using the double least squares method. Over-all, the analysis shows significant heterogeneous results conditional on corruption. Specifically, corruption worsens the effect of financial access, and the depth and efficiency of economic complexity over the sample period. In contrast, it improves the effect of financial stability on economic complexity in the region. The results appear to be robust to an alternative estimation technique.

Corporate governance reforms have been viewed as a means of improving the economic and social welfare of emerging economies and there have been efforts by the Nigerian government and its agencies to promulgate codes of best practices for companies in the country. There are critical questions regarding how effective these codes are in practice, and whether they are achieving the aims for which they were promulgated. Another pertinent issue is whether the codes of best practice actually complement and are complemented by the corporate legislation, because, ideally, meaningful corporate governance mechanisms should comprise of laws, regulations and principles working in synergy in order to achieve an overall atmosphere of effective corporate governance. This chapter discusses these issues and argues that corruption is a barrier to achieving the aims of corporate governance reforms and presents potential solutions to the problem of corruption in regard to creating effective corporate governance in Nigeria.