Anti-corruption versus political security: reflection on the Vietnamese context

This paper demonstrates that key driving force of anti-corruption attempts of Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) is concern about the damage that corruption is causing to its legitimacy. This leads to strict control of the CPV over civil and political rights during anti-corruption process, which springs up from the fear that these rights may be used to raise the people against the mono leadership of the CPV. The author believes that, the CPV's anti-corruption strategy is strongly influenced by Lee Kuan Yew's theory, in which democracy is not an indispensable factor for economic development and fighting corruption. Because of this, the CPV is now facing a dilemma: constraining political freedoms makes the anti-corruption work at standstill, while tolerating those freedoms may cause risks for the mono leadership of the CPV in the country. The author concludes that, without more far-reaching political reforms, corruption in Vietnam can not be dealt with.