ABSTRACT
Current works of the literature suggest that corrupt countries try to hide their corrupt practices from their citizens in attempting to control the number of different types of daily newspapers and that the ability for a nation to provide a variety of media for their citizens as to allow them to choose and to pick from different sources and viewpoints about their country reflects the amount of corruption that country has. This research compares three things: expenditure on R&D, the number of telephone lines in use, and the amount of and variety of newspapers being read in a certain country, and tries to see the relationship between these three variables and the perception of corruption. The results supported the hypothesis that the greater the variety of media that citizens of a country have to choose from, and the greater the expenditure on R&D, the lower the perception of corruption. Interestingly enough, we find that the more the private industry spends on R&D than the government, the lower the corruption.
Keywords
Information, influence, corruption