Jodi Vittori is a nonresident scholar in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program. She is an expert on the linkages of corruption, state fragility, illicit finance, and U.S. national security. She is also the U.S. research and policy manager for Transparency International’s Defense and Security Program and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. Prior to joining Transparency International, Vittori was a senior policy adviser for Global Witness, where she managed educational and advocacy activities on linkages between corruption and national security. Prior to that, Vittori served in the U.S. Air Force, advancing to the rank of lieutenant colonel; her overseas service included Afghanistan, Iraq, South Korea, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain, and she was assigned to NATO’s only counter-corruption task force. She was an assistant professor and military faculty at the U.S. Air Force Academy and the National Defense University. Vittori has published on conflict finance and illicit financial flows and she is the author of the book Terrorist Financing and Resourcing and a co-author of the handbook Corruption Threats and International Missions: Practical Guidance for Leaders. She is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy and received her PhD in International Studies from the University of Denver.
To protect their assets for the long term, some countries invest resources and wealth into sovereign wealth funds, which manage a diversified portfolio. But without adequate transparency requirements, these vehicles can be ripe for corruption and other governance risks.
Kleptocracy, or “rule by thieves,” is a form of corruption where state institutions serve regime elites to exploit citizens. This harms the source countries where resources are stolen, weakening democratic norms and economic development in host countries.
Jodi Vittori sits down with Stewart to unpack Russia’s efforts to escape Western sanctions and the effectiveness of sanctions more broadly.
Confronting kleptocratic networks will be a defining challenge for democratic societies and their policymakers. Unfortunately, too many democracies fail to prioritize global corruption as a major national security threat or to see how their own laws, institutions, and social norms enable it.
The how, why, and everything that can go wrong when we arm the world.
Financial power must be an important component of the U.S.’s Russia containment strategy, not an afterthought.
Equally important, however, is an issue that has not been as widely publicized: That a country considered an especially permissive location for the facilitation of organized crime, corruption, and illicit finance now sits atop the world’s leading global law enforcement agency.
The Pandora Papers reveal that the United States has much work to do to stop being a haven for the ill-gotten gains of political elites from around the world, but there are steps the Biden administration and Congress can take to reverse this trend.
The Afghan security forces’ gradual and then sudden collapse is a cautionary tale about other U.S. efforts worldwide to bolster foreign security sectors that are hamstrung by corrosive and endemic corruption.
A conversation about the role of corruption in Afghanistan.
