Principal Investigator: Dr. Tena Prelec, Assistant Professor in Politics and IR, University of Rijeka
Project duration: 2024–2025
Funders:

  • University of Rijeka – Mladi znanstvenici grant
  • Independent Social Research Foundation (ISRF) – Flexible Grants for Small Groups

Overview

This research project explores the emerging phenomenon of strategic corruption, understood as the use of corrupt practices by state or non-state actors to advance geostrategic objectives. By examining how corruption intersects with foreign policy, influence operations, and transnational financial flows, the project seeks to develop conceptual clarity, collect empirical evidence, and map policy responses.

The project is hosted at the Centre for Advanced Studies Southeast Europe (CAS SEE) and brings together a global network of scholars and practitioners working at the intersection of anti-corruption studies, international relations, and illicit finance.

Key Activities

Expert Workshop – Moise Palace, Cres (21–23 June 2024)

A two-day expert workshop gathered 10 international experts for in-depth discussion of strategic corruption, including case studies, conceptual debates, and policy implications. Participants included:

  • Dr. Tena Prelec (University of Rijeka)
  • Prof. David Lewis (University of Exeter)
  • Dr. Olivia Allison (RUSI)
  • Prof. Elizabeth David-Barrett (University of Sussex)
  • Dr. John Heathershaw (University of Exeter)
  • Mr. Tom Mayne (University of Exeter)
  • Dr. Bertram Lang (University of Göttingen)
  • Dr. Nedim Hogic (University of Oslo)
  • Dr. Saba Kassa (Basel Institute on Governance)
  • Dr. Liudas Zdanavicius (OECD)
  • Dr. Daniel Figueroa (OCCRP)

Topics explored included:

  • Competing definitions of strategic corruption and its overlap with state capture, kleptocracy, and illicit finance
  • Whether the term should be narrowed to focus on state-directed bribery, or widened to encompass elite networks and corrosive capital
  • Conceptual tensions around securitisation of anti-corruption and how this affects democratic oversight
  • Case studies from Russia, China, the UAE, Ukraine, Central Asia, the Western Balkans, Africa, and Latin America

The workshop also identified vulnerabilities in liberal democracies, particularly regarding narrative capture and Western complicity in enabling flows of strategic capital.

The discussion continued at the International Studies Association (ISA) Annual Convention in Chicago in March 2025. Several workshop participants attended the Convention and continued these conversations in related panels.

Outcomes

The first major output of this project is the peer-reviewed article by Tena Prelec and David Lewis, “Corruption and Revisionism: The Role of Illicit Finance in Russian Foreign Policy”, published in June 2025.

This article forms a cornerstone of the project’s contribution, building on longstanding collaborative efforts between the authors to understand the intersection of Russian foreign policy and illicit financial flows. It draws on empirical insights developed through the SOC ACE Programme and expands them within the strategic corruption framework.

This publication appears as part of a special issue of Public Integrity on Strategic Corruption, co-edited by Bertram Lang, Nedim Hogic, and Joseph Pozsgai-Alvarez, which brings together several participants of the Moise Palace workshop.

A policy report on strategic corruption is forthcoming in autumn 2025, as part of the SOC ACE Programme.

UNIRI The Moise Palace: Cres Island

An education center of the University of Rijeka. A five-hundred-year-old patrician townhouse and the largest Renaissance palace on the Croatian islands. A venue and forum for various scientific and research activities, it welcomes visiting academics, students and scholars.