Transparency International

Transparency International

Abbreviation	TI
Formation	February 9, 1993 (1993-02-09)
Founder	Laurence Cockcroft, Peter Conze, Peter Eigen, Fritz Heimann, Michael Hershman, Kamal Hossain, Gerald Parfitt, Jeremy Pope, Roy Stacy, Frank Vogl, Oby Ezekwesili
Type	International non-governmental organization
Legal status	Eingetragener Verein (German registered voluntary association)
Purpose	Combat corruption, crime prevention
Headquarters	Berlin, Germany
Location	Alt-Moabit 96 10559 Berlin, Germany
Coordinates	52°31′26″N 13°20′42″E / 52.5238°N 13.3450°E / 52.5238; 13.3450
Region served	Global
Chief Executive Officer	Maíra Martini
Chair	François Valérian
Vice-Chair	Ketakandriana Rafitoson
Website	www.transparency.org

Transparency International (TI) is a global civil society movement working to combat corruption. It was founded by lawyer Peter Eigen, a former World Bank director for East Africa. TI's headquarters are in Berlin, Germany. Outside Germany, TI has branches in over 100 other countries.

Context and history

The reason for the organization's founding stemmed from founder Peter Eigen's negative experiences with corruption during his long years working for the World Bank, ultimately as its director for East Africa, based in Kenya. Eigen recognized corruption as a major obstacle to the success of development programs there. He believed that development aid programs would not be effective if corrupt structures between rich and poor countries, as well as within countries, were not stopped or made transparent.  When began fighting corruption, he was warned by the heads of the organization. The World Bank told him that any political activity and interference in a country's internal affairs were not permitted.

From that arose the idea of ​​establishing an independent non-governmental organization solely for the purpose of combating corruption. In June 1993, Eigen and 10 colleagues founded TI in The Hague. TI was subsequently registered as an association under German law on October 5, 1993. Initially, TI's headquarters were in Borsig-Villa Reiherwerder in Berlin. The establishment of TI was greatly assisted by German Technical Cooperation Association (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit) (GTZ) (now merged as Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit) (GIZ). Between 1998 and 2008, TI's facilities received approximately 590,000 Euros from GTZ.

At the time of TI's founding, in addition to Eigen, the following were on the executive board: Hansjörg Elshorst, Joe Githongo, Fritz Heimann, Michael Hershman, Kamal Hossain, Dolores L. Español, George Moody Stuart, Jerry Parfitt, Jeremy Pope, and Frank Vogl. Eigen became president and Pope became CEO of TI.

References

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