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Corruption scandals should not be studied only as media events or elite reputational crises. They are public conflicts through which hidden or contested abuses of office become visible, social harm is narrated, and accountability institutions are tested. This open panel focuses specifically on scandals linked to corruption, illicit political finance, clientelism, conflicts of interest, state capture, AND organized crime, asking how such episodes affect social well-being and the quality of democracy.
The panel invites papers that examine how corrupt practices are revealed, translated into public scandals, and processed by courts, audit bodies, electoral authorities, legislatures, anti-corruption agencies, media, and civil society. We are especially interested in contributions that connect scandals to their social consequences: weakened public services, unequal access to state resources, erosion of social rights, distorted policy priorities, impunity, insecurity, inequality, and declining trust in democratic institutions.
The panel asks when political scandals operate as mechanisms of democratic accountability and when they instead produce cynicism, polarization, scandal fatigue, or institutional fragility. Papers may address the timing of revelations around elections, the role of political finance and illicit money, cross-border corruption, digital leaks and whistleblowing, and anti-corruption reforms.
The panel welcomes comparative, historical, quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-method research from all regions. By placing corruption scandals at the intersection of political finance, accountability, democratic quality, and social well-being, the panel contributes directly to RC20’s agenda while avoiding a broad treatment of political scandals as generic tests of elite authority or media visibility.