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Professor Adam Graycar, Dean, School of Criminal Studies, Rutgers University

16 August 2009

Interview with Professor Adam Graycar

Sunday Agenda program, 16 August 2009

Helen Dalley: After a distinguished career in Australia, Professor Adam Graycar became
Dean of the School of Criminal Justice at Rutgers University in the United States. He set up
a School of Corruption Studies at Rutgers, which is in New Jersey, that’s especially
appropriate when you hear him talk about the staggering statistics for graft in that state. I
talked to him about his experiences in America and about his perspective on those
allegations regarding renewed corruption in Queensland.

Professor Adam Graycar, thanks very much for joining on Sunday Agenda.

Adam Graycar: My pleasure.

Helen Dalley: Now, you’ve had extensive experience in Australia and now you’ve been
watching corruption arrests unfold in your new home State of New Jersey in the United
States. How does Australia’s corruption at political levels compare with the US or maybe
more particularly with New Jersey?

Adam Graycar: Well, either it’s very very well hidden or we’re in a totally different league. In
the state in live in, New Jersey, something like 150 public officials have been arrested and
convicted for corruption offences since 2001. In the city that I live in, Newark, five of the last
seven mayors have gone to prison for corruption related activities.

Helen Dalley: Why is a state like New Jersey so corrupt and why can’t it seem to be
stopped?

Adam Graycar: First of all the federal system in America devolves power to a very very very
low level. In New Jersey, which is one-third the size of the Tasmania, there are 566
municipalities and there are 21 counties. All of them have governments. All of them make
rules, all of them make regulations. All of them tell you what you can build and what you
can’t build and where you can build it and what you can do. All of them have school districts.
All of them have police services. And so to find your way through the morass no human
being can do it and so you know what happens in the end it’s much easier to buy your way
through it.

Helen Dalley: Are there no equivalent to the Australian system, no ICACs or Royal
Commissions of inquiry?

Adam Graycar: There isn’t the same method of control and people do care. Everybody says
gee it’s terrible. And the FBI, who does most of the prosecutions, go after these people.
People see the things that happen and the political system is so paralysed that it cannot act,
it cannot because . . .

Sunday Agenda 16 August Professor Adam Graycar

Helen Dalley: All right. But you say power devolves to a very low level so it’s you know the
Mayor of Newark, which is a town of 300,000 people or something. But is there also serious
lack of political will at a higher level to stamp it out at those low levels?

Adam Graycar: There is. Let me give you an example. On his first day in office President
Barack Obama issued an executive order about probity in government, about setting
standards for ethical behaviour. This is a very very important statement and what he said
was that no government employee could do this, this, this and you know the normal range of
things. Now, that edict, that executive order applies to federal public servants. It does not
apply to elected congressmen. It does not apply to judges. It does not apply to anybody in
the states. It does not apply to anybody in local government. He has jurisdiction only over
the executive branch of government.

Helen Dalley: All right. Let’s move quickly to Australia and one of Australia’s eminent anti-
corruption fighters, lawyer Tony Fitzgerald, who did the ground breaking report on police
corruption 20 years ago, he lamented in a recent speech that Queensland could be sliding
back to the dark ages of corruption. Can you assess whether he’s right?

Adam Graycar: Well, it depends on the level of political will and political support. The two
things that we’ve got to look at are whether the corruption that has been identified recently is
systemic or whether it is a rogue element, whether there are one or two people who have
just done the wrong thing. It would be inconceivable in an Australian state today to have a
police commissioner as a crook as we saw in Queensland 25 years ago.

Helen Dalley: Tony Fitzgerald and others believe that the current Queensland Crime and
Misconduct Commission has been neutered by the Labor Government there. Is he right in
your view?

Adam Graycar: Anti-corruption commissions can be very very effective and we’ve seen
some very effective ones around the world. It depends on the legislation; it depends on the
way in which the enforcement activities can be put into place. I’m not close enough to the
Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission to make a judgment.

Helen Dalley: All right. What is key in your view to have in a state to make sure that
corruption doesn’t become systemic?

Adam Graycar: First of all a culture of integrity where people know that having money put
into your bank account by some business people is not right, is absolutely wrong and is
horrifically wrong. Secondly, to make sure the transactions, whether seem dubious or not are
always transparent. So if not sure you say to people hey this is what’s happening, you know
the minister goes to the premier and says this is what’s happening. Thirdly, good
organizational structures with good leadership so that you don’t have some organizations
that are corrupt but rather the leadership says this doesn’t work. You have procedures in
place that make sure that when people are hired they are hired on merit, there are criteria,
there are processes and it is open. Then you have performance appraisal. You have proper
procurement practices and you make sure that there is always accountability and
transparency.

Helen Dalley: Professor Graycar, how murky though does it become when various state
governments and political parties accept political donations and they might come from
property developers and the like, how sure can the community be that corruption doesn’t
exist?

Adam Graycar: You can never be sure because when people make donations it depends on
what they want in return. We do have registers for political donations but let me tell you in Ne

Sunday Agenda 16 August Professor Adam Graycar

Jersey they have a register and people have been able to manipulate those registers and
manipulate the way donations are accounted for. But by and large the important thing is
whether a donation comes with a very specific quid pro quo. If there is a quid pro quo I’ll
make a donation and I want this in return, that is clearly corrupt behaviour and unacceptable.

Helen Dalley: And just on a quick professional note of yours it seems incongruus that you
run an institute of corruption at Rutgers University there in New Jersey in a state that is so
corrupt.

Adam Graycar: Well, when I came to Rutgers a couple of years ago I decided to set this
institute up because there are many issues in corruption. I work internationally mostly with
the United Nations and with the World Bank, but there’s no shortage of local material and
our students are very interested in it and we work very closely with the local law enforcement
people and the legislatures.

Helen Dalley: Well, maybe it’s good that it starts at university level. Professor Adam Graycar
thanks for joining us.

Adam Graycar: My very great pleasure.

Sunday Agenda 16 August Professor Adam Graycar