An in-house discussion on Democracy and Corruption was held at the CPD Dialogue Room on 15 October 2011. Dr Arne Wiig, Senior Researcher of CMI presented a paper titled ‘Does Democracy Reduce Corruption’, jointly authored by him and Dr Ivar Klostad, Research Director of CMI. The paper was prepared based on a study conducted under the CPD-CMI Research Cooperation Programme 2010-2013. Dr Wiig observed that the research indicated a substantive impact on corruption of incremental changes in democracy in relatively poor and somewhat democratic countries like Bangladesh. He said revitalising democracy is not only important in itself, that it also helps to reduce corruption. He observed as democracy matures, transparency and accountability increase, and corruption goes down. Dr Wiig noted that corruption may affect trust which in turn may affect democracy.