Abstract
This chapter describes the research design. It explains how the cross-national comparison for the fifteen countries in the MENA region was systematically conducted using structured focused comparison of the case studies, and specifically the Most Similar Systems Design. Using the Method of Difference to classify the case studies also offers a better understanding of corruption and the variables causing its occurrence in the region. The variables are operationalized using data derived from various international organizations as indicators (World Bank, Transparency International, the United Nations, Varieties of Democracy project, Freedom House, Heritage Foundation, and Reporters without Borders). The empirical analysis is supplemented by expert interviews which enabled more careful and thorough explanations of the causes of corruption in each country.
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Notes
- 1.
The state ownership of the economy indicator is not illustrated on a graph as the scores did not change over the years for most of the countries.
- 2.
Data on poverty rates, income inequality, and literacy rates are discussed without being displayed on graphs, as these are available for only a few years in a limited number of countries.
- 3.
Women’s empowerment indicators are discussed without being displayed in graphs, as the percentages did not show much variation.
- 4.
A numbered list of the anonymous interviews appears in Annex 3.
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Elsayed, D. (2021). Research Design, Methodology, and Data Collection. In: Corruption in the MENA Region. Political Corruption and Governance. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-55314-2_4
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