Abstract

With the enactment of the 2005 law on corruption, the establishment of the National Anti-Corruption Committee in 2006, and the ratification of the United Nations convention against corruption in 2009, the Vietnamese government signaled that the fight against corruption was at the top of the policy agenda. From 2005, media coverage on combating bribes also intensified. This increased public awareness, combined with a series of punitive actions against corrupt public officials and bribe paying firms, made clear to civil society that government legislative action against corrupt behavior would be progressively enforced.