Article 6.1 of the United Nations Convention against Corruption establishes that “Each State Party shall, in accordance with the fundamental principles of its legal system, ensure the existence of a body or bodies, as appropriate, that prevent corruption” and goes on to state in Article 6.2 that “Each State Party shall grant the body or bodies referred to in paragraph 1 of this article the necessary independence”. Article 36 of the same instrument establishes under the title “Specialised authorities” that “Each State Party shall ensure the existence of a body or bodies or persons specialized in combating corruption through law enforcement.”
The United Nations Convention against Corruption is not the only instrument intended to ensure the existence of anti-corruption bodies and that these enjoy the independence they need (the Criminal Law Convention on Corruption of the Council of Europe for instance).
Consequently, in compliance with the international obligations subscribed to, the existence of preventive and investigative anti-corruption bodies (and hybrids) has been adopted by legislators in Europe and the world over.
The institutionalised models at the European level can be classified into three groups:
- Multi-purpose agencies
- Law enforcement type institutions
- Preventive, policy development and co-ordination institutions).
In this section we include several European and international anti-corruption agencies, as well as some of the networks that these agencies have established to exchange experiences and expertise in the prevention and prosecution of corruption.
- LAW 11/2016, of 28 November, of the Generalitat, of the Agency of Prevention and Fight against the Fraud and the Corruption of the Valencian Community (in Catalan)
- Law 16/2016, of 9 December, creating the Office for the Prevention and Fight against Corruption in the Balearic Islands (in Catalan)
- Foral Law 7/2018, of 17 May, creating the Office of Good Practices and Anticorruption of the Foral Community of Navarra (in Spanish)
- Law 8/2015, of 7 August, amending Law 6/1985, of 24 June, on the Council of Accounts, and the revised text of the Galician Financial and Budgetary System Act, approved by Legislative Decree 1/1999, of 7 October, for the prevention of corruption (in Spanish)
- Law 8/2018, of 14 September, on Transparency, Good Governance and Interest Groups (Asturias) (in Spanish)
- Law 5/2017, of 1 June, on Public Integrity and Ethics (Aragon) (in Spanish)
- Government measure for the creation of the Office for Transparency and Good Practices (Barcelona) (in Catalan)
- Organic Regulation of the Municipal Office against Fraud and Corruption (Madrid) (in Spanish)
- Law 2/2021, of June 18, on the fight against fraud and corruption in Andalusia and protection of the person who report
