GENDER AND CORRUPTION PRONE BEHAVIOR OF PUBLIC SECTOR EMPLOYEES: A CASE OF SRI LANKAN PUBLIC SECTOR INSTITUTIONS

Abstract

Many researchers revile that there exists an impeccable augmentation of corruption in all sectors both locally as well as globally. Elicits contemplation of the research focus on the relationship between employee demographics and corruption-prone behavior among the public-sector employees. In addition, it is imperati,'e to explain to what extent such relationship is being moderated by the career cycle stage of the public-sector employees in Sri Lanka. Question such as what stimulates public sector employees to engage with corruption, what differentiation could exist among different demographics towards corruption and finally this study address the impact of employee career cycle stage over the relationship between employee demographics and corruption prone behavior. Research becomes significant in terms of academic contribution to develop the cognitive enhancement of practical consideration regarding eradication of corruption in the public sector. Research is organized with reference to the deductive philosophy and mixed strategy has been utilized. Quantitativc analysis augmentcd with 611 questionnaires to clicit responses from selected representative sample and qualitatively articulated 22 interviews and ethnography are used within the selected six public sector institutions which are reported with highest level of corruption over the last 5 years. Transactional cost, agency theorem and institutional theorem were used along with the career cycle theory to build the theoretical foundation of the research. Forcefully, it has been recognized that the corruption-prone behavior is driven by the internal factors and external factors principally. Further analyses were conducted based on the three pillars, primarily descriptive statistics, secondarily correlation analysis and finally about the hypothesis texting aligned with descriptive statistics and Tukey-HSD test, A:-JOV A, and qualitative analysis, it is revealed that the career cycle stage has no moderating effect over the relationship between employee demographics and corruption-prone behavior. But in relation to both demographics and the external factors together (synchronization) career cycle stage impelled no moderating impact. Qualitative analysis revealed that with forceful articulated aspect of "fearlessness" as the key consideration of corruption due to political interference and the superior security interventions. Predominantly it concludes that female is less vulnerable to corruption than the male counterpart in Sri Lanka and external factors have therefore become more prominent as the corruption prone behavior than the demographic factor.