Today, The Equal Rights Trust and Transparency International are pleased to announce the publication of Barriers to Basics: Corruption and discrimination in education and health services.

The report – the latest in a series of investigations by the partners on the links between corruption and discrimination – demonstrates how these phenomena combine to undermine equal health and educational outcomes.

Corruption and discrimination are global challenges, that prevent people from accessing the services they need and depend upon for their wellbeing. But the links between them are underexplored.

Building upon desk-based research and consultation with directly affected communities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ghana, Madagascar, Rwanda and Zimbabwe, the report shines a spotlight on the dynamics of discriminatory corruption and the myriad of ways in which these dynamics reproduce in the health and education sectors to impede the equal enjoyment of human rights.

In a foreword to the report, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights observes that:

Those of us working in this field need to do more, both at international and national level, to ensure the complementarity of human rights and anticorruption frameworks. This report is an important contribution to these efforts. It will help to strengthen the global fight against corruption, uphold human rights, ensure victims’ access to justice, and break the vicious cycle of discriminatory corruption once and for all.

Concrete policy action is needed. To this end, the report makes a series of recommendations.

The report is currently available in English, and may be accessed here. A French language version will soon be made available.

Both documents will be shared at an official launch event, scheduled to take place later this year.