Ethics and accountability in BRICS countries: analysing critical issues

Abstract

This article reports on ethics and accountability in the BRICS countries comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The group of emerging economies was formed as an economic bloc in 2003, at the time referred to as BRIC, with South Africa joining in 2010. The BRICS countries have various bilateral trading agreements that are mutually beneficial. The aim of this article is thus to reflect how the BRICS countries have addressed issues of ethics and accountability as important prerequisites for good governance. It is underpinned by an ethics and accountability theoretical framework. Although the BRICS countries differ in accountability levels, by all means, they are all corrupt according to the Corruption Perception Index of Transparency International. Employing qualitative methodology and document analysis as a data collection technique and the application of discourse analysis, the extent of ethical cultures and accountability was explored from political and economic BRICS contexts. These contexts are important in understanding ethics and accountability because studies have found that emerging economies, for example, have a tendency to result in corrupt activities and weak accountabilities. The findings suggest that there is a correlation between ethics and accountability - a high ethical environment yields high accountability and the converse applies.