The other week I attended the European Conference on African Studies (ECAS2019) in Edinburgh, with colleagues from the SOAS ACE Research Consortium. Here are three things I learned.

Women in Nigeria’s Lagos State are less likely to engage in corruption than men, according to a survey commissioned by the ACE Research Consortium and conducted last month by Pollit Analytics. The survey, carried out in the Nigerian presidential pre-election climate, asked 500 online respondents about their views on corruption. It offers a snapshot of perceptions and of personal involvement in corrupt activities in the state, as well as of differences by gender.

Should corruption be seen as a moral issue? It often seems so, and that attitude is often reflected in how societies decide it should be dealt with – punishment through the legal system or the rule of law. But there is also another way of thinking about corruption, which says that the historical social and economic structures in a country create the conditions for corruption.

This column outlines key policy measures for building more competitive firms in different economic sectors.