When in Rome do as the Romans : A study of Swedish export companies' attitude towards corrupt behavior

This thesis examines Swedish corruption culture and analyzes if Swedish export companies have a different attitude towards corrupt behavior when exporting to high and low income countries. A regression of Swedish export is run for all the world’s countries with available data, a total of 165 countries. Out of those 165 countries, 98 are classified by the United Nations as low or low-middle income countries and 67 are classified as high or high-middle income countries. The regression applies to the gravity model approach that comprises variables explaining the size of Swedish exports to each importing country. To examine Swedish corruption culture a theoretical background to the structure of corruption in Swedish companies is presented along with some corruption scandals involving Swedish companies. The findings show that a lower level of corruption in developed countries has a positive influence on Swedish export to those countries. However, in the case of developing countries the level of corruption does not have any impact on Swedish export flows. In other words, if a poor country increases or decreases its level of corruption it would not affect the decision of a Swedish company in deciding whether to export to this country or not. The conclusion drawn is that Swedish companies are more willing to bribe developing countries as opposed to developed countries