Sextortion and Corruption

Sextortion, the sexual exploitation by people in positions of power of those subject to that power, is common around the world and fits the standard definition of corruption - the abuse of public power for private gain. Sextortion disproportionately affects women and vulnerable groups. Thus, it is important to understand the factors that give rise to sextortion. Using data from the Global Corruption Barometer, we find that the standard economic and institutional factors that predict corruption do not significantly correlate with the share of people who have either experienced sextortion personally or know someone who has. However, we find that sextortion is more common in countries that are more corrupt. We show that the share of people who perceive sextortion to occur at least occasionally is lower in countries that are more corrupt. These results suggest that corruption both facilitates and masks sexual predation