Leading bureaucracies to the tipping point: An alternative model of multiple stable equilibrium levels of corruption.

We present a novel model of corruption dynamics in the form of a nonlinear optimal dynamic control problem. It has a tipping point, but one whose origins and character are distinct from that in the classic Schelling (1978) model. The decision maker choosing a level of corruption is the chief or some other kind of authority figure who presides over a bureaucracy whose state of corruption is influenced by the authority figure's actions, and whose state in turn influences the pay-off for the authority figure.