Anti-graft agenda on the right track

Corruption is a cancer to which no society is immune. It raised the death toll of Iran's recent earthquake, owing to substandard housing construction 10 years ago. It has afflicted the United States Navy, which is now investigating more than 60 admirals and hundreds more officers for fraud and bribery. And it has brought down countless governments.

President Xi Jinping, a keen student of history, is well aware of the destructive potential of corruption - and has confronted the phenomenon head-on. But, as China's economy continues to modernize, much work remains to be done.

Before reform and opening-up were launched in the late 1970s, corruption in China was relatively petty, as the market's limited size constrained opportunities for administrative abuse. With the widening of the market, however, inadequate legislation and weak institutional safeguards facilitated increasingly brazen corruption and administrative abuses. But, as income and education levels rose, people became less tolerant of such abuses, increasingly demanding transparent and lawful delivery of basic public goods, from infrastructure and environmental protection to a fair distribution of income and opportunities.