Advocates for economic liberalisation then predicted that the demise of the socialist state would bring an end to corruption. In some ways they were right. After 1991, no one any longer had to pay bribes to buy of a bag of cement or a scooter, or to get a new telephone connection. But rather than putting a stop to bribery entirely, the process of reform merely ended up creating new and far grander avenues for the unscrupulous.
