Najaaraq Demant-Poort recommends that training be provided for those who have to deal with dilemmas around power and incompetence on a daily basis in order to combat the feeling of corruption.
Can we trustthat civil servants and elected politicians do not abuse their power?
Not necessarily, believes a large part of the Greenlandic population. This is according to a poll conducted by Transparency International Greenland. 65 percent of those questioned believe that some politicians abuse their power. 25 percent believe that most of these do.
And that mistrust can be a problem, says Najaaraq Demant-Poort, assistant professor with a PhD program at Ilisimatusarfik, who researches administration, public institutions and trust. She has also helped provide data for the study.
– It is a challenge in itself that citizens believe that there is corruption and abuse of power. Even if, objectively speaking, it may not occur, just the fact that citizens can go around with that view can well be a challenge for the political system, she says.
However, she points out that the report shows that, after all, there is great trust in the public sector. 78 percent of those questioned had confidence in the police. There is also a lot of trust in the courts and company managers, while trust in Inatsisartut, Naalakkersuisut and municipal politicians is all at 63 percent.
– We are actually very high compared to other countries in the world on these levels of trust. We are both in the previous survey for Transparency, but also in this one right up there among the 10-12 highest ranked countries in Europe when it comes to how high we rate the trust in these institutions.
Are the rules transparent?
Many measures have been put in place to avoid abuse of power and corruption, says Najaaraq Demant-Poort. Including whistleblower schemes, the Public Administration Act, gift policies and money laundering rules.
But how can it be that there is an idea in the population that some officials and elected representatives abuse their power?
– I think exactly this matter of trusting whether these measures work, there may be some challenges, because it requires, first of all, that you know the whole of this set of regulations. And we are all set up as human beings in such a way that very few of us sit down and read and know legal texts. So the entire knowledge of legislation and the area of legislation is not great, unless you are a lawyer, says Najaaraq Demant-Poort.
In Transparency International Greenland’s report, it appears that 25 percent of those questioned do not believe that corruption is reported because people know each other too well. And precisely an everyone-knows-everyone society can well present challenges, says Najaaraq Demant-Poort.
– We may have an experience that, well, it (the legislation, ed.) will be respected at all in practice, when I know very well that he knows her, and the two of them probably also know each other, and are family or something, she says.
Practical dialogue and training
Transparency International Greenland recommends, among other things, that Greenland get an anti-corruption strategy and create information campaigns for citizens about adopted laws and access to complaints.
But Najaaraq Demant-Poort has a different approach:
– Based on my own research area, I think it is even more important that there must be much more focus on the practical dialogue and training for all those who have to deal with these dilemmas around power and incapacity, especially on a daily basis.
It is typically the top of the political systems and lawyers and civil servants who take care of the legislation. But it must be interpreted on a day-to-day basis by others, many of whom are skilled in other areas. It can be employees at municipal service centres, municipal bailiffs or reserve officers.
– And that’s actually where it’s going to work. We can’t say it works because we made a law. We can say that it works if it turns out to work in practice.
In the survey from Transparency International Greenland, it can be seen that more people believe that the authorities are better at fighting corruption than last year.
In 2016, 60 percent believed that the authorities handled abuse of power poorly. In 2020 the figure was 50 percent and in 2025 it was 38 percent.
