Pakistan’s latest corruption score has improved slightly, yet the data behind that movement deserves a closer examination.
Transparency International’s 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index gave Pakistan 28 out of 100. The country ranked 136th among 182 countries, compared with 27 points and 135th place among 180 countries previously.
That means Pakistan’s score increased by one point, while its numerical ranking moved down by one place. Transparency International says scores provide a more meaningful comparison than ranks because the number and performance of countries can change each year.
The issue matters beyond the ranking itself. Corruption and governance indicators can influence how investors, businesses, lenders and international institutions assess country risk.
The IMF’s 2025 Governance and Corruption Diagnostic for Pakistan identified persistent corruption risks and governance weaknesses. It said these weaknesses constrain private-sector development and public-sector effectiveness.
The IMF also cited research showing that every one-point improvement in the CPI is associated with a 4% increase in a country’s investment rate. However, the IMF clearly described this as an association rather than proof of direct causation.
What Does Pakistan’s CPI Score of 28 Actually Measure?
The CPI does not measure the number of corruption cases, stolen public funds or bribes paid by Pakistani citizens.
Instead, it measures perceived public-sector corruption using assessments from experts and businesspeople. Transparency International combines data from external sources and standardises those inputs into a single score.
Pakistan was assessed using eight of the 13 sources used globally for the 2025 index.
Those sources do not all use the same research methods. They involve different forms of expert assessment, business surveys, institutional evaluations and country-risk analysis.
Therefore, the final score represents a composite perception indicator rather than a direct audit of corruption inside Pakistan.
What Changed Behind the 28?
The source-level figures provide an important part of the picture.
Five of Pakistan’s eight published source scores remained unchanged. Two declined, while V-Dem recorded the only substantial improvement.
Bertelsmann remained at 21, while the Economist Intelligence Unit stayed at 18. Global Insights remained at 32, and PRS ICRG stayed at 33.
The World Bank’s CPIA remained at 39. Meanwhile, the World Economic Forum fell from 33 to 32.
The World Justice Project score also declined, moving from 26 to 25. In contrast, V-Dem increased from 14 to 19.
This makes the V-Dem movement particularly important when examining Pakistan’s one-point overall increase.
The published whole-number source scores add up to 219. Their simple average is therefore 27.375, while Transparency International reports a CPI score of 28.
That difference does not demonstrate a mathematical error. Transparency International uses underlying unrounded values, rather than the rounded figures published for individual sources.
Consequently, the exact calculation cannot be reproduced from the publicly displayed whole-number scores alone.
Why Did Pakistan’s V-Dem Score Increase?
The five-point V-Dem increase is the largest positive movement among Pakistan’s eight CPI inputs.
V-Dem uses expert assessments and statistical modelling. Its datasets can also be revised when new information or updated assessments become available.
Therefore, several possibilities could explain a change in the underlying assessment. These could include changes in expert assessments, revised historical data or methodological updates.
However, the published CPI figures alone do not establish which factor produced Pakistan’s five-point V-Dem increase.
The precise unrounded V-Dem value supplied to Transparency International is not disclosed in the CPI table.
Transparency International referred questions about the V-Dem increase to V-Dem itself. It also said Pakistan’s historical CPI changes have not been statistically significant.
TI described Pakistan’s five-year CPI trend as “stagnant”, with the country remaining in the bottom quartile.
Eight Sources Do Not Mean Eight Identical Measurements
Pakistan’s eight CPI inputs come from organisations using different methods.
The World Economic Forum uses an executive opinion survey. The World Justice Project combines household and expert information.
Bertelsmann relies on expert assessments, while V-Dem uses expert coding and statistical modelling.
The Economist Intelligence Unit, Global Insights and PRS ICRG use country-risk assessments. Meanwhile, the World Bank’s CPIA evaluates institutional performance.
These approaches involve different respondents, experts, definitions and assessment periods.
Transparency International standardises those scores before combining them into the CPI.
That approach provides a common scale, but it also raises a methodological question about how different forms of evidence should be combined.
The use of equal weighting after standardisation is a methodological choice. It does not by itself show that the CPI is flawed.
However, different sources may sometimes draw on overlapping information. Assessors could rely on similar government documents, court cases, media reports, expert networks or international developments.
That possibility does not prove duplication or bias. Instead, it means that eight sources should not automatically be treated as eight completely independent measurements.
The 2025 CPI Does Not Represent One Common Year of Evidence
Another important issue concerns timing.
The eight underlying assessments do not necessarily cover the same period. Some may rely on information from 2024, while others use specific periods during 2025.
Some assessments can also reflect developments over longer periods.
Therefore, the label “2025” does not mean that all eight sources simultaneously measured corruption during the same calendar year.
A reform introduced late in 2025 may not immediately affect every assessment. Similarly, earlier events may continue influencing expert perceptions.
A one-point CPI movement should therefore not automatically be attributed to one particular government decision or reform.
How Easily Can the CPI Data Be Independently Checked?
Transparency International publishes its methodology and explains how it selects, standardises and combines sources.
However, some underlying information remains private or proprietary.
This creates a difference between methodological transparency and data transparency.
Researchers can study how the CPI is designed. Yet they cannot necessarily reproduce every country-level source score from the original observations.
A fuller independent review would require detailed information about assessment dates, expert or respondent numbers, sampling methods, weighting, missing data and unrounded scores.
It would also require information about changes in expert pools and methodology.
Transparency International says the full CPI has been independently reproduced and statistically audited by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre. However, it also says an individual country score cannot be reproduced in isolation because the rescaling process depends on global means and standard deviations.
Pakistan’s Domestic Corruption Surveys Tell a Different Story
The global CPI should also be separated from Pakistan’s domestic corruption surveys.
Transparency International Pakistan conducts the National Corruption Perception Survey separately. It has clarified that the domestic chapter does not collect the data or calculate Pakistan’s global CPI score.
Its 2025 survey covered 20 districts across Pakistan and received 3,989 completed responses.
The survey identified police as the most frequently perceived corrupt sector, followed by tendering and procurement and the judiciary.
It also reported that 66% of respondents had not paid a bribe for a public service during the previous 12 months. At the same time, 77% expressed dissatisfaction with government efforts to combat corruption.
The 2025 survey represented a methodological change for Transparency International Pakistan. The organisation moved from non-probability convenience sampling to a multistage stratified cluster design.
About 1,000 respondents were allocated to each province, with respondents selected at locations including markets, parks, government buildings and community venues.
A larger sample can reduce sampling error. However, sample size alone does not eliminate selection bias.
The published methodology does not provide enough information to independently reproduce every aspect of national weighting, respondent selection and non-response treatment.
That limitation does not establish that the survey findings were manipulated. It means the available information limits independent replication.
A Previous Court Case Highlights the Importance of Methodology
A previous Peshawar High Court case provides another reason to examine corruption surveys carefully.
In 2024, the court considered Transparency International Pakistan’s 2023 National Corruption Perception Survey. The case involved findings concerning the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa judiciary.
The court questioned aspects of the survey’s response data and methodology. It also directed Transparency International Pakistan to recall and republish the report with relevant information.
The judgment specifically examined the handling of responses concerning alleged bribe payments.
It found shortcomings in the explanation and presentation of some responses. The court also raised concerns about distinguishing perceptions from actual corruption.
The ruling concerned the 2023 survey and does not establish that the 2025 survey contains the same weaknesses.
The 2025 methodology is substantially different. Still, the earlier case demonstrates why transparent sampling, response handling and data treatment matter when corruption surveys are published.
What Do People Experience Directly?
A separate Ipsos and Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry survey provides another perspective.
The Index of Transparency and Accountability in Pakistan used fieldwork conducted in December 2025 and January 2026.
It interviewed more than 6,000 respondents across 82 urban and rural districts and more than 195 tehsils. A separate sample also covered government institutions.
The survey found that 68% of respondents believed bribery was common in public institutions. However, 27% said they had personally faced a bribe demand.
Similarly, 56% believed nepotism was widespread. Yet 24% reported personally experiencing favouritism that undermined merit.
The figures show an important distinction between perception and personal experience.
People can believe corruption is widespread without personally experiencing every form of corruption. Likewise, someone may personally encounter corruption without considering it representative of the entire system.
These different measures therefore capture different aspects of the same broader problem.
The CPI Is Not an Audit of Pakistan
The distinction becomes important when interpreting Pakistan’s score of 28.
The figure does not mean that 28% of Pakistanis are corrupt. It does not show that 28% of public money was stolen.
It also does not measure the percentage of government contracts involving corruption or the proportion of citizens who paid bribes.
Instead, it represents perceived public-sector corruption based on external assessments.
At the same time, dismissing the CPI simply because it measures perceptions would also be misleading.
The IMF’s 2025 diagnostic independently identified persistent corruption risks and governance weaknesses in Pakistan. Its assessment covered areas including fiscal governance, market regulation, financial-sector oversight, AML/CFT and the rule of law.
The IMF said these weaknesses can constrain private-sector development and public-sector effectiveness.
Therefore, the CPI should be read as one indicator within a wider governance picture rather than as a complete measurement of corruption.
Why the Score Matters to Pakistan’s Economy
Corruption indicators can matter to investors and international institutions because governance affects perceptions of country risk.
The CPI itself is not an investment rating or credit rating. It is also not an IMF lending condition.
However, corruption and governance form part of the broader institutional environment considered by businesses and financial institutions.
The IMF has linked corruption and governance weaknesses with investment and economic performance. Its cited research found an association between CPI improvements and higher investment rates.
That relationship should not be interpreted as proof that raising a CPI score automatically attracts investment.
Investment decisions depend on many factors, including economic stability, regulation, infrastructure, financing conditions and political and institutional risks.
Still, governance indicators can contribute to the overall picture available to international investors.
What Transparency International Says About Pakistan’s Improvement
Transparency International has defended its methodology while acknowledging the limits of the CPI.
Regarding Pakistan’s move from 27 to 28, TI said V-Dem was the only source showing a positive change. The World Justice Project and World Economic Forum scores declined slightly.
TI also said the improvement was not statistically significant.
On the V-Dem increase, TI referred the question to V-Dem because that organisation produces the underlying assessment.
TI further said it did not conduct a sensitivity test that removed V-Dem from Pakistan’s calculation. The CPI uses all available source data rather than testing alternative country scores by excluding individual sources.
On statistical independence, TI said it cannot formally test whether the individual sources are statistically independent because of confidentiality constraints.
Instead, it relies on methodological diversity as a proxy.
TI has also said the CPI measures perceived public-sector corruption and does not capture every aspect of corruption. These exclusions include illicit financial flows, private-sector corruption, money laundering and citizens’ direct experiences.
The organisation therefore does not present the CPI as a direct measurement of actual corruption.
So, What Does Pakistan’s One-Point Rise Mean?
Pakistan’s CPI score has moved within a relatively narrow range in recent years. The country scored 28 in 2021, 27 in 2022, 29 in 2023, 27 in 2024 and 28 in 2025.
The latest movement therefore represents a modest change rather than a dramatic shift in the longer-term series.
The source-level data also show a mixed picture. V-Dem increased significantly, while WEF and WJP declined and five other sources remained unchanged.
That combination makes it difficult to attribute the overall improvement to a specific institutional reform or policy.
Most importantly, the available data do not establish that Transparency International manipulated Pakistan’s score.
They instead highlight questions about how composite indicators should be interpreted and how much underlying information can be independently examined.
The Bigger Question Behind Pakistan’s Corruption Score
Three different measurement approaches offer different windows into Pakistan’s corruption problem.
The global CPI measures perceived public-sector corruption through external assessments. The domestic NCPS measures perceptions among Pakistani respondents.
Meanwhile, surveys such as the Ipsos-FPCCI index combine perceptions with reported personal experiences.
None of these measures alone provides a complete picture.
The CPI’s one-point improvement is therefore worth noting, but it should not be treated as proof of a broad transformation in Pakistan’s corruption environment.
Likewise, questions about its methodology do not by themselves invalidate the index.
The more useful question is what the underlying data actually show, how consistently those findings move across different indicators and whether institutional changes produce measurable improvements over time.
For Pakistan, the latest CPI offers a modest change in score while leaving a larger question open: what specifically changed enough to move the country from 27 to 28?
That question matters because transparent measurement is essential when corruption indicators influence public debate, policymaking and perceptions of Pakistan’s economic and institutional environment.
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