Samenvatting

The integrity of politics and politicians plays a pivotal role in ensuring the quality of governance. Integrity is also an important value in societal discussions regarding that quality, as well as in research related to ‘good governance’. The public discourse concerning the integrity of politics often centers on the integrity scandals politicians are involved in. In academic research that topic is less prominent, which led to our research project in the Netherlands to gather data on integrity ‘scandals’. How frequently is the integrity of a politician publicly questioned, which political parties are implicated, and what types of integrity violations are mentioned? Since 2013, the Political Integrity Index project has been providing information about those topics. While this project has been covered in the Dutch media and in the journal Public Integrity, it has not been addressed in a Dutch scientific publication. This article provides an overview of the project, including a concise explanation of the conceptual framework and methodology employed. Additionally, it presents several new findings and offers some reflections on these findings. Given the relevance of political integrity scandals, it is hoped that the empirical information presented here will prove valuable for further research, not only in the Netherlands but also in other countries.