Oversight of Political Party Financing and the Prevention of Political Corruption: A Comparative Legal Analysis

Abstract

Oversight of political party financing constitutes a central legal mechanism for safeguarding political integrity, ensuring fair competition, and preventing the transformation of financial power into improper political influence. This study provides a comparative legal analysis of party-finance regulation in Iraq, Iran, and Egypt, with particular emphasis on the supervision of financing sources, financial expenditures, institutional oversight, and legal sanctions. The study adopts a descriptive-analytical and comparative approach to examine how the three legal systems regulate public and private financing, donations, foreign and illicit funding, accounting obligations, financial disclosure, auditing, and the enforcement of financial rules. The analysis demonstrates that effective regulation depends on more than the formal existence of statutory restrictions. It requires an integrated system based on transparency, traceability of financial transactions, institutional independence, professional auditing, timely disclosure, and enforceable administrative and judicial consequences. The comparative assessment indicates that Iraq links party-finance supervision closely to electoral administration through the Independent High Electoral Commission, Iran relies substantially on a committee-based supervisory framework, while Egypt incorporates a comparatively stronger role for specialized financial auditing alongside administrative and judicial oversight. Each model offers distinct institutional strengths but also faces limitations concerning technical capacity, independence, access to financial information, and consistency of enforcement. The study further finds that political corruption may arise not only from unlawful sources of financing but also from the misuse of lawful resources, concealed expenditures, indirect contributions, and unequal access to financial power. Accordingly, the prevention of political corruption requires simultaneous regulation of both income and expenditure, together with effective monitoring of indirect financial support and third-party spending. The study concludes that a coherent party-finance regime should combine clear substantive rules, professional and independent supervision, transparent reporting, proportionate sanctions, judicial safeguards, and equal enforcement in order to strengthen political accountability, protect party independence, and preserve confidence in democratic competition.