Vita, Giuseppe Di creator text xu| 2011 continuing ng p.631-645. The aim of this article is to verify whether the historic sentence, no. 500/1999 of the Italian Legitimacy Court (Corte di Cassazione) in Plenary Session, may have contributed to diminshing bribery in Italy, by increasing the area of liability for both civil servants and the public administration. The empirical analysis is based on a case study conducted in Sicily, in the province of Catania, using a unique data set. The main results of the article are: paying bureaucrats by means of an incentive wage regimes may not be effective in reducing corruption; an extension of the liablity rule for the public administration and civil servants may discourage the phenomenon of bribery; and, the perfect specification o f property rights helps to reduced corruption. - Reproduced. Corruption - Case studies Public administration - Italy Corruption - Italy Corruption International Journal of Public Administration 180718