I recently heard an unverified story regarding our current Prime Minster Dr.Manmohan Singh which seemed pretty amazing (my friend could've been making it up as well, but that I somehow doubt!).
It was in the 90's that a conversation between a reporter and Dr.Manmohan Singh went something like this
Reporter(R): "Sir, how would you reduce corruption in India"
Manmohan Singh (MS)(promptly): "There are 5 ways"
R: "Could you share them with us please?"
MS: "Yes, I would change the currency"
.. and the man apparently slowly walked away... Changing the currency with a 1:1 conversion ratio would necessitate all the black money to get converted to white money by exchanging it with the central bank if it were to have any value. This money would HAVE to then be accounted for in the system (at least in theory, but it sure would shake things up for the corrupt)
I don't know about you, but I sure like politicians with ideas like this, even if not the force. I always wonder what the other 4 ideas were.....