“Given how damaging it can be, it is remarkable how long corruption can continue. Unless there is a crisis, a gap can endure almost indefinitely between the public discourse of an honest, neutral civil service and the private reality of a set of self-enriching bureaucrats. What starts out as a rational, if dishonest, response to an opportunity to make money often becomes hardened into a dominant culture that can last for centuries. Indeed, it can become embedded so firmly and accepted as part of the system that in one sense it ceases to become corruption and merely becomes a different set of norms about the way that a state bureaucracy operates.” – by Alan Beattie from his 2009 book False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World
Jim’s Quote of the Day:
