

Power corrupts, but it only corrupts those who think they deserve it. - cwan
http://www.economist.com/sciencetechnology/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15328544

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DLWormwood
This sounds like Douglas Adams' theory of power is being vindicated. In his
Hitchhiker's "trilogy," Adams sets up a convoluted situation where the
Universe is ruled by a humble "Old Man In A Shack" since people who want power
are therefore unqualified to possess it.

~~~
wisty
Or Steinbeck's "The Short Reign of Pippen IV".

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gcheong
Would like to see a follow-up to see if the ones who are in power but do not
think they deserve it eventually, or can be made to, come to think that they
deserve their power.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
Me too. I think it would complete the verification of Lord Acton's observation
quite nicely.

Intuitively I think the final piece is obvious, but lots of things seem
obvious and yet turn out not to be true.

I seriously doubt somebody would remain in a state of "hypercrisy" very long.
It seems an uncomfortable and unnatural state of affairs.

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cturner
At the point it becomes most interesting the author cops-out with a trite
conclusion.

This speculation:

    
    
        Hypercrisy might thus be a signal of submissiveness—one
        that is exaggerated in creatures that feel themselves to
        be in the wrong place in the hierarchy. By applying
        reverse privileges to themselves, they hope to escape
        punishment from the real dominants.
    

.. steers further awry:

    
    
        Perhaps the lesson, then, is that corruption and
        hypocrisy are the price that societies pay for being
        led by alpha males (and, in some cases, alpha females).
        The alternative, though cleaner, is leadership by wimps.
    

For those interested, the model for austere leadership is Cincinnatus:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnatus>

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blahedo
The experiment is fascinating, but the author draws too strong of a
conclusion: first, the "I didn't deserve it" powerful could exhibit
'hypercrisy' for other reasons, including the old saw "to those who are given
much, much is asked in return". I mean, let's not get _too_ cynical here.
Second, even if _on average_ the "I deserved it" powerful are hypocritical,
that doesn't mean that _all_ of them are; it just means we have to look more
carefully for the outliers.

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scotty79
That's quite horrible.

That means that people of power consists of two groups. First group built of
individuals thinking they deserve power, who take much for themselves
illegally and other group of individuals thinking that they do not deserve the
power, who perceive immoral actions of the people from first group less
immoral then they actually are.

~~~
akamaka
The two groups were constructed for the experiment, to emphasize the
difference. If you're saying that powerful people in the real world are
divided into two groups, that is your own opinion, not something that the
study concluded.

~~~
scotty79
Yes. I was reporting realization that came to me after reading this, not the
results of the research. My opinion is of course simplified (there might for
example be a third group of people in power that don't have opinion on whether
they deserve that power or not who behave like rest of general population and
judge morality of acts closer to average judgment).

What struck me that part of people who have power, those who have high moral
standards for themselves (possibly induced by feeling that their power is
undeserved) might tend to overlook immoral actions of their peers just because
of some glitch in our biology.

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dmaclay
So what they are saying is rather that "power attracts the already corrupt"
you just don't get to see their true colors until they are in power.

Your stereotypical abusive politician is typically someone who has been a
nasty piece of work since childhood, they were just powerless to act on it
until some suckers voted them into office.

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Mz
I think this is an inherent problem with any social system that encourages a
"one up/one down" mentality. I suspect the antidote is to promote a culture
where all people are treated with equal respect, which isn't easy to do at
all.

One problem that I have witnessed is that "nice" leadership tends to get
disrespected and abused. When my kids were younger, at one point I spelled it
out clearly for them that if they didn't quit being pains in the butt, the
nice mommy they were taking for granted could disappear (along with a great
many privileges they took for granted) and be replaced by an evil mommy. I
choose to be nice because I prefer it, not because I don't know how to be
awful. My kids stopped taking me so much for granted and stopped assuming that
I was some kind of doormat.

As an example with adults, I currently participate in an online forum where
the moderator is sometimes viciously attacked. The attackers then justify
their attacks by saying things like "She must not mind. If she did, she could
remove me." Things improved after I got after the attackers and then, when
someone suggested the moderator could leave, stated publicly that "Maybe it is
lost on you that she is the moderator and the only reason her attackers can
remain is because she is a great deal more tolerant than they are." The entire
tone of the forum changed.

As long as most people are so generally disrespectful and so willing to take
good things for granted, "corrupt" leaders may be the only kind who can
survive.

