
Data shows 85% of humans live under a corrupt government - imartin2k
http://newatlas.com/2016-corruption-perceptions-index-our-rotten-world/47566/
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nikanj
The study in question measured /perceived/ corruption there is, not how much
/actual/ corruption there is.

Thus a more naive population seems less corrupt.

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bluetomcat
Corruption is not really about "perceptions" as the article tries to suggest.
I live in Bulgaria which is often deemed the most corrupt EU country in most
rankings. Everyday-life corruption is certainly more prevalent and perceptible
here (bribing traffic officers, paying doctors under the table to do a better
job, etc.), but the effects of these are negligible compared to the corruption
on the high floors of the government. A single act of corruption like the
government signing a rotten deal with a BigCorp may have much more complex
implications and most people wouldn't perceive it as corruption.

~~~
matt4077
The damage of small-scale bribery may be much greater than the actual money
that changes hands. If I were to suddenly be appointed to high office, I
wouldn't know how to be corrupt even if I wanted, and I wouldn't want to
because I had not experienced it even once and therefore consider it a
particularly immoral crime.

And – at the risk of erring on the side of naiveté – I could imagine that
major corruption such as the one you mention is actually easier to control.
Public procurement, for example, is required to happen in open EU-wide bids.
That means you get British (German/Dutch/Polish/...) companies involved in the
process with a financial interest to investigate corruption.

~~~
coldtea
> _The damage of small-scale bribery may be much greater than the actual money
> that changes hands. If I were to suddenly be appointed to high office, I
> wouldn 't know how to be corrupt even if I wanted, and I wouldn't want to
> because I had not experienced it even once and therefore consider it a
> particularly immoral crime._

That hasn't been a problem for lots of people in high offices, in otherwise
"no small corruption" countries.

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dmichulke
People in power will eventually use their power for their own purposes for
(the combination of) two reasons:

\- They can and

\- They want to

In situations like these someone will eventually abuse power and from there on
his/her all successors have the moral "the others did it as well" excuse
(which is a pretty powerful excuse for humans and has a scientific name which
I forgot).

Government corruption is a game-theoretic necessity.

~~~
matt4077
That seems to be contradicted by the fact that some countries manage to be
virtually free of corruption.

Additionally, the same logic would apply to any other crime, and crime rates
have dropped across the board for a few decades now.

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tluyben2
> That seems to be contradicted by the fact that some countries manage to be
> virtually free of corruption.

Which countries?

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coldtea
Freedonia.

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gregman1
Other 15% leave under a government that is so corrupt that it pays for this
kind of researches.

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pavlov
The study is annually made by Transparency International, a non-governmental
organization.

~~~
coldtea
Most "governmental organizations" of the kind are sponsored by governments.

Their list of sponsors sounds like a list of western ministries and puppet
organizations:

[https://www.transparency.org/whoweare/accountability/who_sup...](https://www.transparency.org/whoweare/accountability/who_supports_us/1/)

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neekburm
Based on concepts from "The Dictator's Handbook," this is entirely logical.

This 20 minute video opened my eyes to how politics works:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs)

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basicplus2
Iam not convinced of the figures..

Corruption is just more subtle in western countries, eg property developers
get what they want through offical party policy and law changes, and
politicians get rewarded through contributions via vehicles such as to self
managed super funds via untraceable trusts.

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txutxu
This implies that previously it was not in this way?

You can read the history... government is moved by interests.

Dot.

The grandparent of the grandparent of the grandparent of the grandparent of
the grandparent of the (perl -E 'say "the grandparent of the grandparent of
the " x 1000;')... of your grandparent (and my grandparent) did live uner
similar interests.

Maybe what changes is if the interest is more or less global or local... but
at the end of the day... does this implies that previous governance was more
"honest" or "clean"?

Maybe that _information_ was managed in other ways, but humans didn't change
so much.

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fifnir
Humans ARE the corrupt government

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akjainaj
Humans living in democratic countries have the government they deserve.

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ENTP
Based on those rankings, I think I must have a different definition of
corrupt.

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Qantourisc
Feel free to define it.

