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Wasn’t meaning to be cheeky. Have been thinking about this for a few years and those are observations that took a while.

There’s analogies to building institutions in developing countries. See the constitution in the Ukraine (I think) or South Africa. Ginsberg commented publicly and Brayer agreed with (at a talk I attended) from a “source code” perspective those constitutions are superior to the American one. Sort of v2 efforts where you can adopt best practices. Yet most people would agree those younger nations don’t have stronger institutions and than the US.

So there has to be both an individual and organizational component.

This next comment is completely unbaked and probably terribly phrased, so please read it gently: in addition to the rest of the comments, I believe there is also (and I understand this is a terrible analogy) a “standby passive observer” mechanism mentality similar to how Hitler came to power. Conceptually, people that get hired externally should maybe be >50% of any large organization maybe. Those employees need to see repeated instances of malicious political acts go by (“hey aren’t we going to do something here”) and learn that sort of complicit passivity.

That’s probably a terrible analogy, but notice that there seems to be nothing the three or four people in this threat that worked at Intel could do to alter the company’s direction (obviously) but more importantly there’s also a tone of dread and finality in their words, and they seem to have all chosen to have left.

So, it seems, like nation building, a complicated problem to understand and solve.




Part of this comment made me think of Albert Hirschman's 'Exit, Voice, and Loyalty' [1] - at least as I have understood the argument, comparing the 'standby passive observer' to the 'loyalty' standpoint, and the commenters as having chosen the 'exit' option. Hirschman's book is still on my reading list though, together with his 'The Passions and the Interests' - my impression of his work is mostly based on the episodes of Alphachat where they discussed his life and work [2,3,4]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exit,_Voice,_and_Loyalty

[2] https://www.ft.com/content/d1f5d43e-9cef-41d2-a651-f59a40e47...

[3] https://www.ft.com/content/798e6641-ecf9-480e-906e-8ee756296...

[4] https://www.ft.com/content/33809fbc-c999-41c5-97f6-a5d1f33d0...


Thank you!!! Will Amazon. This is one of those back burner questions that festers and your material seems like it might lead to an unlock! Appreciate it.


As well as the formal, visible institutions like constitutions or legal frameworks there are a lot of invisible ones like cultural norms.

In a lot of countries the most powerful institution is "family first" (sometimes extending that to ethnic or religious in-group second).

The (currently) successful countries got that way with a different norm, "same rules for everyone".

I'm viewing the emphasis on family first in recent Disney/Pixar movies with increasing concern. Sure it sells better in China, but at what long-term cost?


>In a lot of countries the most powerful institution is "family first" (sometimes extending that to ethnic or religious in-group second).

>The (currently) successful countries got that way with a different norm, "same rules for everyone".

Which successful countries are these? As far as I can tell, the richer, more resourceful, established tribes don't follow the same rules as everyone. They might not be as blatantly corrupt as others, or the corruption may be more higher level with more plausible deniability, but "family first" is human nature.


You have any concrete examples of both type of countries?


"Same rules for everyone" countries: the archetype would be England after the civil war, where it became established that it didnt' matter if you were related to the King (or were the King), the law applied to you also.

(Of course there are varying values of "everyone." Most countries pretty much excluded half of the adult population until recently.)

For "family first" countries: this is the default mode for humans, so pretty much every country at one point or another. Nigeria and India would be two ountries where it's important to be related to the right people. India's caste system further reduces opportunities for many, perhaps most, people. For more extreme examples: Yemen, Afghanistan.


“Same rules for everyone” resonates very strongly here in New Zealand. There is a book-length study [1] on our national obsession with ‘fairness’ (contrasted with the USA and ‘freedom’).

[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12112539-fairness-and-fr...


There's the other extreme - state above all.


Constitutions are just pieces of paper. If people don't uphold them - they aren't worth the paper...

You could have a constitution that says - everyone is free and we decide how to govern ourselves voluntarily.... And still get a country like Switzerland.




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