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Re:The antidote to civilisational collapse – An interview wi... by adwn on Wednesday April 07, 2021 @05:04AM (#26722106)
> If A forgets the ticket and B approves the building permit because of it, this is corruption.

That's not what I meant, there's no quid pro quo in my example. My point was that neither A nor B are above or below each other in a hierarchy, and there's no permanent power imbalance between them, and yet they could both be corrupt. Corruption doesn't require a hierarchy, and a flat hierarchy doesn't prevent corruption.

Re:The antidote to civilisational collapse – An interview wi... by jampekka on Wednesday April 07, 2021 @05:20AM (#26722230)
Both A and B have hierarchy given authorities. That A can fine and B can issue permits both stem from a hierarchical system. Perhaps more exact is to say that corruption requires authority.

Flatter hierarchy does not prevent corruption totally, probably nothing will. But it will make corruption harder and more expensive. Some hierarchies, at least context dependent, are probably inevitable. It's a matter of scale.

Re:The antidote to civilisational collapse – An interview wi... by adwn on Wednesday April 07, 2021 @05:29AM (#26722302)
> Perhaps more exact is to say that corruption requires authority.

Yes, that would be more correct. Authority != hierarchy, but you can't have a society without authority. You could start out with anarchy, but then authoritative structures would naturally emerge anyway.

Re:The antidote to civilisational collapse – An interview wi... by jampekka on Wednesday April 07, 2021 @05:58AM (#26722578)
Anarchistic views accept hierarchies and some sorts of authority, but these should be based on voluntary association (as far as possible) and only temporary and to serve some concrete purpose.