Corruption

You appear to be floating around on the top of this ocean of corruption holding the conviction that if your head is above it then you're not a part of the problem - a sort of reverse Ostrich. We all play a part either by accepting that's the way it is or ignoring it and thereby participating in and endorsing it. Pragmatism is no excuse for moral turpitude here.

Corruption and Trust are inextricable from one another so the belief that trust can be re-established without first removing systemic corruption is fallacious - although, rather than this being the corruption of a system it may well be a system of corruption - and when the whole system is corrupt then the the whole system has to go.

Your observation that "honesty in its undiluted form is not necessarily a characteristic which is good for business" would lead one to conclude that under the present "House Rules" honesty is of limited importance so long as an awareness of these "rules" works "perfectly adequately" in your favour. Here we have a conundrum - you can trust corruption. These self-serving "rules" have been the Modi Operandi of Corporations, Financiers and Politicians, abetted by the Media, until it all started to unravel at the onset of it's greatest achievement; the Global Financial Crisis. There have been a few years of "hide the pea" games by the primary beneficiary "elites" - those that see themselves as somehow above the common human rut - but the problem is too big for sleight of hand. This has led to the undignified spectacle of the former participating rats leaving the sinking ship in feigned surprise and indignation to join a recently established Glee Club of the Innocent. Leaving behind those carrying too much baggage to drown.

Given that the whole system appears endemically corrupt it isn't Equitable (I realise this is not one of the "House Rules") to apportion different levels of corruption among participating countries - such as Germany is more corrupt than the UK and both are less corrupt than Italy - once established as corrupt to any degree this is simple hypocrisy (which is one of the "House Rules"). Although what appears to be happening now is that an expensive prostitute has turned on her cheaper colleagues. Understandably there is some resistance to transfer her "top-end" money to one that has caught the Clap and is in danger going out of business. It is not that they want to get out of the game but that they want those that spoil it for them out. Unfortunately this can not be achieved in comfort while in the same profession.

So we're left with the question of whether to weed or plough. Given the damage done to the instruments of democratic government by the present systemic corruption, and the resulting broad loss of public trust this has engendered, that the existing system should remain mostly intact doesn't look like a very positive outcome. While we're focused on the corruption within the media, police and politics we are ignoring - as best we can given the approaching Global Debt Crisis - that other fundamental causative agent that constitutes this corrupt system - Finance. It can be deduced from our present predicament that this agency, having blackmailed sovereign nations into near bankruptcy to provide for their survival, are deserving of the same opprobrium, legal investigation, oversight, regulation and penalties.

If we continue to labour under the conviction that the system is fine, because those that work it to their advantage are able to thrive, and it is only those that are caught with overtly dirty-hands that need punished then we are destined to repeat history. The problems are structural not operational. Honesty, transparency, accountability and responsibility within a system based upon an acceptable level of corruption will not make an iota of difference to the underlying absence of trust.

What will have been resolved if all we do, as a result of systemic scandal, is put Humpty Dumpty back together again?