Corruption

From Lessig Wiki

The general idea

I want us to discuss "corruption" in a very particular sense. I'm not interested in overt lawbreaking or outright bribery (e.g., Congressman X takes $50,000 personally to vote Nay on a particular bill); I am instead interested in non-obvious corruption--instances where a decision is improperly and/or subtly influenced by a government actor's anticipation of some sort of indirect economic gain or loss. Where a person in power is motivated more by, e.g., money to their campaign, support for favored research, etc., than the interests they claim to or otherwise should be advancing.

For this is the core of the corruption in our present system of
government.“Corruption” not in the sense that representatives are bribed.
Rather, “corruption” in the sense that the system induces the beneficiaries
of Congress’s acts to raise and give money to Congress to induce
it to act. There’s only so much time; there’s only so much Congress can
do. Why not limit its actions to those things it must do—and those
things that pay? - Lessig, Free Culture

I've listed some contexts in which I'd like to explore these ideas. Within each, I'd be eager to see (1) recommendations for things I should read; (2) research it would be helpful to do (meaning, if you had all the money in the world, what research question would you explore); (3) examples (of corruption) it would be useful to document.

The definition of corruption is slippery indeed. It seems to emerge from a property of social systems where people employ everyday denial (we all do, see this recent NYT article), to see their role in a limited context while overlooking amoral or immoral aspects of the systemic context in which their role is defined. Of course, an actor's desire to get ahead, have power, influence, reward, abets such "overlooking." Moral Mazes is a critically important book because it an anthropological study of how this works in corporations. -- isen

As I described in my Required Reading blog post, this is a new field for me. I want to read as broadly as I can.

Please don't slander people on these pages (meaning if you do, I will remove them). If you've got some hot tip, save it for email. And NPOV is very important here.

Thanks for the help.

Criticism of the General Idea

Overview: Must-reads and good reads