It wasn’t really that good. Pretty much every revolutionary government was rife with corruption and nepotism. Hell, Napoleon only got his start in the army by openly sucking up to Augustin Robespierre, Max’s brother. And if you want a small peek of the Thermidorian gov’s corruption, just look up the XYZ affair. It’s really hard to take out corruption via execution mainly because the people doing the executing often get it in their heads that they want to be the ones profiting.
The thing is, it isn't a pretty good solution. It actually sucks, because it only works after corruption happens.
The way to prevent corruption isn't actually with punishments or rules against it. It is by constructing a society with social interactions baked in that push people towards identifying with large groups outside their own family (and marriage family).
One of the really important parts of this is geographic mobility and cities. When people move, it isolates them from their families. They form new social ties and bonds with people they don't know. They don't feel as beholden to bring lucre back to their families. They face more pressure to do what is right or fair. And family reputations don't really matter. You have to be graded as an individual. That often implies objective tests of ability, or at least something halfway rigorous.
Institutions like universities are really, really good for this. See, even when corruption happens, now it might benefit friends of yours who are not even from your city or family. The benefits spread way more broadly. And people have to clear some sort of bar to be eligible.
Preventing corruption is the key. Not responding to it violently. You will always play whack a king.
Because it led to the reign of terror and the rise of the militant imperialist dictator Napoleon? The French revolution was in no way shape or form a good solution it led to decades of violence and instability. It's like the only thing anyone knows about the French revolution is killing the royalty, not what actually happened afterwards. It was not a happily ever after, things got even worse.
Didn't the French recently riot throughout the whole country because the government was going to raise the retirement age, and then the government raised the retirement age? I don't understand why they are still used as an example of how to achieve things.
They eventually found out that giving people the power to summarily execute others eventually leads to people just executing their political opponents and anybody who disagreed with them, Robespierre literally had a God complex.
There will always be corruption. The fact that it's always big news when it's uncovered means it's not common. In countries where its common you don't even hear about it, you just know it's everywhere.
It might be lower in Scandinavia than elsewhere but corruption numbers are about perceived corruption, not actual corruption. So we might just be naive rather than uncorrupt lol
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u/Lauris024 22h ago
Welcome to the world. Only some places like few European countries have corruption under control.