Corruption is a huge buffet

Abstract

Professor Stephen Chan reviews Brian Klaa's Corruptible (2021),  a non-academic book authored by an academic. The book aims to answer four main questions: First, do the worst people get power? Second, does power make people worse? Third, why do we let people control us who clearly have no business being in control? Fourth, how can we ensure that incorruptible people get into power and wield it justly?  However, Chan finds that the book does not arrive at an easy and or sinlge way to say who is corrupt and what begets corruption. In his view, it is "a gigantic piece of journalistic provocation, reliant on a huge number of sources with whom the author has engaged, very often it seems on a personal basis". The value of this book, he concludes. is its adventurous collection of stories that are illustrative precisely of the contradictions in inherent in the subject. "This is hardly a bad thing," he concludes. "It is fascinating but also frustrating."