How Power Corrupts
Over at Bleeding Heart Libertarians, Bas van der Vossen has a post asking what is it exactly that we mean when we say, with Lord Acton, that “[p]ower corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”...
View ArticleHow Power Corrupts II
In my last post, I used The Lord of the Rings to explore the meaning of Lord Acton’s dictum ― “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” There is another novel, similar in many...
View ArticleHow Power Corrupts III
I have already touched on the issue of the meaning of Lord Acton’s dictum, that “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” I have invoked J.R.R. Tolkien’s treatment of the pernicious...
View ArticleHow Power Corrupts IV
Thoughts on Bryan Caplan and David Henderson’s discussion of power’s corrupting effects Longtime readers may recall my posts trying to catalogue the various ways in which political “power corrupts, and...
View ArticleHow Power Corrupts V
A recent article by Jerry Useem in the Atlantic, “Power Causes Brain Damage”, provides me an opportunity to return to my series of posts on the corrupting effects of power. My previous musings ― on...
View ArticleThe Sex Appeal of Power
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend recently, in both politics and law. The idea is what I call the “one-way ratchet fallacy” of power. It goes like this: when an institution or entity obtains power of...
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