4 ms·

It looks like a tautology to me. Like: "Corruption erodes social trust in places where social trust exist and is key for the political system."

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
lm28469 7mo ago
I think culture and education play much bigger roles than anything else, all the sources I find show Germany and France having similar level of corruption (on top of being geographically and economically close) but completely different level of "social trust". China's pretty corrupt politically but the social trust is quite high, the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell https://ourworldindata.org/corruption https://ourworldindata.org/corruption https://ourworldindata.org/trust https://ourworldindata.org/trust
- eru 7mo ago
  > the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell What are you comparing with? I don't think PR China has more social trust than Singapore or Japan or Korea?
- rob74 7mo ago
  > China's pretty corrupt politically but the social trust is quite high, the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell There are a few reasons for that that I can imagine: - China is one of very few autocracies that has managed to significantly improve the standard of living of most of its population. - The public trials and (sometimes) executions of allegedly corrupt individuals might help improve the perception of corruption. - The same harsh penalties mentioned above might influence people to declare a higher level of social trust than they actually have, even if the poll is supposedly "confidential" and "only for scientific purposes".
  - ses1984 7mo ago
    >The same harsh penalties mentioned above might influence people to declare a higher level of social trust than they actually have. This 100%. Political imprisonment and reeducation camps are antithetical to any definition of a high trust society that I would subscribe to.
    - eru 7mo ago
      Doesn't matter too much what you subscribe to. Eg Nazi Germany still benefited from a high-ish level of social trust, despite numerous atrocities.
      - ses1984 7mo ago
        That’s actually the example I was thinking of. You can’t honestly say that a country where citizens inform on each other and put each other in forced labor camps based on rumor is a society where trust is high. > The Deutscherblick ("German Look") was a tense, habitual glance over the shoulder used by citizens in Nazi-era Germany before speaking about sensitive topics like food rations, Hitler jokes, or the war’s progress
        inglor_cz 7mo ago
        Not just labor camps. People would regularly get beheaded for anti-regime remarks. Nazi justice was keen on capital punishment for relatively minor crimes. Nazi Germany was full of dedicated informers who would even earn money or other privileges for denouncing someone. It had about as much trust between strangers as Iran under the Revolutionary Guards might have today.
      - triceratops 7mo ago
        What's the benefit of social trust when a society can commit such atrocities? The entire point of a society is to care for its members.
        miroljub 7mo ago
- ses1984 7mo ago
  We are probably meant to assume ceteris paribus and only vary the dimension of corruption. I think you’re right that culture plays a key role. For example if small bribes are customary, that doesn’t erode trust, that’s just the way things are.
- PaulHoule 7mo ago
  The corruption numbers break down into: (1) They didn't ask the question in China, (2) They asked somebody if they paid a bribe or if taking a bribe is every justifiable, and (3) "Expert estimates of the extent to which the executive, legislative, judiciary, and bureaucracy engage in bribery and theft, and the making and implementation of laws are susceptible to corruption" For (2) China doesn't look too different from the U.S., for (3) experts think it has gotten much worse since the time of Mao but I'd say China is on the honest side of the "global South". Note that lay perceptions of corruption are widespread in the US https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/51398-most-americans-see-corruption-as-serious-problem https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/51398-most-americans-see-c... https://news.gallup.com/poll/185759/widespread-government-corruption.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/185759/widespread-government-co... https://www.occrp.org/en/news/survey-reveals-corruption-as-top-concern-for-americans https://www.occrp.org/en/news/survey-reveals-corruption-as-t... though unlike India I think very few Americans have paid a bribe to a cop. See also https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/05/in-25-country-survey-americans-especially-likely-to-view-fellow-citizens-as-morally-bad/ https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/05/in-25-countr...
  - AnimalMuppet 7mo ago
    How do you see Xi's anticorruption campaign? Is it just a club to beat political opponents with, or is there a real problem and he's trying to fix it?
    - PaulHoule 7mo ago
      Both
    - jimbokun 7mo ago
      Knowing nothing my guess would be he wants all the benefits of corruption accruing only to himself.
    - curio_Pol_curio 7mo ago
      There's an interesting paradox hiding in plain sight here: Xi imported the anticorruption strat from Singapore, so superficially, PH below is correct. Since SG has the opposite problem from China: ((low) gov corruption XOR (low) social trust). The paradox is that the strat will have wildly different failure modes in SG vs CN or JP (all are aware of this!) Note also that SG is consistently ranked in the top 10 together with the Nordics+NZ+IE+CH in spite of this failure mode.. My informed opinion is that LDP+loyalist-bureaucrats have been shipping and failing the same strat for years-- LDP dominance is the tell. Any critique of Xi's policy can be backed with JP data. Prediction: Xi will succeed if and only if CPC fall (or do the ship-of-theseus thing) https://archive.ph/hsTzy https://archive.ph/hsTzy https://www.fairobserver.com/world-news/japans-new-ldp-scandal-is-unlikely-to-change-much/ https://www.fairobserver.com/world-news/japans-new-ldp-scand... Keywords (actual jargon) 天下り (fox->human) 忖度族議員行政指導
- bdauvergne 7mo ago
  It's the institutional part which is lacking in France. Look at the budget of the ministry of justice in France per capita and in Germany. Germany spend twice as much and has twice as much judges per capita than France (and everything which goes with it like clerks). My company took the biggest telecom company in France to court for a violation of our license on a soft, license was GPLv2, we won, but it took 12 years. Justice is a very poor and slow institution in France. For the same countries the budget of police forces per capita are nearly the same for example.
  - joe_mamba 7mo ago
    Also Germany spends more than France on defence while having a lot less to show for, with France having nuclear weapons, nuclear subs, aircraft carriers and a much more capable military overall with less money. Germany is the poster child of government waste. If I were a taxpayer there I'd want my money back and/or bureaucrats going to jail.
PunchyHamster 7mo ago
Kinda; authoritarism runs on bribes and nepotism, of course corruption would have lesser effect here, it's expected
scythmic_waves 7mo ago
It's not a tautology because it's not guaranteed. There are plenty of plausible sounding claims that fail to be true. That's why science is needed: to provide _empirical_ evidence for/against a claim.
- sigbottle 7mo ago
  Not to be an "uhm actually" guy but this goes into a lot of interesting philosophy in the first half of the 20th century. You would probably agree that "a fish is a fish" is a tautology, but for more complicated things it gets murkier and murkier. Separating out what are the tautologies from not was a big effort. Then Quine came along, and a big portion of people migrated away from the distinction
  - scythmic_waves 7mo ago
    I dabble in "um actually"s myself (especially given that my original comment was one), so no worries :) I don't disagree with your comment exactly. But I primarily wanted to push back on a common response to scientific works. Something to the effect of "Well obviously, everyone knew that!". Except they didn't because they (presumably) didn't actually investigate. And even after the science, they still don't _know it_ know it. But post-scientific inquiry, they have a much stronger claim to the knowledge than they did before. So the type of dismissal in the root comment is seriously missing the point.

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

lm28469 7mo ago

I think culture and education play much bigger roles than anything else, all the sources I find show Germany and France having similar level of corruption (on top of being geographically and economically close) but completely different level of "social trust". China's pretty corrupt politically but the social trust is quite high, the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell https://ourworldindata.org/corruption https://ourworldindata.org/corruption https://ourworldindata.org/trust https://ourworldindata.org/trust

eru 7mo ago
> the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell What are you comparing with? I don't think PR China has more social trust than Singapore or Japan or Korea?
rob74 7mo ago
> China's pretty corrupt politically but the social trust is quite high, the highest outside of northern europe as far as I can tell There are a few reasons for that that I can imagine: - China is one of very few autocracies that has managed to significantly improve the standard of living of most of its population. - The public trials and (sometimes) executions of allegedly corrupt individuals might help improve the perception of corruption. - The same harsh penalties mentioned above might influence people to declare a higher level of social trust than they actually have, even if the poll is supposedly "confidential" and "only for scientific purposes".
- ses1984 7mo ago
  >The same harsh penalties mentioned above might influence people to declare a higher level of social trust than they actually have. This 100%. Political imprisonment and reeducation camps are antithetical to any definition of a high trust society that I would subscribe to.
  - eru 7mo ago
    Doesn't matter too much what you subscribe to. Eg Nazi Germany still benefited from a high-ish level of social trust, despite numerous atrocities.
    - ses1984 7mo ago
      That’s actually the example I was thinking of. You can’t honestly say that a country where citizens inform on each other and put each other in forced labor camps based on rumor is a society where trust is high. > The Deutscherblick ("German Look") was a tense, habitual glance over the shoulder used by citizens in Nazi-era Germany before speaking about sensitive topics like food rations, Hitler jokes, or the war’s progress
      - inglor_cz 7mo ago
        Not just labor camps. People would regularly get beheaded for anti-regime remarks. Nazi justice was keen on capital punishment for relatively minor crimes. Nazi Germany was full of dedicated informers who would even earn money or other privileges for denouncing someone. It had about as much trust between strangers as Iran under the Revolutionary Guards might have today.
    - triceratops 7mo ago
      What's the benefit of social trust when a society can commit such atrocities? The entire point of a society is to care for its members.
      - miroljub 7mo ago
ses1984 7mo ago
We are probably meant to assume ceteris paribus and only vary the dimension of corruption. I think you’re right that culture plays a key role. For example if small bribes are customary, that doesn’t erode trust, that’s just the way things are.
PaulHoule 7mo ago
The corruption numbers break down into: (1) They didn't ask the question in China, (2) They asked somebody if they paid a bribe or if taking a bribe is every justifiable, and (3) "Expert estimates of the extent to which the executive, legislative, judiciary, and bureaucracy engage in bribery and theft, and the making and implementation of laws are susceptible to corruption" For (2) China doesn't look too different from the U.S., for (3) experts think it has gotten much worse since the time of Mao but I'd say China is on the honest side of the "global South". Note that lay perceptions of corruption are widespread in the US https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/51398-most-americans-see-corruption-as-serious-problem https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/51398-most-americans-see-c... https://news.gallup.com/poll/185759/widespread-government-corruption.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/185759/widespread-government-co... https://www.occrp.org/en/news/survey-reveals-corruption-as-top-concern-for-americans https://www.occrp.org/en/news/survey-reveals-corruption-as-t... though unlike India I think very few Americans have paid a bribe to a cop. See also https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/05/in-25-country-survey-americans-especially-likely-to-view-fellow-citizens-as-morally-bad/ https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/05/in-25-countr...
- AnimalMuppet 7mo ago
  How do you see Xi's anticorruption campaign? Is it just a club to beat political opponents with, or is there a real problem and he's trying to fix it?
  - PaulHoule 7mo ago
    Both
  - jimbokun 7mo ago
    Knowing nothing my guess would be he wants all the benefits of corruption accruing only to himself.
  - curio_Pol_curio 7mo ago
    There's an interesting paradox hiding in plain sight here: Xi imported the anticorruption strat from Singapore, so superficially, PH below is correct. Since SG has the opposite problem from China: ((low) gov corruption XOR (low) social trust). The paradox is that the strat will have wildly different failure modes in SG vs CN or JP (all are aware of this!) Note also that SG is consistently ranked in the top 10 together with the Nordics+NZ+IE+CH in spite of this failure mode.. My informed opinion is that LDP+loyalist-bureaucrats have been shipping and failing the same strat for years-- LDP dominance is the tell. Any critique of Xi's policy can be backed with JP data. Prediction: Xi will succeed if and only if CPC fall (or do the ship-of-theseus thing) https://archive.ph/hsTzy https://archive.ph/hsTzy https://www.fairobserver.com/world-news/japans-new-ldp-scandal-is-unlikely-to-change-much/ https://www.fairobserver.com/world-news/japans-new-ldp-scand... Keywords (actual jargon) 天下り (fox->human) 忖度族議員行政指導
bdauvergne 7mo ago
It's the institutional part which is lacking in France. Look at the budget of the ministry of justice in France per capita and in Germany. Germany spend twice as much and has twice as much judges per capita than France (and everything which goes with it like clerks). My company took the biggest telecom company in France to court for a violation of our license on a soft, license was GPLv2, we won, but it took 12 years. Justice is a very poor and slow institution in France. For the same countries the budget of police forces per capita are nearly the same for example.
- joe_mamba 7mo ago
  Also Germany spends more than France on defence while having a lot less to show for, with France having nuclear weapons, nuclear subs, aircraft carriers and a much more capable military overall with less money. Germany is the poster child of government waste. If I were a taxpayer there I'd want my money back and/or bureaucrats going to jail.

PunchyHamster 7mo ago

Kinda; authoritarism runs on bribes and nepotism, of course corruption would have lesser effect here, it's expected

scythmic_waves 7mo ago

It's not a tautology because it's not guaranteed. There are plenty of plausible sounding claims that fail to be true. That's why science is needed: to provide _empirical_ evidence for/against a claim.

sigbottle 7mo ago
Not to be an "uhm actually" guy but this goes into a lot of interesting philosophy in the first half of the 20th century. You would probably agree that "a fish is a fish" is a tautology, but for more complicated things it gets murkier and murkier. Separating out what are the tautologies from not was a big effort. Then Quine came along, and a big portion of people migrated away from the distinction
- scythmic_waves 7mo ago
  I dabble in "um actually"s myself (especially given that my original comment was one), so no worries :) I don't disagree with your comment exactly. But I primarily wanted to push back on a common response to scientific works. Something to the effect of "Well obviously, everyone knew that!". Except they didn't because they (presumably) didn't actually investigate. And even after the science, they still don't _know it_ know it. But post-scientific inquiry, they have a much stronger claim to the knowledge than they did before. So the type of dismissal in the root comment is seriously missing the point.