Corrupt (pronounced kuh-ruhpt)
(1) Guilty of dishonest practices, as bribery; lacking
integrity; crooked; willing to act dishonestly for personal gain; willing to
make or take bribes; morally degenerate.
(2) Debased in character; depraved; perverted; wicked;
evil.
(3) Of a text, made inferior by errors or alterations.
(4) Something infected or tainted; decayed; putrid;
contaminated.
(5) In digital storage (1) stored data that contains
errors related to the format or file integrity; a storage device with such
errors.
(6) To destroy the integrity of; cause to be dishonest,
disloyal, etc, especially by coercion, bribery or other forms of inducement.
(7) Morally to lower in standard; to debase or pervert.
(8) To alter a language, text, etc for the worse (depending
on context either by the tone of the content or to render it non-original); to debase.
To mar or spoil something; to infect, contaminate or
taint.
To make putrid or putrescent (technically an archaic use
but there’s much overlap of meaning in the way terms are used).
(11) In digital storage, introduce errors in stored data
when saving, transmitting, or retrieving (technically possible also in dynamic data
such as memory).
(12) In English Law, to subject (an attainted person) to
corruption of blood (historic use only).
(13) In law (in some jurisdictions) a finding which
courts or tribunals can hand down describing certain conduct.
1300–1350: From the Middle English verb corrupten (debased in character), from
the Middle French corrupt, from the Old
French corropt (unhealthy, corrupt;
uncouth (of language)) from the Latin corruptus
(rotten, spoiled, decayed, corrupted (and the past participle of corrumpō & corrumpere (to destroy, ruin, injure, spoil (figuratively “corrupt,
seduce, bribe” (and literally “break to pieces”)), the construct being cor- (assimilated here as an intensive
prefix) + rup- (a variant stem of rumpere (to break into pieces), from a
nasalized form of the primitive Indo-European runp- (to break), source also of the Sanskrit rupya- (to suffer from a stomach-ache) and the Old English reofan (to break, tear)) + -tus (the past participle suffix). The alternative spellings corrumpt, corrump & corroupt are effectively all extinct
although dictionaries sometimes list them variously as obsolete, archaic or rare. Corrupt and corrupted are verbs & adjectives
(both used informally by IT nerds as a noun, sometimes with a choice
adjective), corruptedness, corruption, corruptible, corruptness, corrupter &
corruptor are nouns, corruptest is a verb & adjective, corruptive is an
adjective, corrupting is a verb and corruptedly, corruptively & corruptly
are adverbs; the most common noun plural is corruptions. Forms (hyphenated and not) such as incorruptible,
non-corrupt, over-corrupt, non-corrupt, pre-corrupt & un-corrupt etc are
created as needed.
The verb corrupt in the mid-fourteenth century existed in
the sense of “deprave morally, pervert from good to bad which later in the
1300s extended to “contaminate, impair the purity of; seduce or violate (a
woman); debase or render impure (a language) by alterations or innovations;
influence by a bribe or other wrong motive", reflecting generally the
senses of the Latin corruptus. The meanings “decomposing, putrid, spoiled”,
“changed for the worse, debased by admixture or alteration (of texts, language
etc) and “guilty of dishonesty involving bribery" all emerged in the late
fourteenth century. The noun corruption was
from the mid-fourteenth century corrupcioun
which was used of material things, especially dead bodies (human & animal)
to convey “act of becoming putrid, dissolution; decay”. It was applied also to matter of the soul and
morality, it being an era when the Church was much concerned with “spiritual
contamination, depravity & wickedness”.
The form was from the Latin corruptionem
(nominative corruptio) (a corruption,
spoiling, seducing; a corrupt condition), the noun of action from the past-participle
stem of corrumpere (to destroy; spoil
(and figuratively “corrupt, seduce, bribe”.
The use as a synonym for “putrid matter” dates from the late 1300s while
as applied to those holding public office being tainted by “bribery or other
depraving influence” it was first noted in the early 1400. The specific technical definition of “a
corrupt form of a word” came into use in the 1690s. The adjective corruptible (subject to decay
or putrefaction, perishable) was from either the Old French corroptible or directly from Late Latin corruptibilis (liable to decay,
corruptible), from the past-participle stem of corrumpere (to destroy; spoil
(and figuratively “corrupt, seduce, bribe”.
In fourteenth century English, it applied first to objects and by the
mid fifteenth to those “susceptible of being changed for the worse, tending to
moral corruption. The more blatant sense
of “open to bribery” appears in the 1670s.
Boris Johnson, hair by Ms Kelly Jo Dodge MBE.
Corruption
is probably a permanent part of politics although it does ebb and flow and exists
in different forms in different places.
In the UK, the honors system with its intricate hierarchy and consequent
determination on one’s place in the pecking order on the Order of Precedence has
real world consequences such as determining whether one sits at dinners with
the eldest son of a duke or finds one’s self relegated to a table with the surviving
wife of a deceased baronet. Under some
prime-ministers the system was famously corrupt and while things improved in
the nineteenth century, under David Lloyd George (1863–1945; UK prime-minister
1916-1922) honors were effectively for sale in a truly scandalous way. None of his successors were anywhere near as
bad although Harold Wilson’s (1916–1995; UK prime minister 1964-1970 &
1974-1976) resignation honors list attracted much comment and did his
reputation no good but in recent years it’s been relatively quiet on the honors
front. That was until the resignation
list of Boris Johnson (b 1964; UK prime-minister 2019-2022) was published. It included some names which were unknown to
all but a handful of political insiders and many others which were controversial
for their own reasons but at the bottom of the list was one entry which all agreed
was well deserved: Ms Kelly Jo Dodge, for 27 years the parliamentary
hairdresser, was created a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British
Empire (MBE) for parliamentary service.
In those decades, she can have faced few challenges more onerous than
Boris Johnson’s hair yet never once failed to make it an extraordinary example in
the (actually technically difficult) “not one hair in place” style.
A corrupted fattie
Corrupt, a drug addict and a failure: The Führer and the Reichsmarschall
at Carinhall, next to a stature of a beast of the field.
Hitler once told a visitor; “You should visit Göring at
Carinhall, a sight worth seeing.”
Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi
1922-1945 and Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) was under few illusions about the
sentence he would receive from the International Military Tribunal (IMT) at the
first Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946) and resented only the method of execution
prescribed was to be "hanged by the neck until dead". Göring
thought that fit only for common criminals and as Germany's highest ranked soldier, he deserved the honor of a firing squad; the death of a gentleman. In the end, he found his own way to elude the
noose but history has anyway judged him harshly as richly deserving the
gallows. He heard many bad things said
of him at the trial, most of it true and much of it said by his fellow
defendants but the statement which most disappointed him was that Adolf Hitler
(1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head
of state 1934-1945) had condemned him as “corrupt,
a drug addict and a failure”. Once
that was publicized, he knew there would be no romantic legend to grow after
his execution and his hope that in fifty years there would be statutes of him all
over Germany was futile. In fairness,
even in that he’d been a realist, telling the prison psychologist the statutes
might be “…small ones maybe, but one in
every home”. Hitler had of course
been right; Göring was corrupt, a drug addict and a failure but that could have
been said of many of his paladins and countless others in the lower layers of
what was essentially a corrupted, gangster-run state.
Corruption is of course though something bad and corrosive to the state but other people's corruption in other states can be helpful. In 1940, after the fall of France, the British were genuinely alarmed Spain might enter the war on the side of the Axis, tempted by the return of the Rock of Gibraltar and the acquisition of colonial territory in North Africa. London was right to be concerned because the loss of Gibraltar would have threatened not only the Royal Navy's ability to operate in the Mediterranean but also the very presence of the British in North African and even the supply of oil from the Middle East, vital to the conduct of the war. Indeed, the "Mediterranean strategy" was supported strongly by German naval strategists and had it successfully been executed, it would have become much more difficult for the British to continue the war. Contrary to the assertions of some, Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) did understand the enormous strategic advantage which would be achieved by the taking of Gibraltar which would have been a relatively simple undertaking but to do so was possible only with Spanish cooperation, the Germans lacking the naval forces to effect a seaborne invasion. Hitler did in 1940 meet with the Spanish leader Generalissimo Francisco Franco (1892-1975; Caudillo of Spain 1939-1975) in an attempt to entice his entry into the conflict and even after the Battle of Britain, Hitler would still have preferred peace with the British rather than their defeat, the ongoing existence of the British Empire better suited to his post-war (ie after victory over the USSR) visions.
Franco however was a professional soldier and knew Britain remained an undefeated, dangerous foe and one able to draw on the resources both of her empire and (increasingly) assistance from the US and regarded a victory by the Axis as by no means guaranteed. Additionally, after a bloody civil war which had waged for four years, the Spanish economy was in no state to wage war and better than most, Franco knew his military was antiquated and unable to sustain operations against a well equipped enemy for even days. Like many with combat experience, the generalissimo also thought war a ghastly, hateful business best avoided and Hitler left the long meeting after being unable to meet the extraordinary list of conditions demanded to secure Spanish support, declaring he'd "sooner have three teeth pulled than go through that again". Franco was a practical man who had kept his options open and probably, like the Duce (Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943)) would have committed Spain to the cause had a German victory seemed assured. British spies in Madrid and Lisbon soon understood that and to be sure, the diplomatic arsenal of the UK's ambassador to Madrid, Sir Samuel Hoare (1880-1959), was strengthened with money, the exchequer's investment applied to bribing Spanish generals, admirals and other notables to ensure the forces of peace prevailed. Surprising neither his friends or enemies, "slippery Sam" proved adept at the dark arts of disinformation, bribery and back-channel deals required to corrupt and although his engaging (if unreliable) memoirs were vague about the details, documents provided by his staff suggest he made payments in the millions at a time a million sterling was a lot of money. By 1944, the state of the war made it obvious any threat of Spanish belligerency was gone and he returned to London.
The dreaded corrupted FAT
Dating from the mid-1970s, the file allocation
table (FAT) is a data structure used by a number of file systems to index
and manage the files on storage devices. First associated with 8 inch (200 mm) floppy
diskettes, it became familiar to users when introduced by Microsoft in the
early days of PC (personal computer) operating systems (OS) and was used on the
precursors to the PC-DOS & MS-DOS OSs which dominated the market during the
1980s. Over the years there have been a
number of implementations, the best known of which are FAT12, FAT16 & FAT32,
the evolution essentially to handle the increasing storage capacity of media
and the need to interact with enhancements to OSs to accommodate increasing
complexities such as longer file names, additional file attributes and special
files like sub-directories (now familiar as folders which technically are files
which can store other files).
A FAT is almost always stored on the host device itself
and is an index in the form of a database which consists of a table with records
of information about each file and directory in the file system. What a FAT does is provide a mapping between
the logical file system and the physical location of data on the storage medium so it can be thought of as an address book.
Technically, the FAT keeps track of which clusters (the mechanism by
which the data is stored) on the device are linked to each file and directory and this
includes unused clusters so a user can determine what free space remains
available. Ultimately, it’s the FAT
which maintains a record of the links between the clusters which form a file's
data chain and the metadata associated with each file, such as its attributes,
creation & modification timestamps, file size etc. In the same way that when reading a database
a user is actually interacting primarily with the index, it’s the FAT which locates
the clusters associated with a request to load (or view, delete etc) a file and determine their sequence, enabling efficient read and write operations.
The size, structure and complexity of FATs
grew as the capacity of floppy diskettes and then hard disks expanded but the
limitations of the approach were well-understood and modern operating systems
have increasingly adopted more advanced file systems like NTFS (New Technology
File System) or exFAT (Extended File Allocation Table) although FAT remains
widely used especially on lower capacity and removable devices (USB drives,
memory cards et al), the main attraction being the wide cross-platform compatibility.
A corrupted image (JPEG) of Lindsay Lohan. Files can be corrupted yet appear as correct
entries in the FAT and conversely, a corrupted fat will usually contain may
uncorrupted files; the files are content and the FAT an index.
The ominous sounding
corrupted FAT is a generalized term which references errors in a FAT’s data
structure. There are DBAs (database administrators) who insist all databases are in a constant state of corruption to some degree and when a FAT becomes corrupted,
it means that the data has become inconsistent or damaged and this can be
induced by system crashes, improper shutdowns, power failures, malware or
physical damage to the media. The
consequences can be minor and quickly rectified with no loss of data or varying
degrees of the catastrophic (a highly nuanced word among IT nerds) which may
result in the loss of one or more files or folders or be indicative of the
unrecoverable failure of the storage media.
Modern OSs include tools which can be used to attempt to fix corrupted
FATs and when these prove ineffective, there are more intricate third-party
products which can operate at a lower level but where the reported corruption
is a symptom of hardware failure, such errors often prove terminal, thus
the importance of data (and system) backups.
The grey area between corruption and "just politics"
As an adjective, corrupt is used somewhat casually to refer
to individuals or institutions thought to have engaged in practices leading to
personal gain of some sort (not necessarily financial) which are either
morally dubious or actually unlawful and a corrupt politician is the usual
example, a corrupted politician presumably one who was once honest but
tempted. The synonyms of corrupt are
notoriously difficult to isolate within set parameters, perhaps because
politicians have been so involved in framing the definitions in a way which
seems rarely to encompass anything they do, however corrupt it may to many
appear. The word dishonest for example
obviously includes those who steal stuff but is also used of those who merely
lie and there are circumstances in which both might be unlawful but wouldn’t generally
to thought corrupt conduct except by the most morally fastidious. The way politicians have structured the
boundaries of acceptable conduct is that it’s possible to be venal in the sense
of selling patronage as long as the consideration doesn’t literally end up as the
equivalent of cash in the pocket although such benefits can be gained as
long as there’s some degree of abstraction between the steps.
Once were happy: Gladys Berejiklian and Daryl Maguire, smiling.
In
Australia, news the New South Wales (NSW) Independent Commission against
Corruption (ICAC) had handed down a finding that former premier Gladys
Berejiklian (b 1970; NSW Premier (Liberal) 2017-2021) had acted corruptly was
of course interesting but mystifying to many was that despite that, the
commission made no recommendation that criminal charges be considered. It transpired that was because the evidence
Ms Berejiklian was required to provide to the ICAC wouldn’t be admissible in a
court because there, the rules of evidence are different and a defendant can’t
be compelled to provide an answer which might be self-incriminating. In other words a politician can be forced to
tell the truth when before the ICAC but not before a court when charged. That’s an aspect of the common law’s adversarial
system which has been much criticized but it’s one of the doctrines which
underpins Western law where there is a presumption of innocence and the onus of
proof of guilt beyond reasonable doubt lies with the prosecution. Still, what unfolded before the ICAC revealed
that Ms Berejiklian seems at the least to have engaged in acts of Billigung
(looking the other way to establish a defense of “plausible deniability”). How corrupt that will be regarded by people will depend on this and that and the reaction of many politicians was to focus on the
ICAC’s statement that criminal charges would not be pursed because of a lack of
admissible evidence as proof that if there’s no conviction, then there’s no
corruption. Politicians have little interest in the bar being raised. They were less forgiving of
her former boyfriend (with whom she may or not have been in a "relationship" and if one did exist it may or may not have been "serious"),
former fellow parliamentarian Daryl Maguire (b 1959, MLA (Liberal) for Wagga
Wagga 1999-2018). Despite legal
proceedings against Mr Maguire being afoot, none of his former colleagues seemed reluctant
to suggest he was anything but guilty as sin so for those who note such things
the comparative is “more corrupt” and the superlative “most corrupt”, both
preferable to the clumsy alternatives “corrupter” & “corruptest”.
The release of the ICAC’s findings came a couple of days
before the newly created federal equivalent (the National Anti-Corruption
Commission (NACC)) commenced operation.
Although the need for such a body had be discussed for decades, it was
during the time the government was headed by Scott Morrison (b 1968; Australian
prime-minister 2018-2022) that even many doubters were persuaded one would be a
good idea. Mr Morrison’s background was
in marketing, three word slogans and other vulgarities so it surprised few a vulgarian
government emerged but what was so shocking was that the pork-barreling and
partisan allocation of resources became so blatant with only the most
perfunctory attempts to hide the trail.
Such conduct was of course not new but it’s doubtful if before it had
been attempted at such scale and within Mr Morrison’s world-view the internal
logic was perfect. His intellectual
horizons defined by fundamentalist Christianity and mercantilism, his view
appeared to be that only those who voted (or might be induced to vote) for the
Liberal & National Parties were those who deserved to be part of the
customer loyalty scheme that was government spending. This tied in nicely with the idea those who
accept Jesus Christ as the savior getting to go to Heaven, all others condemned
to an eternity in Hell. Not all simplicities are elegant.
As things stand, such an attitude to public finance (ie treating as much spending as possible as party re-election funds) is not unlawful and to most
politicians (at least any with some reasonable prospect of sitting on the
treasury benches) should not be thought “corrupt”; it’s just “politics” and in NSW,
in 1992 it was confirmed that what is “just politics” has quite a vista. Then the ICAC handed down findings against then
premier Nick Greiner (b 1947; NSW (Liberal) premier 1988-1992) over the matter
of him using the offer of a taxpayer funded position to an independent member
of parliament as an inducement to resign, the advantage being the seat might be
won by the Liberal party in the consequent by-election. As the ICAC noted, Mr Greiner had not acted
unlawfully nor considered himself to be acting corruptly but that had been the
result. Indeed, none doubted it would never
have occurred to Mr Greiner that doing something that was “just politics” and
had been thus for centuries could be considered corrupt although remarkably, he
did subsequently concede he was “technically corrupt”
(not an admission which seems to have appealed to Ms Berejiklian). The ICAC’s finding against Mr Greiner was
subsequently overturned by the NSW Court of Appeal.
So the essence of the problem is just what corruption
is. What the public see as corrupt, politicians regard as “just politics” which, in a practical sense, can be reduced
to “what you can get away with” and was rationalized by Ms Berejiklian in an answer to a question by the ICAC about pork-barrelling: "Everybody does it". Of course that's correct and the differences between politicians are of extent and the ability to conceal but her tu quoque (translated literally as "thou also" and latterly as "you also"; translation in the vernacular is something like "you did it too") defense could be cited by all. The
mechanism of a NACC has potential and already both sides of politics are
indicating they intend to use it against their political enemies so it should
be amusing for those who enjoy politics as theatre although, unfortunately, the
politicians who framed the legislation made sure public hearings would be rare. One might suspect they want it to be
successful but not too successful. Still, the revelations of the last ten years have
provided some scope for the NACC to try to make the accepted understanding of corruption
something more aligned with the public’s perception. Anomalies like a minister’s “partner” being a
“partner” for purposes of qualifying for free overseas travel (business class air
travel, luxury hotels, lavish dinners etc) yet not be defined a “partner” for
purposes of disclosing things which might give rise to a possible
conflict of interest for the minister is an example of the sort of thing where
standardization might improve confidence. It probably should be conceded that corruption
can’t be codified in the way the speed limits for a nation’s highways can but it’s
one of those things that one knows when one sees it and if the NACC can nudge
the politicians’ behavior a bit in the direction of public expectation, it’ll
be a worthy institution. On a happier note, Mr Greiner went on to enjoy a lucrative corporate career and Ms Berejiklian (currently with telco Optus) is predicted to follow in his tracks although suggestions posted on social media she'd been offered a partnership at PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers International Limited) on the basis of her experience making her a "perfect fit for the company" are thought mischievous rather than malicious.
