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    1. Yea. For example, there are parallel terms to Sitwa – http://www.in-formality.com/wiki/index.php?title=Sitwa_(Poland) – from just about all over the world.

      Alena Ledeneva’s exceptional Global Encyclopedia of Informality (2018) is probably the most comprehensive, awareness-building comparative source on “corruption” and informality. Links for free access here (Video description):

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffcDhkjTPHw&list=PLyRk2yIHSNKnfe55CzUmJAh28NkvWkmfV&index=13

      Francis Fukuyama’s “Origins of Political Order” (2011) and “Political Order & Political Decay” (2014) are probably the most comprehensive sources on the comparative global history of the eternal struggle between kinship/friendship networks and impersonal state bureaucracies.

      Both point out that “informal” networks represent the natural default mode of human behavior – it’s biologically hard wired, and state bureaucracies go against this.

      As Fukuyama points out:

      “Before Americans, Britons, or Germans get too self-satisfied about their own political systems, however, it is important to note that the problem of patrimonialism is never finally solved in any political system. I argued in Volume 1 of this book that reliance on friends and family is a default mode of human sociability and will always return in different forms in the absence of powerful incentives to behave otherwise. The modern, impersonal state forces us to act in ways that are deeply in conflict with our own natures and is therefore constantly at risk of erosion and backsliding. Elites in any society will seek to use their superior access to the political system to further entrench themselves, their families, and their friends unless explicitly prevented from doing so by other organized forces in the political system. This is no less true in a developed liberal democracy than in other political orders, and one can make the argument that the process of repatrimonialization continues into the present.

      The Progressive Era reforms in the United States eliminated one particular form of clientelism, the ability of the political parties to secure support through the distribution of jobs in the bureaucracy at federal, state, and local levels. It did not, however, end the practice of distributing other kinds of favors, such as subsidies, tax breaks, and other benefits, to political supporters. One of the big issues afflicting American politics in recent years has been the impact of interest groups that are able to effectively buy politicians with campaign contributions and lobbying. Most of this activity is perfectly legal, so in a sense the United States has created a new form of clientelism, only practiced at a much larger scale and with huge sums of money at stake.” (F. Fukuyama, 2014: “Political Order & Political Decay”, London: Profile Books, p.218 – at google books: https://books.google.de/books?id=j6hzAwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&hl=de&pg=PA208#v=onepage&q=Before%20Americans&f=false )

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