Every Corruption I Am Not Part Of Is Evil

The sentence is not a confession. It is not an excuse. It is the sharpest thing a person can say about themselves: I know my nature. I name it. And precisely for that reason I know why we need structures.

I. The Sentence and Its Wink

“Every corruption I am not part of is evil.” Those who hear this sentence for the first time laugh. It has the structure of a joke — the punchline comes at the end, arrives unexpectedly, inverts the expectation. One waits for a condemnation of corruption. One gets a condemnation of the competition.

But the wink is not a minimisation. It is the opposite of hypocrisy. The hypocrite says: corruption is bad — and then avails themselves of it the moment it serves them, without noticing or naming it. The Rhinelander who says this sentence notices. He names it. He makes no virtue of it — but he makes no hidden shame of it either.

This is Montaigne: honest self-observation as the highest form of morality. Not the profession of virtue, but the profession of one’s own limits. “I know what I am. That should be enough to make me careful.”

II. We Know Each Other, We Help Each Other

In the Rhineland, corruption is not an exception to the normal state. It is the normal state — only one does not call it that. One calls it network. Relationship. Recommendation. Favour. The Rhenish maxim “mer kennt sich, mer hilft sich” — we know each other, we help each other — is not meant cynically. It describes a culture in which social proximity generates moral obligation. Those who are known are preferred. That is not arbitrariness — it is social capital that accumulates and distributes itself.

Cologne is the most precise example in Germany. The city where the concept of “Klüngel” — cronyism — acquired its modern meaning: informal networks that privatise public decisions without anyone breaking a law or even feeling they are doing anything wrong. The CDU as a Rhenish network project. Adenauer as master of the Klüngel — who was simultaneously one of the most effective statesmen of the 20th century. The Klüngel works. That is what makes it so hard to combat.

The difference between a network and a corruption structure is often only the standpoint. Those inside call it relationship. Those outside call it exclusion. Those who profit call it trust. Those who do not profit call it injustice. Both are right — and both describe the same thing.

III. The Second Side: The Right Offer

But the sentence has a second side that weighs heavier. “I would perhaps have found good reasons too, if someone had made me the right offer.” That is no longer nonchalance. That is self-knowledge in its radical form.

It is easy to say: I am not corrupt. As long as the right offer does not come, this statement is worthless. It describes no virtue — it describes an opportunity gap. The virtue of the person who was never tempted is no virtue. It is luck.

What is the right offer? It is rarely cash in an envelope. It is usually subtler: a position that suits one. A contract that saves one’s firm. A recommendation that opens a door. A gesture of recognition from someone whose recognition one desires. The offer comes in the language of normality — and that is precisely why one finds the reasons so quickly.

Rationalisation always comes after the decision. First one decides — then one finds the reasons. That is not a weakness. That is human cognition.

IV. Frederick and Silesia

Frederick II wrote the Anti-Machiavelli — and six months later occupied Silesia. He received the right offer: a wealthy land, poorly defended, an inexperienced opponent on the Viennese throne, a chance to make Prussia a great power. He found good reasons. Strategic necessity. The weakness of Austria as a historical opportunity. The protection of Prussian interests.

He even admitted it — with a candour absent in his successors: “Ambition, interest, the desire to establish myself in the world — these were the passions that drove me.” That is the Rhenish sentence at royal level. I know what I did. I name it. I make no virtue of it.

The difference between Frederick and the Rhenish Klüngel is only the scale. The mechanism is identical: the right offer comes. The reasons are found. The sentence one previously wrote about morality remains standing — because one regards it as the principle one follows in general, not as a guide to concrete action in the individual case.

V. The Selectivity of Moral Outrage

Moral outrage at corruption is almost always selective. We are outraged at the corruption that excludes or harms us. The corruption we profit from is either invisible or has a different name.

The cum-ex bankers who defrauded the state of billions did not feel like criminals. They exploited an opportunity the system offered — legal transactions that interpreted tax laws as tax laws may be interpreted. The moment it became corruption was gradual. And those watching from the inside did not see the line — because it was not a sharp boundary but a slow transition.

The politicians who are outraged when the other side distributes positions by party quota — and do the same the moment they are in power. The entrepreneurs who condemn lobbying — and employ lobbyists themselves. The journalists who report on networks — and live in networks. The sentence applies to all: every corruption I am not part of is evil.

VI. What the Sentence Achieves That Morality Does Not

Moral appeals against corruption do not work. That is empirically established — not as cynicism, but as observation. Anti-corruption campaigns, ethics codes, oath formulas, transparency laws without enforcement — none of this changes behaviour if the structures remain the same. People working in corrupt systems adapt. People working in clean systems do too.

What the sentence achieves — “every corruption I am not part of is evil” — is something different: it makes the mechanism visible. It does not describe how one should be. It describes how one is. And those who know this about themselves have an advantage over those who do not: they can take precautions.

Not: I will be virtuous. But: I know that under the right pressure I would find reasons. So I build structures that prevent this pressure from arising in the first place. I avoid situations where the right offer might come. I create transparency not because I trust it, but because I do not fully trust myself.

The opposite of corruption is not virtue. It is structure.

VII. Montaigne and the Honest Gaze

Michel de Montaigne invented in the 16th century an essay form resting on a single premise: the person I know best is myself — and even him I know only incompletely. His essays circle around this incompleteness without lamenting it. It is no failure not to know oneself fully. It is the condition of being human.

The Rhenish sentence is Montaignesque. It does not say: I am a bad person. It says: I am a person. With all the implications. I know the mechanism that moves me. I name it. I harbour no illusions about what I would be if the circumstances were different.

That is the higher honesty — not the profession of virtue, but the acknowledgement of temptability. Those who say “I would never” have simply not yet observed themselves in the right situations. Those who say “I would perhaps have found good reasons” have understood why we need structures that protect us from ourselves.

VIII. The Circle to Structure

Here the circle closes back to Frederick, to Cincinnatus, to the Anti-Machiavelli. Cincinnatus was virtuous — but the constitution would have compelled him to virtue. Frederick wanted to be virtuous — but the structure drove him into Silesia. The cum-ex banker perhaps wanted nothing bad — but the structure showed him the way.

The person who says “every corruption I am not part of is evil” has understood what the moralist does not: it is not the quality of people that determines the quality of a society. It is the quality of structures. In good structures with good rules, people have the possibility of behaving well. In bad ones, they adapt to circumstances.

The Rhinelander who says this sentence with a wink is no cynic. He is a realist. And the realist who knows his own nature is the only person to whom one can entrust a constitution. Not because he is incorruptible — but because he knows he is not, and therefore insists on institutions that compel him to be so anyway.

Those who say “I would never” are lying. Those who say “I would perhaps have found good reasons” have understood why we need structures.