Charles Hugh Smith: Concentrated power and wealth are intrinsically sociopathological by their very nature.
I have long spoken of the dangers inherent to centralization of power and the extreme concentrations of wealth centralization inevitably creates.
Longtime contributor C.D. recently highlighted another danger of centralization:sociopaths/psychopaths
excel in organizations that centralize power, and their ability to
flatter, browbeat and manipulate others greases their climb to the top.
In effect, centralization is tailor-made for sociopaths gaining power. Sociopaths
seek power over others, and centralization gives them the perfect
avenue to control over millions or even entire nations.
Even worse (from the view of non-sociopaths), their perverse abilities
are tailor-made for excelling in office and national politics via
ruthless elimination of rivals and enemies and grandiose appeals to
national greatness, ideological purity, etc.
As C.D. points out, the ultimate protection against sociopathology is
to minimize the power held in any one agency, organization or
institution: