Polybius' mixed constitution: why good organisations decay with nobody to blame
The first generation earns its authority; the second is born holding it. The wheel starts turning down at the second.
There is no villain. The first generation earns its authority, the second inherits it without earning it, takes it for granted and overreaches — and then the wheel starts again, only in a club it turns in three years rather than a century.
- Authority earnedthe founders' word carries because everyone saw them do it
- Authority inheritedthe next board gets the same weight without having built anything
- Taken for grantedhaving never known scarcity, they treat the club's standing as given
- Overreachthe healthy form turns into its disease: kingship into tyranny, democracy into mob rule
- The situation
The president is also the treasurer and the only holder of the bank account, and nobody has read the statutes since the club was founded.
- What the model says
For Polybius a constitution means dependence: each part needs the others' consent, so each is forced to persuade. Here nobody has to persuade anyone.
- What you do
By the end of the month, add a second signature for spending above an agreed amount. One decision a single person can no longer take alone.
What it claims
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Source
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The primary source is in the public domain: it may be read, quoted and reprinted freely.
These works are related to the one you just read — and not by accident:
shared competencies: Continuity, Judgement, Strategy
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shared competencies: Judgement, Strategy
shared competencies: Judgement, Strategy
Of the ten gslk competency domains, this work grounds:
The same work written for a member: what to do with it in the club.
This text is freely available, so the links go straight to it rather than to a summary of it.
- Perseus — Polybius's Histories in Greek and English
- LacusCurtius — the Histories in Paton's translation, from Book 1
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