ABSTRACT
Corruption flourished because it lubricated business and showed the symbolic utility of wealth; so external sanctions were unlikely to reduce it. Corrupt leaders mostly thought they were being communal. Most of their ill-gotten lucre was usually spent on their whole groups, not on themselves. (The accounts are not available, but testimony from many strongly suggests this.) Hinge cadres' responsibility to the state could easily be lost in corruption, because the state was not their only network. If less hierarchal and more specialized relations between people became more common in the course of change, the current epidemic of corruption might be assuaged. Symbols, not just sanctions, were crucial for local leaders. A letter to Mayor Zhu Rongji in 1988 opined that the city fathers' frequent diatribes against corruption would not mean much until cadres who were found guilty had their names printed in newspapers, because publicity was what they feared most.49
