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The argument that « power drives mad and absolute power drives absolutely mad » is often used as a moral formula to explain the drifts of leaders.
Behind this sentence is a much more complex, systemic and structuring mechanism. It is not an individual pathology, nor a mere moral betrayal, but a chain of psychological, institutional and economic processes that gradually transform the exercise of power.
As decision-making becomes more focused, entourage filteres and accountability mechanisms weaken, power tends to become more self-reliant, more rigid and even more predation-based.
In French-speaking Africa, this dynamic is amplified by presidential regimes inherited from colonial architecture: extreme centralization, personalization of power, chronic weakness of institutional counter-powers and sacralization of the presidential figure.
The « Power madness » So it's not an accident. It is often the logical outcome of a political system that concentrates, isolates and absolutes public decision-making.
