There is no system that cannot be abused. None in welfare, none in politics, none in knowledge production. No airtight blueprint. With the consequence that all systems are suspicious, and suspected. Meaning we cannot establish a consensus. Whenever policies, or results, contradicts one social group's assumptions, there is always a way to question it instead of questioning ourselves. Rightly or wrongly ? Was the system actually abused, corrupted, subverted ? It's just a matter of luck, we don't have much more than subjective intuitions (the very subjective intuitions that oppose us) to rely on. No solid foundations.
Of course, not everything is equal. It isn't a perfect symmetry. Some systems can be more solid, more reliable than others, with more safeguards (peer reviews, accountability, etc). The degrees of cohesion and arbitrary contradictions can be evaluated. We try to set up methodologies over methodologies to unmask our own biases, errors, vulnerabilities. And we can sometimes assess the very intent to stay self-critical or not. But these aren't absolutes, and you can always find systemic or punctual counter examples to cast a shadow of doubt on the system. Honestly or deviously.
Se we're between a rock and a hard place. I try to not reproach others things that I would do in symmetrically opposite conditions, and I try to pinpoint on what exact ground I legitimise or delegitimise it. And usually it comes to values, morals, way above the ethics, deontology, which themselves come above conformity to a system that is supposed to feature its own failsafes. But I still dream of something that would ground a consensus. To build upon some universal common ground, and accept the architecture of it.
It's just no product of such architecture can be accepted blindly. Because - there's no system that couldn't be abused.
