I think that "kleptocratic" is a great word to describe what I perceive the situation in Zimbabwe to be. What's going on there would certainly appear to be an extreme example of state theft, and I've heard some horror stories about it on TV and the radio from people who've been through it. It's reminiscent of the kind of heavy-handed government taxation process characterised by the rulers of Norman England in the 12th and 13th centuries which gave rise to the myth of Robin Hood. But updated to the "needs" of today, of course!

I believe that a state that taxes heavily without reinvesting those taxes in the public good could also be considered mildly kleptocratic - rule by institutionalised theft. And most countries have had governments like that at one time or another. New Zealand in the 1970s immediately comes to mind.

If I recall correctly, it was also used to describe the Russian communist government 1921 - 1989. The state took all production away by force rather than with the consent of the governed, and that was the context in which I first saw the word used, probably in The Economist. It tends to like words like that.






The idiot also known as Capfka ...