Tol Eressëa "The Lonely Isle"

During the great part of His Majesty's reign of forty-eight years, when the
top of the hierarchy, on despair, found that central leadership did not
exist, cynicism and slack discipline spread through all the ranks. The di-
ligent had less reason to maintain their diligence; the corrupt, on the
other hand, had better chance to indulge their corruption. The decline of
the overall performance of the bureaucracy was steady and gradual. If the
dynasty did not collapse at this point it was largely because no alter-
native to it existed. In an immense yet noncompetitive empire such as
ours, the establishment continued to exist through mere inertia.