The Unaccountability Machine shows how large organizations diffuse decision responsibility into "accountability sinks", creating flawed outcomes and making it hard to trace and correct mistakes.
Big systems often hide who actually makes decisions, turning policies, best practices, or automated workflows into black boxes that scramble feedback. Dan Davies calls these "accountability sinks" - mechanisms that strip owners from outcomes, letting organizations blame the process instead of people.
When responsibility is diffused, mistakes become invisible and corrective action stalls. Davies illustrates this with examples from finance, government, and tech firms where rules or software intermediaries block clear lines of accountability, leading to costly errors and public distrust. The book argues that these sinks are not accidental but built into scale, and they erode logical decision making.
For leaders, the insight is practical: map where accountability sinks exist in your organization, re-establish direct feedback loops, and redesign processes to tie outcomes back to decision makers. Doing so restores clarity, improves decision quality, and prevents the systemic failures that Davies describes.
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