The phenomenon of political corruption is examined from an interdisciplinary approach that combines psychoanalysis with political science and history. The current political crisis in Peru, stemming from the revelation of millionaire bribes delivered by Brazilian companies to a long list of public officials and authorities, including five of the last six former Presidents of the Republic, in order to win the tenders of large public infrastructure works, serves as a starting point of a brief retrospective tour of the history of corruption in a country that reveals its structural and transversal character. The analysis of the particular case of Peru serves as a basis for outlining some general reflections on the responsibility of the electorate, and on the dynamics of relationships among corrupt leaders, their inner circle, and the people that carry them to power. It also explores the extent and scope of a social pathology that Leo Rangell has called the “syndrome of the compromise of integrity”.