I still maintain the answer is the near total absence of accountability at the top echelons of our public institutions - a source from which decency and integrity can trickle down thru our institutions.
Funny enough this came up recently in a private conversation and I was reminded of the ghost power of ... the deputy ministers. They are unknown, unreplaceable and in all likelihood not the most forward thinking purveyors of institutional achievement.
What's bubbling up instead is dissolving public trust and basically locking our civilization into it's declining trajectory.
I will maintain that the basic institutions are still there and the system could be flipped positive without much more than a popular leader with good ideas.