Two points:

• Methinks you’re fighting a battle against somebody else other than me and the point I was making.
• “Human nature” is just a short way of referring to the complex subject of certain behaviors present in some individuals and how they interact with human group dynamics, similarly to how “Theory of Evolution” is a short way of referring to the complex subject of how genetic traits that provide small advantages with reproductive success consequences can through time and the law of large number spread to alter an entire population or even create new species. In fact both those things are correlated.

Call it whatever you want: you can’t logically deny that some behavioral traits present in some humans cause them to seek or even create positions were they have power over others, structures which they then defend, preserve and extend whilst they extract personal upsides from their positions in it, and that group systems were there is already a single power pole with little or no effective independent oversight are way easier to take over by such people than systems with multiple power poles which keep each other in check.

(In summary people who lust after power will do whatever it takes to keep it going once they get it)

And yeah, this applies just as much to the dictatorships calling themselves “Communist” as it does to “Capitalist” systems - we’ve been seeing in the last 3 or 4 decades in Neoliberal so called “Democracies” Money subverting the supposedly independent Pillars of Democracy (though in some countries, not really: for example in many countries those at the top of the Political Pillar choose who heads the Judicial Pillar hence the latter is not independent of the former) to make itself THE power above all others, all this driven by individuals with those very behavioral traits I mentioned above, just starting from further behind (having to first undermine multi-polar power systems) than similar people trying to take over autocratic systems were power is already concentrated in a single pole that answers to nobody else.

(The path to unchallenged supreme power is a lot shorter in autocratic regimes)

Are you denying that amongst humans there are people with the behavioral trait of seeking power at any cost? Are you denying once such people get said power they will do whatever it takes to keep it going, including preserving the societal and political structures that maintain said situation even whilst telling everybody else “this is only temporary”? Are you denying that it’s easier to capture power in that way in systems where its already concentrated in a single place which is not kept in check by independent entities which can overthrow it?

And I’m not even going it other human behavioral traits involved in things like groupthink and “yes men” and how such elements in human groups can pervert ever the most honest holders of power.

Battling against the expression “human nature” doesn’t change the fact that these traits exists in many humans and the dynamics of their interaction with human social structures as shown again and again in millennia of History.

Interesting take. But there is some truth to the notion of ‘human nature’. Humans do act certain ways; we retract from pain, we attempt to solve problems and communicate. Whether it is ‘human nature’ that dictatorship power corrupts people can only be inferred by the examples we have seen. If you can show that a dictatorship didn’t lead to abuse of power in some significant number of cases, then it would be proven false. But there’s the problem - and it’s more of a logical one - no system can make everyone happy and so from at least some perspectives, any political system will be seen as corrupt by some. So we can never have a dictatorship that isn’t considered corrupt. Just like we can’t have a democracy / capitalist society that isn’t considered corrupt by some. All we can do is look at observed general patterns and try to extrapolate. And there aren’t enough examples to do a really convincing statistical analysis. So far it seems that humans in power always abuse that power, so it’s reasonable to conclude that that is a natural human tendency, like continuing to breath when able.