Personal vs institutional

The patronage system of power distribution differs from the system of merit in the way they define duty. 

Duty in the patronage system redounds to the maintenance of the patron's honor and the saving of his face; duty in the merit system redounds to the maintenance of the institution's honor and the saving of its face. 

Again, the difference is in the personal vs the institutional, in the carnal vs the procedural. The difference between the carnal vs the procedural is the carnal does not entail accountability while the procedural does. Whose side are you on is about the patron who needs to account to no-one; building and sustaining things that endure is about the institution, which, by definition, is about the accountability of the procedures that constitute that which endures. 

So the difference between the two is a matter of time frame. The patronage system focuses intensely on the personal situation of the patron and has serious problems when it comes to succession; the merit system focuses on the longer term interests of the institution and has correspondly fewer problems with succession. 

Democratic institutions have even less problems with succession than other sorts of institutions because the hold on democratic power is in the first place term-limited and subject to sunset provisions.