Often present in Corporate America, Downhill Accountability is the blame game in conjunction with the idea that stuff rolls downhill. When something goes wrong, each tier of management blames their subordinates, who in turn blame their subordinates, until there is only one lonely peon at the bottom of the hill.
President: "Sales are down 8%"
Vice President: "The sales team needs to get their stuff together"
Sales Team Manager: "Our Administrative Assistant has failed to provide bid documents to account managers in a timely fashion."
Admin Assistant: "FML. The color printer is broken, we're out of binders, and they always wait till hours before their deadlines to submit their bid docs for assembly. I guess that's downhill accountability for you"