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Bridge players hate guessing. Allowing non-disclosure will basically turn the game into a pointless guessing game, with luck (and to some extent, the bidding system) becoming the predominant factor, rather than skill. This will surely drive away the good players, and all that will be left will be self proclaimed bidding theorists... Just because you cannot ...

It is a "sporting" rule as much as anything else. The opponents need to be given an opportunity to learn your bidding system. Some will take it, and some won't. But you can't have a situation where the opponents had "no chance" at understanding.

To address the second question - where would new bidding systems come from if all players were required to play the same system? How would one enforce that?

Imagine the opportunities for abuse. Without a disclosure rule, partners can make up any system they want and thereby communicate in illegal ways. There's really no difference to the other players between "qble and Monica's private bidding system that we won't disclose" and conducting the conversation in Swahili; either way it's obfuscating information ...