As I write this series of posts on the subject of Government and Leadership, I should probably note that these are my thoughts and opinions. That those thoughts and opinions are based on the things I was taught in school, in Scouts, in the books I've read, in the people I have knows, the relationships I have cultivated (or mangled), in 30 some years of reading the newspapers everyday. They are rooted in my beliefs in economics and politics and my general thoughts of what we are and who we can be.
Who I hope we can be at our best. I may not make too many citations. You are welcome to disagree (and comment). You are also welcome to highlight anywhere where I am stating what you think is obvious.
So I think I made the point that we need some government. At least, I believe we have to have some government - if only because if we don't then people tend to start banding together to protect themselves. Governments coalesce.
If governments form from people trying to protect themselves (often from other groups of people!) then I guess we can say that a key role of a government is to provide security. Security for the society that belongs with that government. I mean "security" in the sense of physical security. The Army for external defence, the Police for internal. But in the society we live in (and throughout most of the world) governments often provide much more. Why?
I believe the answer to that involves a bit of a digression. Humans seem to be at their best when we compete, and when we cooperate. That sounds a bit contradictory, but we see it all the time. Sports teams are groups of people working together to beat other groups. Businesses are organizations of people that compete for gain against other groups offering similar commodities, products or services. We are surrounded by people competing and cooperating.
How does this involve governments? Well whenever we compete we seem to need to devise rules for the competition. Again, this is a result of human nature. It has been seen throughout history that certain groups, without any checks, can come to dominate or monopolize a market. In that case certain individuals (or groups) can amass so much economic power that they can wield physical power. In some cases take over or form a government themselves. If they then "take advantage" of the rest of society - say by consuming so much wealth and resource that the remainder of society is harmed - then that can be perceived as a violation of the security of the society and thus the government has failed. The results of that can vary from nothing (the dissatisfaction of the population is successfully suppressed, see North Korea for example) to revolution. An example there would be Syria, where 5 years of drought displaced so may farmers to cities that a civil war has started.
Ok, these examples are a little simplified, but what I want to illustrate is that history and current events show quite clearly that people expect more from government than just protection from invaders, thieves, and murderers. A degree of economic and political security seem to be something expected from the rulers.
So once again we've found some boundary conditions. A government needs to make sure (somehow) that the country is not invaded, the civil order is maintained (i.e. the crime rate kept to an acceptable level) and that most people at least can find some life satisfaction. Eat, find shelter, raise children, care for family and so on.
Is that all?
In most societies people trade. They grow and sell food, goods, services. We don't always agree the transaction was fair. The state can (but doesn't always) provide dispute resolution mechanisms. The civil courts. Many people can also contract with a private arbitrator, but in most cases in the Western World, our government provides a legal system that govcrns not only criminal behaviour (mostly physical security between citizens) but also commercial dispute resolution.
In fact, there appears to be a higher expectation. We hear a number of voices calling for economic regulation. The "level playing field". After all, if you are considering investing in a company, you examine the company's books - and you expect them to be honest. How to ensure that without having to find out after the fact, and take a company to court? So we have securities laws, which are there to ensure minimum standards. Whose standards? Well in the case of securities, we have an agreed set of rules "Generally Accepted Accounting Principles" so that we're all talking the same language.
In the same vein, as our society has become more technological, and we engage in using high -energy machines (cars, trucks, planes, boilers, refineries, etc.), and we use them around each other, we have evolved from people sueing each other when things go wrong (like the explosion of a poorly operated, and unprotected boiler) to requiring that those boilers be safely designed and the design registered and checked before it may be operated, and then it may only be operated by a trained and qualified operator.
So we can observe that our government(s) have evolved from groups of people keeping watch for predators by the fire at night, to a complex set of agencies overseeing our activities and regulating... well is it everything?
Which leads us to the flip side, what shouldn't a government do? Philosophically speaking, why does our government not just regulate everything from cradle to grave? Wouldn't it be easier, and safer? Wouldn't we maximize security?
Well maybe, but I see two big objections. In the second place, it's been tried, and has been done very poorly. The Soviet state bankrupted and corrupted itself trying to control everything in its' reach. It's successor state is not quite so extreme. The Chinese Communist party noticed that problem and has begun decentralizing and privatizing much of its' economy, the results are not yet in on how their version is going to work out, but the early results are (economically) somewhat encouraging.
But in the first place, what fun would it be? Humans cooperate and compete. If we turned everything over to the state, where would the competition go? How would we strive and challenge ourselves? Many of the most successful ideas came from people who ignored experts claiming that "it couldn't be done". Both our individual successes and societal advances depend on the freedom of individuals to try new things, challenge the existing order, and succeed with something new! (Or fail, learn a lesson and try again).
So there is certainly a tension to try and find the balance between providing security (physical, economic, political) and allowing freedom.
But how do we find that balance? Well we have a group of people we select from amongst our citizens to deal with the day to day provision of security, rules, and other benefits(?) of our society.
The Government.
No comments:
Post a Comment