I'm thinking about Belgium - no government for months (constitutional crisis) - nothing seemed to go wrong, particularly.
Italy - caretaker unelected technocrats in charge because of the economy - seemed to actually function better.
The Civil Service is the machinery that gets things actually done, it seems.
Thoughts?
We don't need the ones on offer, that's for sure.
without a government there will be no one to protect the rich from the poor.
this is why we need a 'none of the above' option,
We'd soon find out.
No we need an Administration to look after National affairs on our behalf. Calling them the Governmant gives them totally the wrong idea about who is in charge. We employ them.
Seems to be working out fine in Somalia.
but without a government those poor little loves would actually have to
work for a living instead of the lucrative expenses world they live in
now ... think of the outcry 😉
Belgian example is good, Italian one less so; there is more to it than meets the eye there and people are less than happy with having a Troika government or the ongoing economic decline there.
In principle though, we do not 'need' government and certainly not in the way it exists right now, where we seem to have two choices; get shafted by unions and 'big' politics, or get shafted by big business and 'big' politics of another kind.
You do have a none of the above option. It's called spoiling your paper and that's why it is so important to vote even just to spoil your paper.
30% turnout does not give the same message as 80% turnout with 50% spoilt papers...
It's an interesting question Woppit. I think there is a better example though than the ones you've offered. From what I have been told, Switzerland has very little centralised/federal government. Most of the power and decision making authority is devolved to the Cantons.
This was explained to me in a lecture and to illustrate the point the lecturer asked the two Swiss students that were part of the cohort if they could name the Swiss President. They both shrugged. One couldn't (it changes annually) and while the other could he said what was the point of knowing, they don't have any power.
If we had 'The Peoples Government' instead of 'Her Majesty's Government', would we see progress?
On whose behalf are MPs spied on and foreign policy (illegal wars n that) decided?
The problem with not having a government is what happens in the long term. Basically an unelected government will become gradually less and less responsive to the public, and more and more corrupt.
Mark Twain's comment is so right about this: 'Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason.'
Yes but much smaller in scale and scope.
Fine having representatives but our leaders??? Come on.....as noted in other threads of the seven "leaders" in the TV debate how many would you employ?
You mean as now?
Asking do we need a government? Is a bit broad. We need to ask do we need a legislator? Do we need an executive? If so how should they be formed?
In the OP's post he mentions Belgium and Italy it isn't true that they didn't have Government, they did, it just wasn't in the usual democratically elected format that we are used to.
Yes though a stable democracy can stay civil for a brief perido of time but lawless will win out in the end
how many would you employ?
The yardstick by which I measure all politicians.
Yes but they need to stop fiddling so much. They should just set the big broad agenda then allow the local areas do the rest.
Some African countries function for long periods of time without effective government because all the money is being stolen and the citizens just exist in hope and live off the black market. I'm thinking places like the DRC and Nigeria where people just "manage" and there's no evidence of any government investment in the country. Britain is a little different because taxes are collected and there's revenue from oil and other exports, only a small proportion of which gets stolen. So we need somebody who has a broad view of the situation to tell the civil servants what to do with the cash although in the end I think we bumble along at the whim of world forces, not really able to affect much of what happens.
globalti - Member
I'm thinking places like the DRC and Nigeria where people just "manage" and there's no evidence of any government investment in the country.
😯 Really?!?
Britain is a little different
That's all right then!!
The problem in UK isn't so much the "government", but the "establishment". Criminal behaviour within this establishment is accepted, in a way which similar behaviour (benefit fraud) outwithit is not.
There appears to be no check on that behaviour - no organisation which is capable of jailing fraudulent or paedophiliac MPs, Lords, Senior Police/Judges. Without an organisation to keep the upper echelons of power in check then we are in reality no better than Mafiosa ridden parts of Italy, or Narco states like Mexico or Colombia.
I'm thinking places like the DRC and Nigeria where people just "manage" and there's no evidence of any government investment in the country.
As someone who has done a bit of work for the Nigerian federal goverment, I disagree.
dannybgoode - Member
You do have a none of the above option. It's called spoiling your paper and that's why it is so important to vote even just to spoil your paper.
Nonsense, spoiling your paper has no effect on the government. Governments can stick get in with a simple majority. A proper none of the above option would have the ability to invalid a result making them try again..
It's interesting how the strong anti-government sentiments of the American Tea Party activists have slowly spread over here. It is of course designed to have exactly the same effect.
Yes, as most people know it's actually Civil Servants than run the country but it should be a purely mechanical function which follows guidelines handed down from Government, who in turn (supposedly) act on our behalf.
We could in theory do away with The Commons, the Lords, The Welsh Assembly, Hollyrood and rely on Local Government to collect the bins and keep the street lights on and the Courts to lock up the guilty and compensate the victims of whiplash.
But we'd be living in a de-facto totalitarian society, relying on the benevolence of the Civil Servants, Council Leaders and Judges to no enslave us all.
Non-Governance can work well, there are tiny groups of people who live in the wilds of Alaska (see Discovery Channel for details) who live so far from "civilisation" they are all but free of government - but it's telling to me that they only feel safe living miles from the next human being and generally great strangers from the safe of a rifle until they're proven to be 'safe' at least.
Living in close quarters Humans can no longer co-exist in harmony without rules and regulations telling them how to behave and fear of repercussions of they don't - chaos and anarchy explode form almost nowhere very quickly when order is lost.
If we are talking about Democracy - as distinct from Government, then there are some interesting initiatives starting to appear
http://opensource.com/government/14/8/interview-pia-mancini-democracyos-part-one
Someone above mentioned Tea party - perhaps Syriza (Greece) and Podemos (Spain) are the opposite in a European context.
Theoretically no...limited examples but 1936 Barcelona anarcho syndicalism of worker owned co production mutualisation see Chomsky for a critique.
Someone above mentioned Tea party - perhaps Syriza (Greece) and Podemos (Spain) are the opposite in a European context.
You mean opposite in the sense of being nothing like them, ie, not set up by a couple of billionaires to further their interests?
If we were going to have no govt could we relax the gun law first? Coz I need to defend myself from possible ZMs attacks. 😀
Living in close quarters Humans can no longer co-exist in harmony without rules and regulations telling them how to behave and fear of repercussions of they don't - chaos and anarchy explode form almost nowhere very quickly when order is lost.
Intresting point of view and is it a reflection on the manufactured consent that 'we' need a government and structure to protect us from each other and the fear of destruction of civilised society....
who is manufacturing this view and why are consenting to assume that what we have as a government is the only form/format that can exist.
Anarchy is not without rules ( not talking individual anarchist based on ego but on collective or socialist based anarchy) and is used as a term of 'terror' based on the mid 1880 to 1910 wave of fear created by the anarchist bombers, a truly great book is the world that never was.....exploring how states used anarchy to mean unfettered collapse of society and the state.
This message is still prevailing today we need control we need order and structure we need the techno crats and politicians.
Regardless of whether you like Russell Brand, a key message is what do we keep doing same old thing of electing people in based on parties/bankers contributions and who have become a politicial elite. Mr Brand has popularised and plagiarised several key folk here Chomsky being one.
Our nation state is based on the concept of the 1648 Treaty of Westphilia and then the need to protect our resources rather than looking collectively at what we need to accomplish to have peace sustainability equity and shared wealth.
If we had that no need for guns or the fear of Zombie/Survivalist nightmares/dreams...though if you want a gun you can have it but no bullets okay 😀
How about taking turns to act as a sort of executive-officer-for-the-week?
You mean opposite in the sense of being nothing like them, ie, not set up by a couple of billionaires to further their interests?
sorry - yes I meant exactly that Ernie.
Indeed.Junkyard - lazarus
how many would you employ?
The yardstick by which I measure all politicians.
Or even, how many of them actually know what is is to be employed outside of politics? How many have worked in jobs - public or private - and existed as normal voting citizens? These days, regrettably few.
There is something worrying about the rise of the career political type, at the expense of other candidates.
How about taking turns to act as a sort of executive-officer-for-the-week?
Sound good. We could use STW as a sounding board. That should work well.
I think we should go back to letting the church and monasteries run the country, I know how much you enjoy religion Mr Woppit 😆
sorry - yes I meant exactly that Ernie.
Well I've got to agree with you in that case.
After all the American Tea Party activists claim, just like the OP suggests, that all governments and politicians are bad and aren't really needed.
While in contrast Podemos is a political party made up of highly politically motivated individuals who wish to replace the existing Spanish and EU governments with different ones, ie, they aim to achieve political power.
While in Greece Syriza is similarly a political party made up of highly politically motivated individuals who have successfully opposed the former government and are now the government themselves.
Both Podemos and Syriza see the importance of government in society and its active involvement, the complete opposite of the American Tea Party activists. They also recognise the importance of voting and being part of the political process.
Still, the American Tea Party being started by a couple of billionaires while Podemos and Syriza being started by ordinary working people says all you really need to know.
The major flaw with the current system is the lack of public engagement with the process...
say for example there is a vote in parliament on preventing MPs from having 2nd jobs, or on mandatory reporting of child abuse, whereby MPs would be punished for failing to report child abuse by their colleagues.
In both of those instances, the public interest is likely to deviate from the interests of those actually voting on the legislation (i.e. the MPs)
Of course, that's before you factor in the influence of lobbyists and the like on issues such as the Arms Industry, Banking, Fracking, etc.
Perhaps an element of direct democracy is the answer.
Benevolent dictator is the only system likely to work. But who defines 'benevolent'? One person's 'fair' is someone else's 'unfair'.
Personally I've no idea who to vote for this time - one side is, in my view, incapable of managing the country as well as not reflecting my own principles and philosophy, the other is telling lies about their success and has taken decisions which are directly negatively impacting on my life, and I couldn't vote for them with a clear conscience given the impact of those decisions on society as a whole... rock and hard place.
We really need to find a way of expressing this as a vote (or not-voting or spoiling the paper) isn't effective at capturing the nuances which lie behind our voting intentions.
On the other hand, I can't help thinking that there's a link between falling living standards/lower incomes and our strength of feeling about our government ie: we weren't so angry when we thought we were wealthy. In that respect I think we, the electorate should take a closer look at ourselves and ask if we've simply ended up getting the politicians we deserve.
The emphasis we ourselves put on being consumers and being entertained isn't exactly healthy... I never aspired to owning 4 bikes when I was growing up in the 70s and 80s but now I rather expect to be able to if I want to...
Last time the economic tectonic plates shifted like this we ended up at war. I hope we don't again but there's surely something very big shifting in the model of western liberal democracy and it doesn't look like the genie's going to go back in the bottle.
Falling cost of technology, widespread availability of sophisticated communications, social media and a general cultural trend away from command and control towards self-organisation, could well shape our future in a much more positive manner, but unlikely to get to that utopia smoothly IMO
How about taking turns to act as a sort of executive-officer-for-the-week?
Like HIGNFY has a guest host that sort of thing?
Clarkson is free IIRC
Indeed.
I am sure THM got it
Good question.
Civil service could do a good job without Government, but big decisions (do we prioritise growth or the environment, low taxes or healthcare etc.?) would be made by unelected permanent secretaries.
That might be a bit obvious, but it does highlight the important role of having an elected government. Even if they are all sheisters.
Benevolent dictator is the only system likely to work. But who defines 'benevolent'?
I do. No question about it.
[i]The major flaw with the current system is the lack of public engagement with the process...[/i]
You could argue that that's a measure of it's success. We're so content that the machinations of Govt. are largely unimportant to us, apart from Pro-Am arguments on the internet.
Certainly Hobbes would see it that way.
Government by Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon
1 PrimeMinister , 12 Cabinet, 144 FrontBenchMPs, 1728 MPs (scrap house of lords)
20,736 Councillors, 248,832 Sub-Councillors, 35,831,808 voters and household proxy holders.
Anyone can drop in at any level as long as they are supported by a commensurate pyramid of voters.
Whole lot on a database, Elections once a month, (no vote is taken as same as last vote) instant democracy.
maccruiskeen - Member
Benevolent dictator is the only system likely to work. But who defines 'benevolent'?
I do. No question about it.
I am benevolent as I treat everyone equally.
What did you say again? Off with your head! 😆
re Benevolent dictators
a properly trained economist maybe a good start, instead of the present PPE shower of muppets
António de Oliveira Salazar
who reversed century-old tradition of deficits and made budgetary surpluses the hallmark of his regime. The surpluses were invested in a series of development plans.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/518989/Antonio-de-Oliveira-Salazar
Greece has a proper Economist as a Finance Minister
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Varoufakis was inspired to study economics after he met Andreas Papandreou, an academic economist who founded PASOK and became Greece’s first socialist prime minister.[6] After training in mathematics and statistics, he received his PhD in economics in 1987 at the University of Essex. Before that he had already begun teaching economics and econometrics at the University of Essex and the University of East Anglia. In 1988, he spent a year as a Fellow at the University of Cambridge. From 1989 until 2000 he taught as Senior Lecturer in Economics at the Department of Economics of the University of Sydney. In 2000, he accepted the offer of Yannis Stournaras to become Professor of Economic Theory at the University of Athens.[6] In 2002, Varoufakis established The University of Athens Doctoral Program in Economics (UADPhilEcon), which he directed until 2008. From January 2013 he taught at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin.
We've got George Osborne
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He was given a demyship to Magdalen College, University of Oxford,[3] where he received a 2:1 bachelor's degree in Modern History.[6] He also attended Davidson College in North Carolina for a semester as a Dean Rusk Scholar.[10]In 1993, Osborne intended to pursue a career in journalism. He was shortlisted for but failed to gain a place on The Times trainee scheme, and instead did freelance work on the Peterborough diary column of The Daily Telegraph. Some time later, an Oxford friend of his, journalist George Bridges, alerted Osborne to a research vacancy at Conservative Central Office.