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In a nutshell, one of the bedrock ideas of liberal society is that government officials and governments are not the same thing. We permit the government to do s

In a nutshell, one of the bedrock ideas of liberal society is that government officials and governments are not the same thing. We permit the government to do some things that individuals are not permitted to do, out of necessity, because we have yet to construct a society that eliminates the need for certain ostensibly necessary evils. We find that delegating those responsibilities to a corporate body that is largely (if imperfectly) answerable to the population as a whole for its actions tends to result in better outcomes than any other alternative that's been tried. The actual execution of those responsibilities then gets sub-delegated out to individuals, but they are supposed to only be permitted to do so when lawfully acting on behalf of the government. Again, out of necessity. While it's not awesome, anything else anyone has tried so far has ended up working out even worse. As individuals acting on their own behalf, though, nobody should be considered above the norms of civil society. By definition - if it didn't work that way, society would not be civil. (I'd highly recommend reading both A Theory of Justice by John Rawls and Anarchy, State and Utopia by Robert Nozick for two different but equally thoughtful treatments of this sort of thing.)

mercer 6y ago
Where does it leave the people who lack trust in that kind of delegation? What do we do about that? I'm inclined to agree with what you describe, but it worries me how many of them (us?) have come to feel that it doesn't work. We have a growing left convinced that 'the government' is just a bunch of elites caring about maintaining their wealth, and a growing right that believes the same. I feel both perspectives are at least not unreasonable. So as someone trying to be reasonable and in favor of maintaining some kind of order, where does that leave me? How do we maintain order without accepting a very small elite to maintain it's (corrupt) power? How do we talk to our 'constituents' about this? I'm truly in favor of solutions that don't end up causing societal chaos and killing people, but I'm lost as to the how.
- mumblemumble 6y ago
  That gets outside of political theory and into practicalities, which isn't somewhere I'm personally prepared to go in any serious way. But, here's one thought: Texas state legislators are paid a salary of $7,200 per year. Not exactly a lot to live on. So they've clearly got to either be independently wealthy, or figure out some other source of income. "A well nourished Legislature, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to seek and receive graft shall not be infringed." Or something like that.

mercer 6y ago

Where does it leave the people who lack trust in that kind of delegation? What do we do about that? I'm inclined to agree with what you describe, but it worries me how many of them (us?) have come to feel that it doesn't work. We have a growing left convinced that 'the government' is just a bunch of elites caring about maintaining their wealth, and a growing right that believes the same. I feel both perspectives are at least not unreasonable. So as someone trying to be reasonable and in favor of maintaining some kind of order, where does that leave me? How do we maintain order without accepting a very small elite to maintain it's (corrupt) power? How do we talk to our 'constituents' about this? I'm truly in favor of solutions that don't end up causing societal chaos and killing people, but I'm lost as to the how.

mumblemumble 6y ago
That gets outside of political theory and into practicalities, which isn't somewhere I'm personally prepared to go in any serious way. But, here's one thought: Texas state legislators are paid a salary of $7,200 per year. Not exactly a lot to live on. So they've clearly got to either be independently wealthy, or figure out some other source of income. "A well nourished Legislature, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to seek and receive graft shall not be infringed." Or something like that.