What is good government? You may well ask...

     Sometimes one reads some very interesting stuff. Like articles from SciTechDaily. This one – When Good Governments Go Bad: History Shows That Societies Collapse When Leaders Undermine Social Contracts.

    The title alone is very interesting and you could surmise easily the reason why that happens. When leaders, let’s take two examples, Starmer and Trump from the western sphere of political ‘democracies’, forsake core principles. Now, we might argue over what core principles would be but the most important I believe to be the equal sharing of wealth. Another would be services provided to be fair to all. It is something that has bothered me and thousands of others for quite some time because quite evidently the two principles mentioned have not been working. It probably is the reason why there is so much unrest in our societies. Certainly in Britain the undercurrent is gaining momentum whilst in the States it is beginning. Just listen to news reports. In the UK Starmer’s Labour government seems to completely misunderstand the principle of sharing wealth equally. The UK is an example of how NOT to govern. Previous governments were equally burdened with bad decision making culminating in laws which worked for a short time but failed. 

    Simply because these laws were intended to ‘solve’ a problem but did not consider possible related issues. In other words, no thoughts were given to possible side issues occurring because of law implementation. Perhaps superficially but no in-depth research. You can see it in the States with the ‘interesting’ verbal declarations of the present POTUS. Unhinged would be a weak explanation. In the States there is a stark concentration of wealth and power, side-lining people. This is also beginning in Britain and possibly other European nations. Russia in particular being a prime example of that. Russia has suffered this state for hundreds of years. The reason it still is a nation is the fact it is so large and disparate. The reality of Russia is it is basically a nation not much larger then Ukraine in real terms. Going east after Moscow will land you fast in empty or very sparsely populated areas. Russia has and still is, plundering its resources to the benefit of a few ‘oligarchs’. Those oligarchs hold all the power. Something now beginning in the States as well.

    Looking at the Roman empire you will see exactly the same happenings. In fact you can note it in all empires, those gone and those still existing. They may however last hundreds of years. This is for present inhabitants of these empires not good news but has to be endured. Just as in democratic states we have to endure bad government until elections. Whether things will improve will depend on the calibre of the people who lead. The research has a stinging sentence: We refer to an inexplicable failure of principal leaderships to uphold values and norms that have long guided the actions of previous leaders, followed by a subsequent loss of citizen confidence in the leadership and government, followed by collapse. It also said that good government meets the needs of the people, in large part because quite simply it depends on the people to pay the taxes and resources to keep the State afloat! Even in non-democracies it is the basic point! It is something Starmer and Co need to start thinking about. He is a learned man, he ought to know. Why is he failing? Good question.