The three ages of government: from the personal, to the group, to the world

It is only in the last 250 years that ordinary people (in some parts of the world) have become citizens rather than subjects. This change happened in a very short period, between 1780 and 1820, a result of the foundations of democracy laid in the age of revolutions. A century later local governments embraced this shift due to rapid industrialization, urbanization, and population growth. During the twentieth century, all democratic governments began to perform a range of tasks, functions, and services that had no historical precedent. In the thirty years following the Second World War, Western democracies created welfare states that, for the first time in history, significantly reduced the gap between the wealthy and everyone else. Many of the reforms of that postwar period have been since rolled back because of the belief that government should be more like a business. Jos C.N. Raadschelders provides the information that all citizens should have about their connections to government, why there is a government, what it does, how it does it, and why we can no longer do without it. The Three Ages of Government rises above stereotypical thinking to show the centrality of government in human life. Contents Acknowledgments Introduction: What Is Government? One. Understanding Government in Society: The Past Fifty Years 1. Government Today 2. What Positions Can State and Government Occupy in Society? 3. What Roles Can Government Play in Society? Government’s Political Revolution 4. Trends in the Role of Government in Society 5. How the Study of Public Administration Contributes to Understanding Government 6. Why Study This? Two. Government in Society: The Conceptual and Historical Context for Understanding Government 1. Opening Salvo: On the Torture of Holistic Scholarship 2. Government as Artifice of Bounded Rationality: Simon and Vico 3. Social Ontology for Understanding Institutional Arrangements 4. Hierarchies of Knowledge: From Simple to Complex Phenomena 5. Government as Function of Instinct, Community, and Society 6. Institutional Changes and the Triple Whammy Changes at the Constitutional Level Changes at the Collective Level Changes at the Operational Level Enter the Triple Whammy: Industrialization, Urbanization, and Rapid Population Growth 7. The Stage Is Set for the Remainder of This Book Three. Instinct and Intent: Origins and Elements of Human Governing Behaviors 1. The Nature-Nurture Issue: From Dichotomy to Balanced Complex 2. Sociality among the Great Apes and Humans: Similarities and Differences Similarities Differences 3. Physical and Social Features of the Hominin Tribe 4. Human Instinct and Intent 5. How We Differ from Primates: Governing among and of Hunter-Gatherers 6. Conflicting Impulses Underlying Governing Arrangements 7. Concluding Comments: Relevance to Understanding What Government Is Four. Tribal Community: Governing Humans in Ever Larger, Sedentary Groups 1. The Growth, Dispersion, and Concentration of the Human Species 2. The Agricultural Revolution: Fraud or Inevitable? 3. Small and Large-Scale Governing Arrangements: Four Main Phases of Socioeconomic Development, Three Structuring Constants, and Two Governing Revolutions 4. The Rise and Fall of Governing Arrangements: Self-Governing Capacity as the Default 5. The Political-Administrative Revolution since the 1780s: A Very Brief Recap 6. The Triple Whammy Plus High-Speed Communication Technology 7. From Government as Instrument to Government as Container: The Role and Position of the Individual Five. Citizen and Government in a Global Society: Globalization and the Deep Current of Rationalization 1. What Is Globalization? What Is a Global Society? 2. The Impact of Globalization on People as Citizens and as Public Officeholders 3. The Impact of Globalization on the Structure and Functioning of Government 4. The Impact of Globalization on the Role and Position of Government 5. Understanding Globalization: The Deep Current of Rationalization and Its Manifestation(s) 6. How Can Citizens and Governments Deal with Globalization and the Perversions of Rationalization? Six. Governing as Process: Negotiable Authority and Multisource Decision-Making 1. The Role and Position of Career Civil Servants in Democratic Political Systems 2. The Nature of Public Authority 3. Negotiable Authority as Key to Understanding What Democratic Government Is Today 4. The Nature of Public Decision-Making 5. Multisource Decision-Making as Standard in Democratic Government 6. The Governing We Can Take for Granted 7. Citizens and Government Have Come a Long Way in a Very Short Time Seven. Democracy: Thriving by Self-Restraint, Vulnerable to Human Instinct, Tribal Community, and Global Society 1. The Position and Role of Government in Society 2. The Influence of Human Instinct 3. The Influence of Tribal Community 4. The Influence of Global Society 5. Democracy as Ideal and as Vulnerable: Challenges from Human Behavior Democracy as Ideal Political System Declining Trust in Government Rent-Seeking Behavior by Private Actors: Business Principles in the Public Realm Personality Politics and Populism: The Enduring Power of Emotions Na-Na-Na-Na-Boo-Boo Politics: The Price of Polarization and Partisanship The Need for Continuous Civics Education 6. Democracy and Bureaucracy: The Delicate Interplay of Fairness and Efficiency 7. Democracy, Self-Restraint, and True Guardians Notes References Indexes Name Index Subject Index The mood of the first U of M U.S.-Japan Auto conference in January 1981 could only be described as electric. People wanted to know what our problems were and how we could begin to solve them. Inherent in the latter issue was the questions, what could we learn from the Japanese? One left the conference with a sense that there was a call for action, a mandate to address the problems facing industry. The mood, about a year later, at the March 1982 U.S.-Japan Auto Conference was far more subdued. While undoubtedly this reflected the stream of statistics confirming the continually depressed state of the industry, another dynamic was possibly operating as well. Whereas the 1981 conference was "electric," a state of mind which flowed from a certain frustration at seemingly overwhelming difficulties and often vague expectations of what we might learn from the Japanese, the 1982 conference was more "workmanlike" in the sense that speakers discussed specifically what progress was being made in addressing problems. This more subdued, pragmatic approach continued throughout wand was reinforced by workshops held the day after the main conference. Instead of discussing the virtues of the Just-In-Time system in Japan, speakers addressed the practical problems of introducing such a system in the U.S. firms. Instead of railing about the benefits or failings of regulation of the industry, they discussed what we could reasonably expect from regulation. Instead of exhorting the industry to adopt Japanese practices willy-nilly, they focused on some of the limitations of the Japanese model in a range of different areas. Instead of trying to identify some magic key to Japanese success in the automotive industry, they discussed the interrelationships among various factors. At the same, they continued to explore the basic issues transforming the auto industry worldwide. In this connection, they sought to unravel some of the complexities associated with the internalization of the auto industry and trade obligations under the GATT. For much of history, people have been treated as subjects to those with political and economic power and wealth. It is only in the last 250 years that people (in some parts of the world) have become citizens as opposed to subjects. This change happened in a very short period, between 1780 and 1820, when the foundation for democracy was laid. This was also the basis upon which a century later, local governments responded to rapid industrialization, urbanization, and population growth. During the twentieth century, all democratic governments came to perform a range of tasks, functions, and services that had no historical precedent. In the thirty years following the Second World War, Western democracies created welfare states that, for the first time in history, significantly reduced the gap between the wealthy and the rest. Many of the reforms of that postwar period have been rolled back since then because of the belief that government should be more 'businesslike'. The changes in the role of government in society have been massive in the past 250 years, and so little is known about why. Jos C.N. Raadschelders examines the questions that citizens should have about their connections to government, why there is a government, what it does, how it does it, and why we can no longer do without government. What is Government? rises above stereotypical thinking about government International communication as a field of inquiry is, in fact, not very "internationalized." Rather, it has been taken as a conceptual extension or empirical application of U.S. communication, and much of the world outside the West has been socialized to adopt truncated versions of Pax Americana's notion of international communication. At stake is the "subject position" of academic and cultural inquirers: Who gets to ask what kind of questions? It is important to note that the quest to establish universally valid "laws" of human society with little regard for cultural values and variations seems to be running out of steam. Many lines of intellectual development are reckoning with the important dimensions of empathetic understanding and subjective consciousness. In Internationalizing "International Communication," Lee and others argue that we must reject both America-writ-large views of the world and self-defeating mirror images that reject anything American or Western on the grounds of cultural incompatibility or even cultural superiority. The point of departure for internationalizing "international communication" must be precisely the opposite of parochialism - namely, a spirit of cosmopolitanism. Scholars worldwide have a moral responsibility to foster global visions and mutual understanding, which forms, metaphorically, symphonic harmony made of cacophonic sounds