To unpack this concept, we must first think of a democracy as an enterprise a business let’s say, and every election cycle you ‘re hiring folks to run this enterprise. In other word they work for you, and in exchange for them “governing the resources” you’ve entrusted them with, you agree to pay them. Note here I didn’t say govern the citizens, I said the resources. Let me clarify what I mean by resources, these are natural resources (oil, gas, forests etc) as well as the ones the citizens contribute the most, taxes. They are to defend and steward these resources to the best of their abilities. We also ask them to enact and maintain law & order, as this helps maintain civility between fellow citizens. In doing so they’re to look out for the interests & well being of all the citizens, not only the ones that hired them. If you don’t like the job, they’re doing you get to fire them every election cycle.

So, while you and I can complain all we want about the civil servants we’ve got, but we must face the fact that we hired them. Of course, some of you at this point are saying, hey Kam I didn’t’ hire these folks I wanted to hire the other guy, well that’s fine, you’re off the hook if you lived up to the responsibilities I’m about to lay out. And others of you are saying hey I didn’t hire anyone at all, in other words I didn’t vote, great then I’ll leave it to you to tell the next generation you’re partly responsible for the bankrupting of this enterprise and they’re screwed.
Now for those of you who’re still tracking with me and are beginning to wrap your heads around this concept, let’s take a look at what’s demanded and expected of you to run this enterprise, we call democracy, shall we. I’ll give you a hint, it’s really no different than running any other business.
First off you would never hire anyone without doing your due diligence would you? For starters wouldn’t you want to see their resume, to gauge their experience, wouldn’t you want to know what they fell qualifies them to work for you? Now they may not have necessarily done this exact job before, but what life and professional experience do they have that would lead you to believe they could?
Once you get past this wouldn’t you at least conduct job interviews, talking to each of your prospective employees and gauging what they were all about, posing questions that were the most important to you in the day to day running of your business? Now like any good employer wouldn’t you follow up on them once they were hired, you know checking in with them and providing feedback? Wouldn’t it make sense to do the occasional performance review, pointing out areas of success and those needing improvement?
Now I’m not saying you need to do this weekly, but once every 4 years doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense, as your employees would be engaged in a “free for all” sort of like today no? Wouldn’t this level of involvement help keep them on track and ensure they strived towards accomplishing what was most important to you as their employer? Do you think they would perform better, if they knew someone was watching and holding them accountable and if he or she wasn’t satisfied with what they were doing they would ultimately fire them? I’m thinking yes’s across the board, right?
If your employees were squandering the resources, you were giving them, wasting company money on useless things would you be fine with it? Wouldn’t you ensure they got the most out of every dollar? Would you be fine with them stealing money out of the till, would you simply say well that’s just the way they all are? Would you be okay if some owners got more profits than others, profits that they weren’t entitled to or earned? If I had to guess, I’m thinking the answers to my questions is likely a bit fat no!

In closing I realize that a country, province, or municipality isn’t completely like a business, and there are sometimes decisions that need to be made that have nothing to do with the bottom line. However, why should our expectations both of those running it, the civil servants we hire and those of us doing the hiring, the employers be any less?