Ancient Greek-city
states showed how people gathered together to deliberate and resolve on various
issues that were of great interest to the community through direct democracy.
Stateless societies, in history, have shown the
presence of political authority, similar to one (government) that directs the
affairs of modern state. Therefore, it is right to say that government is older
than the state.
“As farming populations gathered
in larger and denser communities, interactions between different groups
increased and the social pressure rose until, in a striking parallel with star
formation, new structures suddenly appeared, together with a new level
complexity. Like stars, cities and states reorganize and energize the smaller
objects within their gravitational field
(Christian opcit, p. 245)”.
The increasing agricultural outputs created
opportunity for growing population and population growth was instrumental to
evolution of agrarian societies into ones that are more politically organized.
Therefore, there emerged the need to have a
government to regulate the activities of various individual actors to reconcile
any clash of interests that may crop-up in the evocation of social intercourse
and interrelationship among people.
Ancient Egypt is typical example dated back to 3000
BC; Summer in 3200 BC.
1.4 Aspects of
Government
One of the basic needs of the people is the provision
of security of life and property without which no meaningful development can
take place.
People often give their mandate to a set of people
to lead them within a framework of social contract. Here, the government is
charged with responsibility of providing essential services, peace and security
to the people while the people are also obliged to perform some civic duties to
the government such as respecting the constituted authority, obey the laws and
order, regular payment of tax (es) among others.
What is Institution?
Institutions are prerequisite mechanisms or
corporate entities put in place to enable a system (state) achieve its aims and
objectives.
What is System?
System is the kind of organizational structures put
in place by the state
Type of system
(1)
Military system:
is a system that is controlled by the military will be patterned along the
autocratic agenda of the junta. In this case, the checks and balance element of
civilian administration will be missing because military rule is the product of
‘might makes right’.
(2)
For
democratic systems: for
effective running of state and optimal operation of government, various
institutions must be put in place and these include the executive, the
legislature, the judiciary and the bureaucracy. The executive has the major
function of executing and carrying out the policies, and laws of the
government. It is the hallmark of political administration of any state. The
legislature is concerned primarily in the making of laws and policies for
government and check any excesses of the executive. The judiciary on its part,
is mandated to adjudicate and interpret the conflicts of law and play a role of
final arbiter in the dispute between parties. Bureaucracy is public service or
corporation like civil service, police, the armed forces, Central Bank, and
other government parastatals. These parastatals are the engine engine-room of
implementation of government policies.
Processes
are also the vehicles through which the decisions of government are made. There
are two types of processes in decision:
This process involves a situation
whereby decision is made in accordance with the laid down rules and procedures.
This process is unique, novel, complex
with little regard for laid-down procedure. This process is easier, quicker but
more technical than the structured processes.
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