The mission of a government is:
1. To exercise wise stewardship of the environment.
2. To protect human rights within its jurisdiction and to stand for human rights everywhere.
3. To uphold and preserve reasonable spheres of sovereignty on the part of individuals, closely bonded personal relationships, confidential professional relationships, and religious institutions. (A key element in each of these spheres is the right of personal privacy.)
4. To advance the public good, for example, in the areas of health, commerce, exploration, research, technological development, the arts, information preservation and dissemination, education, and physical infrastructure; and to contend with evil suffered by or perpetrated against the public or any of its members.
5. To maximize freedom.
6. To uphold the equality of all people before the law; and to provide means of fairness with regard to the political and legislative processes, social organization, economic opportunity, the disposition of conflict, the determination of guilt or innocence, and punishment.
7. To protect the weak and to mitigate harmful effects of the prevailing socio-economic system, especially effects upon those marginalized thereby.
8. To express and enact the collective will of the people, however, without violating individual human rights.
9. To represent the people beyond the jurisdiction of the government and to uphold treaty commitments.
10. To defend the sovereignty of the people.
These categories of a government's mission are not mutually exclusive.
Author: Norman E. Anderson
Posted, September 6, 1998; new url, Janaury 28, 2004; last modification, Janaury 28, 2004
Copyright ©1998-2004 by Norman E. Anderson
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