27. Government Agency/Board/Commission (definition)

NOTE: if you’re new to Ground-Up Governance, or are finding anything a bit strange or confusing, you might want to START HERE.

Governments are really complicated. Even the government of a tiny little town still has to worry about all of the different factors that might affect the people who live there, and try to make sure that it has the resources (money, people, etc.) to get everything done. For those of you who live in the most fortunate places on earth, try thinking of all the crazy things that probably exist around you without you even paying attention to them – roads, running water, electricity, schools, public transit, signs, firefighters, etc. etc. Governments make those things possible either directly or indirectly. 

When certain government services get really complicated – especially when those functions involve buying and selling things – it can be smart for the government to create a corporation to get those things done. Those corporations are called different things in different parts of the world, but for the sake of Ground-Up Governance we will call them “government agencies/boards/commissions” or “ABCs”. From a corporate governance perspective, ABCs are usually exactly the same as a for-profit corporation except that the only shareholder is the government. Turns out that one little difference can be a BIG deal. 

You probably had between one and five parents or parent-like people raising you as a kid and at times it probably felt like even that was too many. Well, imagine you were raised by a group of ALL of the parents in your entire country, all of whom had different personalities, opinions, interests, and styles. Oh and they could never agree on anything, and constantly gave you instructions that contradict each other. And if their instructions turned out to be bad, they told everyone that it was your fault. Well, that’s kind of how it feels to have the government as your shareholder. And every time there’s an election, you might get a whole new group of parents…