Example Of Why Do We Need Government Essay

While the formation of government has been for protection of human rights and equal distribution of resources, there are negative notions about functions of the government. The negative notions are that governments are formed because of the desire to control others through manipulation and threat, and to protect a certain class of people. However, since society is more civilized today through advanced education, it can be argued that society can function without supervision from government. Furthermore, without supervision, humans can be prosperous and peaceful if government is eliminated altogether. This fact is reinforced by Einstein who said that “a genius is born in the midst of freedom and absence of restriction.”
First, the reason why a government is not necessary is that the society has reached a level where the majority is educated, innovative, and knowledgeable. This is not as in the past where the strong combated the weak for survival. The elimination of the weak was also the main reason that the government was created for their protection. However, it is argued that the function of the government has ceased as everyone has reached a level of being stronger at his or her own level. While natural selection—elimination of the weak by the strong—according to Darwin exists, it is now evident that even the weak in the society have tools and skills to be at par with their stronger counterparts. A proof of the misuse of government functions is capitalism where the wealthy control wealth and therefore the poor would never have a chance to get wealth fairly. Therefore, in the absence of government, wealth and resources will never be at the hands of the powerful and healthy. This would enable everyone whether poor or rich to fight for resources fairly since they are at par intellectually.
Second, while absence of government in the society looks like a communist style of government where there are no scarcity, classes, nor government, the difference in this argument is that there is no external force to take away your returns after hard work and give it to a lazy person. Instead, people are free to eat from their own labour even if it is very much. The excesses are left to the will of the worker to decide whether to eat all the fruits alone or share it with the needy. Less reliance on the government is also seen to spark humanity in the society where people would see the need to help others instead of leaving the task to government. For instance, a farmer can employ a person without a livelihood so that later on they can share benefits; purely for survival. This will be easy as there would be no taxation, working for intangible profits, and competitiveness that is seen in societies with governments.
The notion that the government is important for protection can be rebutted by the fact that people’s reliance on the government is what makes them weak. People do not learn the methods and tools that are useful in their protection needs hence rely on the government. Martial arts and ammunition can be easily obtained for protection. While it is dangerous that some criminal elements might just start to kill others, it is important to note that majority of people might fear to confront others since they themselves are not sure that the other party is armed. The fear to confront others might result in forced peace where the society will shun violence as a problem solver and instead seek other alternatives. Money would also be saved as there would be no need for armies as people can form their own when the need arises. The negative side of this is that certain communities can rise up against others and result in genocide and war crimes. However, this can be prevented by alternative methods of solving conflicts since everyone will be able to protect themselves well hence risky to attack each other.
John Locke argues that humans are born with the rights of life, liberty, and property. The statement originated during the independence of America, and it served as a reminder that American people would be free to live as they wanted as long as they did not infringe on the rights of others. The government was set up to protect the rights of people, however, the dependence by people on the government to know which are their rights and the government demanding certain services and money from its citizens amounts to infringement of people’s rights. For instance, if the government decides that you have committed a capital offence, then the punishment is death or life imprisonment. This is fair if indeed the offence was committed, but very unfair if a person is innocent. Therefore, intrinsically submitting to the government is seen as elimination of a person’s liberty, confinement to the laws, monetary systems, taxes, and government policies all of which prevent people from pursuing happiness. Limitation of a person’s income and excess taxation as is evident in UK and French governments results to unhappiness of its citizens.
Lack of government is also advantageous when it comes to travelling to other countries as there are no restrictions. Governments come up with laws and requirements like passports that restrict movement. Furthermore, people are not free to squat on land since all property is either owned by the state, by private people, or demarcated for special purposes like game reserves or habitat conservation. This is however advantageous when combating lawlessness and creating societies that can operate independently of each other.
Anarchy—a type of absence of government—in the society is also against a big government, and so groups would come up to survive and reduce excesses in the society through even division among people. This would result in peace as many people would work for the good of the group and receive what they need to survive. The added freedom allows people to engage in whatever activities that makes them happy and causes them to be truly free instead of being limited by educational or financial handicaps.
Furthermore, many people are afraid of anarchy because it means that they become at risk. This is true; however, it can be countered by arguing that people have the capacity to defend themselves and the natural compulsion to help one another, even if our own sustained benefit will keep us working together in the absence of a central government. As a result, all the community’s inhabitants can pursue their desires within the codes of the community, or choose to not participate at all. Either way, everybody wins.