The Pernicious Myth of "Public Service"

The Pernicious Myth of "Public Service"
China Post Editorial
by Bevin Chu
August 24, 2009

The concept of "public service" lies at the very heart of modern government.

The central justification for the modern nation state is that it "serves the people." The modern nation state purportedly consists of obedient servants who provide the public with essential public services. Hence the term "public servant."

The term "public servant" contains an unspoken but clear implication. It implies that there are two kinds of servants: private servants and public servants.

According to the "master narrative" of democracy, private servants and public servants are both servants. They differ only in whom they serve. Private servants serve private individuals. Public servants serve "the general public." But both are servants, and both serve their masters.

That is the myth anyway.

In fact, only private servants are truly our servants. Only private servants will ever be our servants.

So-called "public servants" are not our servants. So-called "public servants" will never be our servants, for the simple reason that they are in fact our Lords and Masters.

A servant is defined variously as:

One who expresses submission, recognizance, or debt to another: your obedient servant.

One who is employed to perform personal services for an employer and who, in that service, remains entirely under the control of the employer.

One who works for, and is subject to, the control of the master; a person employed to "perform services in the affairs of another and who with respect to the physical conduct in the performance of the services is subject to the other's control or right to control.

Do our so-called "public servants," particularly "democratically elected" heads of state, regardless of party affiliation, bear even the remotest resemblance to the aforementioned definitions of "servant?"

Did former President Lee Teng-hui, our nominal servant, "express submission, recognizance, or debt to us," when the 9/21 Earthquake struck and his helicopter entourage killed a five year old earthquake victim, one of his nominal masters?

Was former Vice President Annette Lu, our nominal servant, "subject to our control," when Typhoon Mindulle struck, and Lu demanded that Taiwan's Aborigines, the island's original inhabitants, its rightful owners, her nominal masters, be ethnically cleansed from the island?

Was former President Chen Shui-bian, our nominal servant, "entirely under the control of his employer," when one million of his nominal masters took to the streets and struggled vainly to discharge him for emptying out our national coffers and transferring our hard-earned public wealth into his private overseas accounts?

Was President Ma Ying-jeou, our nominal servant, subject to our control "with respect to the physical conduct in the performance of his services," when Typhoon Morakot struck and bereaved and homeless flood victims, his nominal masters, felt compelled to prostrate themselves before him, weeping inconsolably, begging him to "Please do something?"

Do you have a servant at home? When you want your servant to do something on your behalf, how do you go about it? Do you petition him or her by falling to your knees, tearing your hair out, crying your eyes out, begging him or her to take pity on you?

No?

Then why would you do so when your servant is a "public servant?"

If it turns out you must do all these things when your servant is a "public servant," is he or she really your servant? Or is he or she something else altogether?

What makes our "public servants" different from our real servants, from private servants? How can we ensure that our "public servants" treat us with the same deference as our private servants?

The answer of course is that with private servants, we wisely retain our natural rights and individual liberty. Our relationship with our private servants is voluntary. Wages are the currency of voluntary exchange. We voluntarily pay our private servants the wages they desire, on the understanding that our private servants voluntarily provide us with the services we desire.

With "public servants," on the other hand, we have foolishly forfeited our natural rights and individual liberty. Our relationship with our "public servants" is involuntary. Taxes are the currency of involuntary coercion. What the government calls taxes, the Mafia calls protection money. We cannot voluntarily choose to stop paying our "public servants" the taxes they desire, on the understanding that they can voluntarily choose to stop providing us with the services we desire.

Citizens of modern nation states have swallowed the pernicious myth of "public service" hook, line, and sinker. Until we demand that our "public servants" relate to us in precisely the same way as our private servants, until we reclaim our natural right to contract voluntarily for services, in both the private and public sectors, we will remain indentured servants of our "public servants," and our "public servants" will remain our Lords and Masters.