The role of government in one sentence.

[Massachusetts]

If you had to write just one sentence to describe what the role of government is supposed to be to somebody who knew nothing, say a child, what would you say?

Should be an interesting little thread.

 

[erowe1]

The role of government is to facilitate the subjugation of one group of people to another.

 

[jj-]

One Word

Nightwatchman.

 

[Travlyr]

"This is the function that the liberal doctrine assigns to the state: the protection of property, liberty, and peace." - Ludwig von Mises

 

[Sola_Fide]

Is the purpose of government to protect liberty? I wonder because Ron always says that.

 

[Kotin]

the purpose and role of government is to control.

 

[MelissaWV]

Government is currently there to tell you what to do, even if you know better, and to protect you from things you could better defend yourself from, and to steal money from you under threat of violence to fund all of the aforementioned, paying far more than you ever would have spent on programs you never would have dreamed of paying for at all.

 

[Kylie]

Government is force.

It should not be this way, but it is.

 

[Noble Savage]

government is for people that can't protect themselves

 

[DGambler]

Government is to enforce contracts between sovereign individuals.

 

[Eisenhower]

To serve the people.

 

[erowe1]

To serve the people.

I can think of a lot of organizations whose role it is to serve people, and what they all have in common is that they aren't the government.

 

[MelissaWV]

To serve the people.

^ This would be my answer for "government," but our current Government cannot be described as such.

 

[Vessol]

The monopoly of the use of physical force within a given territory.

 

[jj-]

The monopoly of the legal use of physical force within a given territory.

fixed?

 

[Vessol]

fixed?

No. When the same institution that holds a monopoly over declaring what is legal or not, also decides that it's monopoly on the use of force is the only one that is legal. It makes a mockery of the word "legal" to a rubber stamp definition.

The role(definition in this case) of government is simply:
A institution that claims a monopoly on physical violence in a specific geographic area.

 

[seraphson]

To pay for my food, shelter, kids, education, and healthcare. To warmonger and use an alliance of other government's nations to bully and beat up certain select nations into giving me cheaper natural resources. To make laws, bans, regulations, and to have things the way I see fit as long as it furthers their agenda as well. To tax those who are productive and leverage the difference into existence using fiat currency to pay for all of this. Mostly its main role is to replace my need to think for myself and substitutes that for its own.

 

[MelissaWV]

... that's a lot more than one sentence.

 

[Vessol]

... that's a lot more than one sentence.

Keynesian sentences defy your grammatical logic!

 

[Pericles]

The role of government is to provide for the common defense, establish justice via an honest legal system, and secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity.