What happens when citizens lose faith in government?

[xchrom]

http://blogs.reuters.com/chrystia-freeland/2011/08/05/what-happens-when-citizens-lose-faith-in-government/

Tolstoy thought unhappy families were unique in their unhappiness.

But when it comes to countries, these days the world’s gloomy ones have a lot in common. From Fukushima to Athens, and from Washington to Wenzhou, China, the collective refrain is that government doesn’t work.

“2011 will be the year of distrust in government,” said Richard Edelman, president and chief executive of Edelman, the world’s largest independent public relations firm.

For the past decade, Mr. Edelman has conducted a global survey of which institutions we have confidence in and which ones are in the doghouse. In 2010, the villains were in the private sector — from BP, to Toyota, to Goldman Sachs, corporations and their executives were the ones behaving badly.

[PoliticAverse]

1. Some external threat appears to unite citizens behind the government ? n/t

[Doctor_J]

5. 9/11 probably kept Bush from getting impeached and/or imprisoned

If you want to know who is behind some major event, look at who stands to gain. Then look at whose lives were improved by 0/11.

[OHdem10]

2. Start another war.

[bhikkhu]

3. "distrust in government" and "government can get anything right" are a RW mantras

As far as governments getting things right, the easiest way to say it is that the bulk of the civil and social infrastructure here was the product of government, and we have become the richest and most well-provided nation in the history of humanity...it doesn't seem so at the moment, but for much of my lifetime it has been so.

Trust is a harder issue - I haven't ever trusted the government. How much do you trust an entity that has the capacity to crush the life out of the planet, 20 times over? Its easy to trust something that can do no harm, but something that so many people depend on for their life, and which has such a great capacity for harm, I don't think "trust" is a sane expectation there; rather, one must keep up a high standard, and high expectations.

...and keeping in mind how important it is that government functions well, we need to be more careful about electing the most qualified, the most intelligent and capable to the job.

[yurbud]

4. and the progressive joke is ''and when the get elected, they prove it,'' but

that makes it all the more puzzling why Obama is so eager to compromise with them and sometimes even START with their ideas, like education reform, health care reform, and tax credits for business as part of the stimulus (as if companies will hire more people when few are buying their products).

[SharonAnn]

6. Eventually, they change it.

[earcandle]

7. I just applied for an accounting position with Edelman... not that he will hire me... but it is nice

to see his political bent! 

[dash_bannon]

8. Historically speaking...

Historically speaking when people lose faith in government they abolish it. If they have free and fair elections, they vote the bums out. If they don't they overthrow governments violently.

[bemildred]

9. Take a look at London, that's what it looks like. nt

[tcaudilllg]

10. Usually a civil war as assassin squads form to destroy established figures.

By the way, "the year people lost faith in government" is a gross overgeneralization.