The Difference Between ‘Rule’ and ‘Reign’

Whenever a person ‘rules’ or ‘reigns’ , he or she exercises authority over others. While a person who reigns — a monarch — derives authority from some notion of Sovereignty, sources of rulers’ authority can be as diverse as aggregate sample of rulers.

Consider that while Queen Elizabeth of England derives her now ‘notional’ authority from sovereignty of the United Kingdom, and her supposedly God given authority (not questioning divine right, merely displaying neutral agnosticism, after all, I was not present at institution of British monarchy, cannot prove God given authority, but then again my opinion is irrelevant, all that matters is Britons believe), the Prime Minister of Britain derives authority for ruling from her party, and people who voted her party into power.

An important difference between a monarch and a ruler? Were Queen Elizabeth to be deposed, her authority cannot be revoked, only can cease to be recognized. Prime Minister May’s authority? If indeed she has agreed to step down at completion of the Brexit process, her authority already is in process of being revoked.

Rulers’ authority always can be revoked. Given their divine right once was acknowledged, recognized, monarch’s authority only can cease to be recognized. But then again, each of ‘revoked authority’, and ‘authority no longer recognized’ receive state funded retirement income. Qualitatively then, is the outcome not in entirety the same?

Across the world, there are rulers who derive authority from their country’s military (e.g. Myanmar), from their party but not from the people (e.g. China), from their people and their party (e.g. USA), or from no one in particular (e.g. Burundi, a country governed by a President who, in order to remain in power, violated the country’s constitution).

Consider China and the USA, two countries governed by rulers, but with one country ruled in context of a democracy, the other in context of communism. Few if any would argue that current leadership of China does not to a large extent attempt to rule for benefit of the people. We have then that a communist government can, to the best of current state of it’s party machinery, attempt to rule for the benefit of the people. What then shall we call China’s current government, a ‘commucracy’ —government of the people, for the people, by the party?

‘Commucracy’ sounds like a nice pseudonym for government of the people, for the people, by the party.

Consider in juxtaposition, the United States of America, which operates a democracy, with democracy defined as, ‘government of the people, for the people, by the people’. Cursory perusal reveals two commonalities between democracies and commucracies, which are (i) government of the people, (ii) for the people.

In presence of government of the people, for the people, does anyone really care whether government is ‘by the people’ or ‘by the party’? Can we argue that ‘government by the people’ is more important than ‘government of the people, for the people’?

If proferred a strict choice, it would require quite a bit of denseness of common sense for a group of people to prefer government by the people to government of the people, for the people.

That people have the right to choose their leaders (government by the people) does not imply resulting governance will be for the good of the people. There are lots of countries within which government is by the people, yet not for the people.

With respect to Monarchs, in but few countries, monarchs wield power in context of a notional, as opposed to some parliamentary sense, as such are more ceremonial than parliamentary in their societal roles.

Suppose, however, monarchies function with real parliamentary power. Within context of parliamentary power, divine right typically has been interpreted to imply right to bestow wealth on factional basis, as opposed to bestowal via some sort of achievement based meritocracy.

Factional allocations of wealth and benevolence by monarchies were catalysts for the French Revolution, and essence of the Magna Carta treaty between English Lords and lecherous John, King of England. Each of Democracy and Commucracy are reactions or responses of various societies to failings of monarchies.

With respect to the only divine institution of leadership of which I am aware, can vouch for, leadership is earned by whoever develops greatest capacity for loving of others. There is no rulership, no reigning over others, only leadership. God identifies the loving person, makes him or her leader. Given God’s choice must be seen to be credible — must demonstrate capacity for loving of others — there exist objective metrics for assessment of the leader’s performance.

A Lovetocracy seems appropriate terminology for a system consisting of ‘government of the people, for the people, but by God’.

With the assumption that He exists and is loving and benevolent,why can God be trusted?

With the assumption that He exists and is loving and benevolent, since God’s welfare does not depend on affairs on earth, He always can be trusted to pick good leaders for Lovetocracies.

So then, which would you prefer? A Democracy, Commucracy, or Lovetocracy?

If each of Democracy, Commucracy, or Lovetocracy could operate perfectly, which is more likely to consistently produce good leaders for a society? Holding educational attainments of a polity constant, which of the three could most easily be exploited? Which of the three systems of government appears to have the greatest upside for welfare of the people?

Turns out there is a third rarely exploited possibility for exercise of authority over others, a system of governance rarely exploited even in context of religious circles — A Lovetocracy.

Jesus is a great leader who preached Lovetocracy. With all of Jesus’ preaching of Lovetocracy, however, when His disciples decided to choose a replacement for Judas Iscariot, His betrayer, they did not resort to accounting of love for arrival at choice, resorted to familiarity of a lottery. Apparently, Jesus’ teachings had yet to fully sink in. Enter Apostle Paul who wins Jesus’ approval by preaching the gospel at his own expense for proving of altruistic love to non-Jews (by the way, based on accounts by professional historians, Apostle Paul and Jesus are facts of history, as such, much as Aristotle, Socrates, and Plato, relevant for secular philosophical illustrations).

Is a Lovetocracy impractical in context of present day society? Perhaps. But then, if one is to dream, might one as well not dream as big as possible?

After all, regardless of possibility that better likely is improbable, what good is knowledge of what is possible if one simultaneously lacks awareness of what is better?

In Finance or Economics, in order for any optimization solution to earn characterization as a second-, or yet third-best solution, the first-best solution always has to be known or derived. What is good, but yet seemingly unattainable is what casts light on what is not quite as good, yet attainable.

Will failures of democracies and commucracies ever induce mankind into consideration of Lovetocracies as form of governance within either of society or religious circles? Could society ever develop enough faith and trust for Lovetocracies ever to be feasible as form of governance?

Your guess is as good as mine.