RALEIGH – These days, it can be difficult for newspaper readers to tell the difference between the state news section, the gossip page, and the crime blotter.
Many of the controversies and investigations surrounding former Gov. Mike Easley remain unresolved, with a new round of hearings by the State Board of Elections scheduled to commence in late October. Sen. R.C. Soles of Columbus County remains the subject of what is reportedly a wide-ranging probe of alleged criminal and personal wrongdoing. Rep. Ty Harrell of Wake County has just resigned from the legislature after authorities pointed to irregularities in his campaign-finance reports. Divisions within two state departments, Environment & Natural Resources and Transportation, are now under investigation for accepting pricey meals and other gifts from private vendors. Another department, the Office of the State Treasurer, is formulating new ethics guidelines in response to reports that vendors spent thousands of dollars either subsidizing the travel of the former chief investment officer or contributing to a (worthy) charity in her honor.
Of course, these and other recent stories about official mistakes, lapses in judgment, or wrongdoing only involve a small fraction of North Carolina’s state employees and politicians. Are the state’s journalists asking the right questions? Are they pursuing front-page exposes and broadcast exclusives at the expense of covering more-important stories?
I know there’s a large chunk of the political class who thinks so. I think they’re mistaken.
Ensuring that government operates as openly, honestly, and fairly as possible is more than just a worthy cause. It’s an imperative. When political insiders abuse governmental power and waste taxpayer money, they don’t just commit a little boo-boo. They strike at the very heart of what makes free societies free, and what separates modern liberal democracies from the corrupt states that have dominated human life since the dawn of history.
Douglass North, the famous economist and Nobel Laureate, has just published a new book with coauthors John Joseph Wallis and Barry Weingast entitled Violence and Social Orders. I’m about halfway through their comprehensive discussion of the history of governmental forms. It’s fascinating but complicated.
The relevant part for this discussion is how the authors distinguish between two mature forms of government: natural states and open-order states. Most human cultures and civilizations have produced and maintained natural states. Only in the past couple of centuries, beginning in Europe and America, did open-order states arise and prosper. Both kinds of states accomplish the primary function of government, according to Douglass and his colleagues: to restrain the use of violence in society. But the open-order state allows for the creation of far more wealth, health, and happiness.
What’s the distinction? To put it simply, in natural states the offices and benefits of government are distributed by coalitions of ruling elites according to kinship, patronage, or tribal membership. Think ancient pharaohs, medieval kings, and modern sheikdoms and banana republics. In open-order states, the relationship between public officials and others is impersonal. No matter who you are, if you fall into the proper category you have the same experience as anyone else. If you have the same economic means as your neighbor, you pay the same tax – even if he knows the governor personally and you don’t. If your house is burglarized, the police respond regardless of who your mother was. If you apply for a permit to open a shop, no regulator will ask what political party you belong to or which politician you supported in the last election.
In other words, while open-order states are hardly perfect, they are less corrupt and more efficient than natural states are, for pretty much the same reason. As I have previously noted, political corruption is not, or is not only, a laughing matter. It is a serious impediment to social wellbeing and economic development. Even the appearance of impropriety, the perception that greasing the right palms or supporting the right politicians will get you contracts or tax breaks or special treatment, disrupts the ability of government to deliver the social order that is its chief object.
Sure, there are other important stories to cover in North Carolina. But until significant progress is made against the entrenched political corruption in our state, the journalistic exclusives, legislative deliberations, regulatory probes, and criminal investigations should continue to compel our utmost attention. No matter what you think government should do, a corrupt government will never do it well.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation