Question

should government be more active, providing assistance to achieve a common good for all citizens; or, should government be more limited, involved only to the extent that it protects individual rights and liberties?" Explain your answer.

Answer 1

The idea of government as a protector requires taxes in order to fund, train and equip an army and a police force; in order to build courts and prisons; and in order to elect or appoint officials to pass and implement the laws must not break citizens. Regarding foreign threats, government as a protector requires the ability to meet and treat with, and combat, other governments. This streamlined conception of government is apparent in the early days of the American Republic, consisting of the President, Senate, Supreme Court, and Treasury, Defense, State, and Justice departments.

The social welfare state is a more comprehensive definition of government as a provider: government can cushion citizens ' inability to provide for themselves, particularly in the vulnerable circumstances of youth, old age, disease, disability and unemployment due to economic forces beyond their control. As the welfare state has grown, its opponents have come to see it more as a shield from the harsh effects of capitalism, or perhaps as a means of protecting the rich from the dispossessed's political wrath. Nevertheless, at its finest, it offers a care infrastructure to allow people to prosper socially and economically just as a productive infrastructure does.

Government's potential builds on those pillars of security and supporting. Government will continue to protect citizens against violence and life's worst vicissitudes. Government will continue to provide public goods at the level necessary to ensure a globally competitive economy and a society that works well. But wherever possible, government should invest in the capacity of citizens so that they can provide themselves in circumstances that change rapidly and continuously.

This government should be more active, providing assistance to achieve a common good for all citizens;