Chapter I - To What Extend Forms of Government are a Matter of Choice

This chapter tries to find to what extent a form of government can be devised or chosen by a particular people for themselves; and if there is some possibility there, what are it's limitations.

• Mill posits that there are two popular opinions on this question
  1. government is purely an invention which can be devised or chosen by a people to be applied
  2. government is like an organic growth; it's form is inevitable for a given people / context and cannot be chosen
• Mill finds it self evident that the truth is somewhere between the two
• There are some obstacles that may make a particular form of government untenable
  1. Repugnance of the people towards a particular form of government
  2. A people unwilling or unable to fulfill the necessary conditions
     • may be due to laziness, cowardice or lack of patriotism
     • unwilling to fight for it; when attacked
     • able to be deluded easily; or convinced to hand over liberties to some individual
     • unwilling to leave vengeance to he law – results in a necessarily despotic government
     • people more likely to shelter a criminal then to testify against; or whose sympathies are not on the side of the law
  3. Mechanical difficulties may also make a form of government impossible by disrupting tax collection or law enforcement
• Kindling a desire in people for a particular form a government is a necessary step in forming a new order
• Some claim that the existing power dynamics pre-determine the order of a nation – however, Mill argues that power is actually primarily gained through government itself.
• Beliefs can disrupt physical and economic power
• Mill concludes that the form of government is a result of rational choice on the part of it's people

Some great quotes form this chapter

It [government] needs, not their simple acquiescence, but their active participation

To inquire into the best form of government in the abstract is not a chimerical, but a highly practical employment of scientific intellect

In politics, as in mechanics, the power which is to keep the engine going must be sought for outside the machinery

One person with a belief is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests.