The Indefensibility of Political Representation - Gerard N. Casey - Mises Institute

The Indefensibility of Political Representation - Gerard N. Casey - Mises Institute: "In what way are our political representatives representative? What does it mean for one man to represent another? Under normal circumstances, as our examples show, those who represent us do so at our bidding and cease to do so at our bidding. They act on our instructions within the boundaries of a certain remit and we are responsible for what they do as our agents. Furthermore, the central characteristic of representation by agency is that the agent is responsible to his principal and is bound to act in the principal's interest. Is this the situation with my so-called political representatives? Political representatives are not (usually) legally answerable to those whom they allegedly represent. In fact, in modern democratic states, the majority of a representative's putative principals are in fact unknown to him. Can a political representative be the agent of a multitude? This also seems unlikely. What if the principals have interests that diverge from each other? A political representative must then of necessity cease to represent one or more of his principals."

One type of representation in the private sector that seems to be similar to political representation is a corporation's board of directors that is elected by the share-holders. Does that type of representation (and political representation) fall under rule #2 (freely arrived-at binding agreement)? As long as citizens are free to leave a country (exit the agreement) then is the law and political representation a form a of a freely arrived-at binding agreement? Looking back to the countries found it does appear to be something like that.