Impersonal Rule and Interpersonal Order: Bureaucracy versus Commicracy in the Moral Architecture of Society
BY: OMOLAJA MAKINEE
Every system of governance carries an implicit philosophy of how human beings ought to relate to one another. Long before laws are written or institutions erected, a society answers—often unconsciously—a foundational moral question: Do we govern people as objects to be managed, or as persons to be engaged?
The tension between bureaucracy and commicracy is, at its core, a tension between impersonal procedure and interpersonal order. Bureaucracy governs by impersonality. Commicracy governs by interpersonality.
This distinction is not semantic; it is moral, psychological, and civilisational.
1. Impersonal versus Interpersonal: A Philosophical Distinction
To be impersonal is not merely to be neutral or objective. Impersonality is a method of decision-making that deliberately abstracts away the person. It prioritises rules over relationships, its procedures over moral agency, predictability over contextual understanding. In impersonal systems, outcomes are justified not because they are just, but because they are procedurally correct.
Interpersonality, by contrast, begins from the recognition that human beings are moral agents embedded in relationships. An interpersonal system does not abandon rules, but it refuses to treat rules as morally self-sufficient. It recognises that every decision affects a person, and that justice cannot be separated from moral consideration.
At the heart of interpersonality lies an ancient ethical maxim, present across cultures and civilisations: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” This is not sentimentalism. It is a principle of reciprocal moral reasoning—one that demands empathy, proportionality, and contextual judgement.
Commicracy institutionalises this interpersonal ethic. Bureaucracy neutralises it.
2. Bureaucracy as the Institutionalisation of Impersonality
Bureaucracy arose historically as an attempt to eliminate arbitrariness, corruption, and personal bias. Its promise was fairness through standardisation. Yet in pursuing neutrality, bureaucracy substituted moral judgement with procedural obedience.
In bureaucratic systems:
- Responsibility is fragmented.
- Moral agency is displaced onto “the system.”
- Individuals become files, cases, numbers, or units of labour.
The bureaucrat does not ask, “Is this just?” but “Is this permitted?” The system does not ask, “What is reasonable?” but “What is prescribed?”
Over time, this produces institutions that function efficiently while failing ethically.
3. Commicracy as the Architecture of Interpersonal Governance
Commicracy begins from a different assumption: that human judgement cannot be removed from governance without destroying justice itself. Rather than suppressing discretion, commicracy distributes it. Rather than erasing moral agency, it commissions it under its commissioning-rules.
Interpersonal governance does not mean chaos or subjectivity. It means that rules are:
- Generated by those affected,
- Interpreted with contextual awareness,
- Applied with proportional reasoning,
- Corrected through collective feedback.
Commicracy does not replace law with emotion; it restores moral intelligence to law.
4. The Justice System: Procedure versus Moral Reason
Nowhere is the contrast clearer than in the justice system. A bureaucratic justice system treats offences as violations of rules, not disruptions of social relationships. Guilt is determined by technical compliance, sentencing by rigid guidelines, and rehabilitation often becomes secondary to punishment. Such systems frequently produce outcomes that are lawful but unjust.
An interpersonal, commicratic justice system—such as palaver courts or redeem-systems—asks deeper questions:
- Did the accused understand the rule?
- What harm occurred, and to whom?
- Can the harm be repaired?
- How does justice restore social equilibrium?
Here, first offences are assessed holistically, not punitively. Ignorance of complex law may constitute legitimate exception, while violations of universally known moral prohibitions—violence, theft, abuse—remain fully accountable. Justice becomes restorative rather than retributive, without sacrificing responsibility.
5. Law-Making: Abstract Authority versus Lived Consensus
Bureaucratic law emerges from distant institutions, drafted by specialists insulated from daily consequences. Citizens are expected to obey laws they did not author, understand, or consent to—often under the maxim that ignorance of the law is no excuse.
Commicratic law-making is interpersonal and participatory. Laws arise from collective social reasoning, shaped by lived experience. Complexity is not weaponised against citizens; instead, the burden of clarity lies with the State. Here, law is not a trap but a shared social instrument.
6. The Military: Command Obedience versus Ethical Commission
Bureaucratic militaries are organised around unquestioning obedience. Moral responsibility is displaced upward: soldiers follow orders, commanders issue commands, and accountability dissolves into hierarchy. This structure enables efficiency—but also atrocity.
An interpersonal framework recognises that ethical agency cannot be suspended by uniform. Commicratic military organisation emphasises commissioned responsibility: soldiers are not mere executors, but moral actors bound by shared ethical codes and collective accountability. Authority becomes conditional, not absolute.
7. Family Structures: Hierarchy versus Relational Ethics
Bureaucratic logic often infiltrates family life through rigid hierarchies: patriarchal authority, role fixation, emotional suppression. Obedience replaces dialogue; control replaces care.
Commicracy re-centres the family as a relational institution, governed by interpeer ethics. Authority exists, but it is reciprocal and accountable. Decisions are guided by the same maxim: Do unto others as you would wish done to you. This does not erase structure—it humanises it.
8. Banking and Economic Institutions: Extraction versus Reciprocity
Bureaucratic banking systems are impersonal by design. They evaluate creditworthiness, enforce contracts, and extract value without regard to social consequence. Human hardship is irrelevant to algorithmic decision-making.
Commicratic economic institutions operate on reciprocity rather than extraction. Economic participation is embedded within social responsibility. Risk is shared, access is equitable, and survival is not conditional on procedural compliance alone. The economy becomes a social organ, not a predatory mechanism.
9. Education: Standardisation versus Human Development
Bureaucratic education prioritises standardised testing, credentialism, and institutional ranking. Students are processed rather than cultivated; intelligence is measured rather than nurtured.
Interpersonal education recognises learners as developing moral and cognitive beings, not data points. Teaching adapts to capacity, context, and purpose. Knowledge becomes a social tool, not a competitive weapon.
10. Hierarchy as a Moral Failure
Ultimately, bureaucracy’s devotion to hierarchy is not neutral—it is ethically corrosive. Hierarchy concentrates decision-making while diffusing responsibility. It teaches people to obey rather than to reason, to comply rather than to care.
Commicracy does not abolish structure, but it rejects domination. Authority is horizontal, relational, and reversible. Leadership emerges through trust and competence, not position.
Conclusion: Restoring the Human Face of Governance
Bureaucracy governs by distance. Commicracy governs by relationship.
Impersonal systems may deliver order, but they cannot deliver justice. They may manage populations, but they cannot cultivate moral societies. Interpersonal governance, grounded in reciprocal ethics, restores the human face of power.
To govern others as we wish to be governed ourselves is not naïve—it is the oldest and most enduring principle of civilisation. Commicracy does not invent this truth; it institutionalises it.
In an age where impersonal procedures have replaced conscience, the task before us is not to perfect impersonality, but to re-humanise governance itself.
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