Why the Economy Must Become a Branch of Government
Correcting the Structural Blindspot of Politics, Republican Nationalism, and Executive-Centred Power
BY: OMOLAJA MAKINEE
Modern systems of governance have inherited a fundamental structural error: the assumption that the economy is merely an administrative extension of the Executive-arm of government. This assumption, deeply embedded in republican nationalism and partisan political systems, has produced widespread economic alienation, labour exploitation, regulatory capture, and the persistent subordination of workers’ welfare to elite political interests. Under such systems, economic life is governed over workers rather than with them.
Govox-populi and ethnopublican nationalism confront this error directly by recognising the economy not as a sector to be managed, but as a distinct constitutional domain of governance, requiring its own institutional authority, legislative competence, and supervisory protection. For this reason, the Economy-branch is introduced as the fourth branch of government, standing alongside the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches—not in rivalry, but in constitutional interdependence.
1. The Blindspot of Executive-Centred Economic Power
In conventional republican and democratic systems, economic power is centralised within the Executive-branch and exercised through ministries, departments, and regulatory agencies controlled by partisan political leadership. This concentration produces three systemic failures.
First, political capture of economic policy. When economic authority resides under the Executive, policy decisions are inevitably shaped by electoral cycles, donor interests, party loyalty, and ideological expediency. Long-term worker welfare, workplace safety, and sustainable production are subordinated to short-term political survival.
Second, the silencing of workers as economic actors. Workers are treated as passive inputs within the economy rather than as co-authors of its rules. Their participation is reduced to indirect mechanisms—unions lobbying politicians, strikes as last resorts, or advisory consultations without binding authority. Economic decisions affecting their livelihoods are made elsewhere, by actors insulated from their consequences.
Third, the illusion of neutrality in technocratic governance. Executive-controlled economic agencies often present themselves as neutral, expert-driven institutions. In reality, they operate under political instruction and elite alignment, producing regulatory frameworks that protect capital concentration while socialising economic risk onto labour.
These failures are not accidental; they are structural. They arise because politics and the economy are incompatible domains when fused under a single executive authority.
2. Ethnopublican Nationalism and the Separation of Economic Sovereignty
Ethnopublican nationalism begins from a different premise: that sovereignty does not reside exclusively in the State, but is distributed across the lived domains of society. Citizenship and labour are not identical experiences, even though workers may constitute the majority of citizens.
Workers engage the State not only as voters or cultural participants, but as daily producers of material value—operating within workplaces governed by specific risks, procedures, technical conditions, and economic pressures. These realities demand a governance structure capable of addressing them directly, rather than filtering them through general State governing institutions.
The Economy-branch exists precisely to govern this domain. It recognises that:
- The material conditions of work are structurally different from general civic life.
- Economic decisions require specialised deliberation grounded in lived workplace realities.
- Workers’ welfare cannot be safeguarded through indirect political representation alone.
Thus, the Economy-branch institutionalises workers as co-legislators of economic life, without collapsing governance into syndicalism or politicising production.
3. The Functional Architecture of the Economy-Branch
In the govox-populi framework, governance is not divided by prestige but by function.
- The Judicial-branch supervises constitutionality and resolves disputes.
- The Executive-branch implements policy and coordinates administration.
- The Legislative-branch prescribes laws and public policy.
- The Economy-branch governs economic life through organised working-groups.
The economy-branch occupies a unique position: it combines legislative authority with implementation, yet remains constitutionally bound to executive direction and judicial supervision. This is not a contradiction, but a necessity.
In practice, the economy-branch:
- Prescribes laws and policies relating to workplace safety, labour standards, production ethics, and economic welfare.
- Enforces executive economic directives within workplaces and industries.
- Operates through working-groups constituted by sectors, trades, and professional domains.
Although it enacts and enforces economic rules, it does not act independently of the State. Like the citizenry and the StateLords, it is obligated to enforce executive decisions within its jurisdiction, ensuring coherence across governance domains.
For this reason, the Economy-branch is legislative in substance, even where it appears executory in function.
4. Why Workers Must Legislate Economic Life
The argument for an Economy-branch is not ideological; it is structural and empirical. Those who bear the risks of economic activity—injury, work conditions, automation, exploitation—must possess the authority to shape the rules governing that activity. To deny this is to institutionalise economic injustice.
Under govox-populi:
- Economic laws are not imposed upon workers; they are authored by them.
- Workplace governance becomes preventative rather than reactive.
- Productivity and welfare are aligned rather than antagonised.
This does not abolish private enterprise, innovation, or efficiency. Rather, it stabilises them by rooting economic regulation in lived reality rather than abstract political calculus.
5. Checks, Balances, and Productive Tension
The inclusion of the Economy-branch does not weaken the system of checks and balances; it strengthens it. The Executive and Economy branches implement policy. The Legislative-branch prescribes law. The Judicial-branch supervises and arbitrates all.
Where tensions arise—between executive direction and economic feasibility, between legislative prescription and workplace realities—these tensions function as constitutional safeguards, not partisan blockades. They test compatibility, expose contradictions, and prevent unilateral domination.
Crucially, because govox-populi is non-partisan, these tensions are not weaponised for partisan gain. They are resolved through structured deliberation rather than ideological conflict.
Conclusion: Restoring Economic Dignity Through Governance
The introduction of the Economy-branch corrects a historical distortion in political theory: the false belief that political representation alone can secure economic justice. It cannot.
Only by recognising the economy as a constitutional domain of self-governance can societies escape the cycles of exploitation, elite capture, and worker disenfranchisement that have defined both capitalist and statist systems alike.
Govox-populi and ethnopublican nationalism do not abolish the State; they complete it—by giving economic life the institutional dignity it has long been denied. In doing so, they lay the foundation for a society where production serves people, governance reflects lived reality, and power is exercised where responsibility is borne.
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