The Executive Branch and the Formulation of Public Policy

The executive branch of government is one of the oldest ones, and indeed, at the present period of time it is one of the most powerful ones in any kind of state, be it a democracy or an autocracy.

“Every political system has an executive in which leadership is concentrated in the hands of a single individual or a small elite group… This can be explained by the fact that all political executives have access to a wide range of available political resources that are usually not accessible to other branches of government”.

Executives have enormous powers in any nation-state, Canada included. These powers include the power of information, organization, economic power, etc. The Canadian resources available for Canadian executives are enormous, but they are restrained by the supervision of the Cabinet to which they are held accountable. There really are some signs of the executives reasserting their power in Canada, one of such situations may be analyzed on the example of exercising economic power. The Canadian executive has enormous economic power.

“Resources are available to them through their position in government, the powers of taxation and confiscation…Canada’s federal and provincial government ministers tend to grant the lion’s share of government contracts to the constituencies they represent, spending millions that often ensure their re-election”.

Access to information is also a field in which reassertion of power may be detected; executives have much access to personal information, as has already been discussed earlier, and for this reason, they may make decisions on economic and other issues that are more grounded than the general public. These privileges are excessive because extensive access to information is not meant for their personal purposes but for the sake of their professional activity.