As the political process now comes to grips with a sad and painful episode in Flint, Michigan, some are arguing forcefully that the emergency management resolution of the city's financial crisis, and its emphasis on "business" principles, are to blame for the water crisis. "This shows you can't run government like a business!", is the cry.
But this casts the net too wide. Some businesses are run poorly, and make mistakes like Flint (and Michigan) made. But some governments, like Flint and Michigan, can do the same thing. Good businesses succeed in providing value for their customers, and good businesses try to manage costs in a value-producing way. Many businesses generally succeed at doing this, while others fail. Saying that the Flint example shows that government “shouldn’t be run like a business,” period, vastly oversimplifies things, and sometimes, in pursuit of an agenda.
Here's a pretty good article in The Christian Science Monitor that gets into the issues. I thought one of the people interviewed had a reflection worth reflecting on. "... In Flint’s case, Kousser says, the problem stemmed from what appears to have been a trade-off between cost-cutting measures and public health. “The private marketplace works because of competition, but governments often have monopoly,” he notes. “When Volkswagen screws up, you can buy a Ford. But when lead starts coming out of your tap, you can’t just turn on another tap. “I don’t think it proves a general point that governments can’t be run like a business,” Kousser adds. “But it shows some of the things you risk when you do.”..."
Businesses and governments do share a common requirement, in their efforts to succeed. Some of those efforts succeed, and others fail. But all organizations have to be "run," and good accounting and financial reporting are cornerstones of those efforts. Governments, and businesses, that fail to measure themselves well, will likely fail in measuring up, period.