Difference Between Government and Governance

Government vs Governance

Government and governance are two very similar words. People often get confused about the differences between “governance” and “government.” Here we are going to discuss the differences between these two related words.

Government
Government is a group of people who rule or run the administration of a country. In other words, it may be said that a government is the body of representatives that governs and controls the state at a given time. Government is the medium through which the power of the state is employed.

Government may be of different types. It may be a democracy or autocracy, but most of the modern governments are democratic. Here we are taking into consideration the democratic ones in relation with the government.
A democratic government may be defined as that which has the public mandate to run the affairs of the country with a well-defined term after which in the successive term the same people may be elected again. The government may be labeled as good or bad according to their ways of working for the good of the people. If a government provides capable governance, then it has a chance of coming back into power again.

Governance
Governance is the act of governing or ruling. It is the set of rules and laws framed by the government that are to be implemented through the representatives of the state. Simply put, governance is what governments do.
Governance is a concept that can be followed in an organization of any size, be it a single cell or an organism or all of humanity. Governance may function variously for profit or non-profit, for people, or itself. The main purpose of governance is to assure good results following a set pattern of rules.
Governance may be of various types:

Global Governance
Corporate Governance
Project
Information Technology
Participatory
Non-Profit and a few others

The difference between “government” and “governance” may be clarified using an example of a business which is run by a group of people. The rules and regulations which they follow in order to run the business successfully are called the management. This involves the experience and the knowledge of the owners working together with the employees to meet the set target. On a similar pattern, the government is a body of elected representatives which is headed by a single person. This body makes use of established rules and a principle to efficiently run the affairs of the country in favor of the people of the nation is called governance.

Summary:

1.Governance is what a government does.

2.Governance is the physical exercise of the polity while the government is the body through which this is done.

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