Leaders are not necessarily authors or originals who have created something of value and thereby earned the allegiance of followers. In most modern systems, leaders are elected, appointed, or seize power through various mechanisms, and once installed, they enjoy authority, privilege, and the instruments of state power. This raises a fundamental question: when those who hold power are simultaneously empowered to make the very policies that govern society, can we expect them to act against their own interests? Would they craft rules that might diminish their authority or challenge their privilege? The evidence from authoritarian governments across the globe—regimes that have extended their terms, eliminated opposition, and reshaped constitutions to perpetuate their rule—suggests a troubling answer: power seeks to preserve and expand itself.
There exists a fundamental incompatibility between holding executive power and making policy. Leaders who simultaneously wield authority and write the rules create an inherent conflict of interest that corrupts governance, undermines democratic principles, and threatens the welfare of society. Policymaking and leadership execution must be separated to ensure that the rules governing society serve the common good rather than the interests of the powerful.
To understand why leaders should not make policies, we must first examine the nature of political leadership itself. Leadership positions come with tangible benefits: prestige, material comfort, influence, and the ability to shape society according to one's vision. These rewards create powerful incentives to maintain one's position. Even leaders who initially possess genuine concern for the public good face constant pressure to prioritise their own survival and advancement. This is not merely a matter of individual moral failing; it is a structural problem inherent in concentrating policy-making and executive power in the same hands.
Consider the case of Venezuela under Hugo Chávez and his successor Nicolás Maduro. Chávez came to power in 1999 through democratic elections, but once in office, he systematically rewrote the constitution, extended presidential term limits, and consolidated power in the executive branch. In 2007, Chávez held a referendum to eliminate term limits entirely, which initially failed but was reintroduced and passed in 2009. This allowed him to run for reelection indefinitely. Each policy change was presented as serving the people's interests, yet each conveniently expanded executive power. Maduro has continued this pattern, using policy changes and constitutional interpretations to maintain power despite economic collapse and massive popular opposition. The leaders who held power were the same individuals rewriting the rules of the game—a clear conflict of interest that has led to authoritarian consolidation.
Similarly, in Russia, Vladimir Putin has employed constitutional amendments and policy changes to extend his rule far beyond initial term limits. Upon completing two consecutive terms as president in 2008, he became prime minister while a close ally served as president, maintaining effective control. He then returned to the presidency in 2012. In 2020, constitutional amendments were passed—amendments initiated by Putin's government—that reset his term count to zero, potentially allowing him to remain in power until 2036. At each juncture, the person holding power was also the architect of policies that extended that power. This is not governance in the public interest; it is the use of policy-making authority to serve self-interest.
Structural Corruption of Combined Powers
When leaders possess the authority to make policies, they face an irresistible temptation to craft rules that benefit themselves and those who support their rule. This creates several interconnected problems that corrupt the entire system of governance.
First, leaders will naturally create policies that entrench their position and make removal difficult or impossible. This might take the form of laws that restrict opposition parties, limit press freedom, expand surveillance powers, or manipulate electoral systems. In Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan systematically consolidated power through constitutional changes that he himself promoted. A 2017 referendum, held under a state of emergency, transformed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential one, dramatically expanding executive powers and reducing checks and balances. The leader who benefited from these changes was the same leader who championed them—an obvious conflict of interest.
Second, leaders will create policies that reward their supporters and punish opponents, not based on merit or justice, but based on political calculation. When the same people who hold power also write the rules, the distinction between governance and patronage collapses. Resources flow to loyalists, contracts go to cronies, and legal frameworks are shaped to benefit those in the leader's circle. In the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos, policy-making power was concentrated in the executive, allowing Marcos to enrich himself and his associates while impoverishing the nation. "Crony capitalism" flourished because the person making economic policies was also the person benefiting from those policies and protecting those who supported his regime.
Third, the combination of policy-making and executive power creates a feedback loop that becomes increasingly difficult to break. Each policy that strengthens the leader's position makes it harder for opposition to emerge, which in turn allows the leader to pass even more self-serving policies. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has used his government's policy-making authority to reshape electoral districts, change electoral laws, take control of media outlets through friendly oligarchs, and pack the constitutional court with loyalists. Each policy change makes the next one easier and makes genuine democratic alternation of power less likely.
Separation of Policy-Making from Executive Power
The solution to this fundamental incompatibility is structural: policies must be made prior to the assumption of authority, and by entities separate from those who will hold executive power. Policy makers must be neutral actors whose role is to craft rules that serve the common good rather than any particular leader or party. Elected leaders must be confined to planning and executing the policies that have already been established, not creating new rules that serve their interests.
This is not an entirely novel concept. It reflects, in part, the logic behind constitutional governance and the separation of powers. The genius of constitutional systems is that they establish fundamental rules before specific leaders come to power, and they make those rules difficult for any one leader to change. The United States Constitution, for example, was written by a convention separate from the executive branch and requires extraordinary majorities to amend, preventing any single leader from rewriting the rules to suit themselves. Parliamentary systems similarly separate legislative and executive functions, though imperfectly.
However, the principle needs to be taken further. Policy-making bodies should be insulated from direct political pressure and structured to represent long-term public interest rather than short-term political advantage. This might take several forms:
Independent Policy Commissions: Critical areas such as electoral rules, ethics standards, and government structure should be governed by policies created by independent commissions composed of experts, civil society representatives, and diverse stakeholders—not by sitting politicians. New Zealand's Electoral Commission, for example, operates independently to set electoral boundaries and rules, preventing politicians from gerrymandering districts to their advantage.
Citizen Assemblies: Randomly selected citizens, similar to juries, could be convened to deliberate on major policy questions. Ireland has successfully used citizen assemblies to address contentious issues like abortion and marriage equality, creating space for thoughtful deliberation removed from immediate political pressures. These assemblies make recommendations that are then put to referendum, separating policy creation from political self-interest.
Sunset Clauses and Regular Review: Policies should include automatic expiration dates and require renewal through processes that involve actors beyond sitting leaders. This prevents leaders from indefinitely benefiting from favourable rules they or their predecessors established.
Strong Judicial Review: Independent courts must have the power to strike down policies that serve leaders' self-interest rather than the public good, particularly when such policies affect fundamental rights or democratic processes.
Critics might object that elected leaders have democratic legitimacy and should therefore have policy-making authority. After all, voters chose them to lead, which presumably includes making decisions about what policies to implement. This objection, however, conflates two distinct functions: executing the public will and writing the rules of governance. Leaders can have democratic legitimacy to govern according to existing policies without having legitimacy to rewrite the fundamental rules in their own favour. Voters elect leaders to solve problems within a framework, not to reshape the framework itself to ensure their perpetual rule.
Another objection might be that separating policy-making from executive power would be impractical, creating gridlock and preventing necessary adaptation to changing circumstances. This concern has merit but overstates the problem. The separation need not be absolute or rigid. Leaders can certainly propose policies and advocate for their adoption, but the actual authority to enact policies—especially those affecting governance structures, rights, and democratic processes—should rest with independent bodies. This creates a deliberative space and prevents the most egregious forms of self-dealing while still allowing for necessary evolution of policy.
Some might argue that neutral, expert policy-makers are a fiction—that everyone has interests and biases, so we might as well have democratically accountable leaders make policies. While it is true that perfect neutrality is impossible, there are meaningful degrees of separation from self-interest. A diverse commission with fixed terms and no prospect of reappointment has far less incentive to craft self-serving policies than a leader seeking reelection. A randomly selected citizen assembly has no political machine to protect. Structural design matters.
The need to separate policy-making from executive power has become more urgent in recent years as democratic backsliding has accelerated globally. According to the V-Dem Institute's annual democracy report, the number of liberal democracies has been in decline, while electoral autocracies have increased. A common pattern in this backsliding is that elected leaders, once in power, use their policy-making authority to entrench themselves and hollow out democratic institutions.
The incompatibility of leaders making policies is not a minor flaw in governance; it is a fundamental design problem that corrupts democratic systems and enables authoritarian consolidation. When those who hold power also write the rules, the result is predictable: rules that serve the powerful rather than the public, systems that entrench incumbents rather than enable alternation of power, and governance that prioritises regime survival over social welfare.
History teaches us that power, left to govern itself, will always work to preserve and expand itself. The authoritarian governments that have extended their rule through convenient policy changes, the democracies that have backslid into hybrid regimes, the constitutions rewritten to benefit incumbent leaders—all demonstrate that the combination of executive power and policy-making authority is toxic to legitimate governance. The question is not whether leaders will abuse the power to make policies that benefit themselves. The question is whether we will continue to grant them that power, knowing what it inevitably produces. The answer, if we value democracy and the common good, must be no.
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