Social contract theory and
water industry resilience*
Dr Ron Ben-David
Chairperson
Essential Services Commission
The Essential Services Commission is the economic regulator of the Victorian water industry. It has
determinative powers in relation to the pricing of water and sewerage services and it administers a
state-wide performance monitoring framework. In this paper, Dr Ben-David applies an analytic
framework based on social contract theory, to the events of June 2012, to explore the meaning of
‘resilience’ for the water industry. Dr Ben-David argues that it would be wrong to define ‘resilience’
solely in terms of the robustness of a water authority’s assets, systems, operations or people. He
concludes that the true measure of ‘resilience’ for the water industry resides with the community’s
faith and trust that its interests are being upheld by the industry.
Presented at:
VicWater Annual Conference 2012 – 13 September 2012
*
The opinions expressed in this presentation are those of the author alone. They do not represent the views of the Essential
Services Commission, its staff or the Victorian Government. The author takes full responsibility for any errors, omissions or
conjectures made herein.
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[blank page]
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We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the
pursuit of Happiness.
This must surely be one of the most remarkably crafted statements in the
English language. I cannot really tell you what makes this statement so
remarkable. Maybe it has something to do with its poetic lyricism, its uncanny
cadence; or maybe there is something about its semantic or syntactic
construction that calls to us subconsciously. Or perhaps, it is something else
altogether. Perhaps it is the absolute authority and perfect certainty that the
words project into the world; the complete absence of any hint of self-doubt in
the minds of the authors. Or perhaps there is something more profound yet.
Maybe this statement’s power derives from an extraordinary symmetry between
the words of which it comprises and the thoughts to which those words give
expression — the thoughts of those giants of American history: Thomas
Jefferson, John Adams and James Madison.
Of course, this sentence comes from the United States Declaration of
Independence of 1776; a declaration that had a revolutionary impact we can
barely conceive today. Some years later, the Constitution of the United States
came into effect. The first ten amendments to that Constitution comprise what
has come to be known as the US Bill of Rights. Perhaps the most famous (or is
it infamous?) provision in the Bill of Rights comes from the second amendment
which states:
…the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
3
To us, in Australia, there is something incongruous, or even incomprehensible,
about an uninfringeable right to bear arms. Social order and lethal weaponry do
not seem to go hand-in-hand.
*
You might be wondering: What is the relevance of these US documents for a
conference about resilience in the Victorian water industry?
Answering that question will involve a whirlwind tour through Europe in the
Age of Enlightenment, America in the eighteenth century, Victorian in the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and Melbourne in the twenty first century. I
will then draw some conclusions that, I hope, challenge your discussions about
the idea of water industry resilience over the next day or so.
*
Let us begin in seventeenth century Europe where brilliant thinkers like Hugo
Grotius, Thomas Hobbes and John Locke (followed by Jean Jacques Rousseau
in the eighteenth century) are trying to understand the origins of political
authority. These were extraordinary times. European society and the nature of
authority were undergoing rapid change. Old orders were being displaced. The
basis of power was shifting away from brute force and inheritance; drifting
towards the people; a Parliament and primordial forms of representative
executive government. The philosophers just mentioned were seeking answers
to questions like: From where do the powers of monarchs, parliaments and
governments originate? What is the basis of their legitimacy?
4
In different ways, and starting from very different assumptions about the initial
conditions that describe humanity, these thinkers contributed to the
development of a body of ideas collectively known as Social Contract Theory.
There is no way I can do justice today to this corpus of political philosophy;
therefore, I will focus on just a couple of its most salient features.
I am sure that many of you will have heard statements such as: “we have a
social contract with our customers to [do such-and-such]” or “we have a social
contract to maintain the environment for [this-or-that reason]”. In other words,
reference to the social contract is often taken to mean an organisation’s (usually
a public entity) duty to deliver something to do with a broader public benefit.
This is not what the term ‘social contract’ means in the political philosophy
tradition.
The social contract of Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau is one that is struck among
citizens. It is struck among citizens in order to establish a political society and
delegate authority to a monarch or a government. Social contract theory
conceives of political power as arising from individuals who want to live in
peaceful coexistence in order that they may be free to pursue the things that
maximise their own well-being. However, in order to achieve the ‘freedom’ to
purse their own interests in an orderly and safe fashion, they must surrender
some of their individual freedoms. The mutual agreement to surrender one set
of freedoms in return for another guaranteed set of freedoms is the basis of the
social contract.
As with any agreement or contract between two or more parties, a mechanism is
needed in order to enforce the contract. In social contract theory, that
mechanism is created through the surrender of individual rights to a monarch or
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government. It is the role of the monarch or government to ensure that those
delegated rights are enforced for the general good. The legitimacy of the
monarch or the government’s authority is solely a function of its ability to
enforce those rights for the common weal.
It is important to appreciate that the social contract is not between the ruling
authority and its citizens. It is not about a legal or moral obligation that the
citizens impose on the ruling authority. It is entirely comprised of a set of
agreements or consents between individuals.
Likewise, it is important to appreciate that the social contract is not about
democracy and the voting of political parties in-and-out of power. Democracy
alone is too benign an interpretation of the social contract. In fact, under the
social contract, the reserved and inalienable right of individuals is to dismantle
the entire form of political authority: to overthrow and behead a king; to burn
down a parliament; to execute a dictator and hang his body on a meat-hook; to
take the managing director of a water authority and…
…but I am jumping ahead of myself. I will return to the matter of water
authorities shortly.
*
Let’s briefly return to the US Declaration of Independence. I have already
highlighted how it expresses an endowment of certain inalienable rights; and I
proceeded to juxtapose that statement with the Constitutional right to bear arms
— as though the right to bear arms were one of those inalienable rights. This is
how most people seem to understand the so-called ‘right to bear arms’. The
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freedom to bear arms seems to be considered in equal terms to other preserved
freedoms, such as: freedom of religion, freedom of speech and freedom of
peaceable assembly (all of which are preserved in the Constitution’s first
amendment).
But this view is wrong and we can see why if we go back to the Declaration of
Independence.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That
whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these
ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to
institute new Government…
When you see the fuller text, it becomes amply clear that the founding fathers of
the United States, were completely in the thrall of social contract theory. The
great new republic would indelibly acknowledge, and thrive on the
acknowledgement, that all political power originates with the people. That
power is vested in government by those individuals only for so long as
government continues to act to preserve their inalienable rights. Where it
becomes contemptuous of those rights, the people may seize back that
delegation; and if necessary, they may do so by exercising lethal force.1
1
Indeed, the full text of the Second Amendment reads: A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security
of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
7
Viewed in this light, the so-called ‘right to bear arms’ can be seen to be
derivative. Unlike, say, the freedom of religion, which exists axiomatically, the
‘right to bear arms’ is not self-evident. Rather, it is only codified in the
Constitution in order to protect those other rights which are indeed axiomatic.
*
We have nothing in this country that compares to the American Declaration of
Independence. Although our federal Constitution draws on the mechanics of its
US counterpart, it expresses none of the latter’s sublime conceptions about
rights and freedoms and powers. There is no time today to explore all the
reasons for, and consequences of, these differences in our respective national
histories. Nonetheless, we should give some consideration to the emergence of
political authority in Australia and Victoria. Most interestingly for our purposes
is the emergence of political authority at a local level.
Elsewhere, I have written about the emergence of local government in Victoria
in the nineteenth century.2 Quite obviously, that history shares none of the
romanticism or rhetoric of the upheavals overseas. Nonetheless, it is an
important story; and it is an important story for the water industry because you
share, what I have previously called, “a common ancestry” with local
government.
Sometimes local government was established in order to provide water (and
other) services to the surrounding community. At other times, local government
found itself having to assume this responsibility; and at other times, water
2
Ben-David, Ron (2010) Why is reporting on service delivery so challenging when it comes to local
government? Public Administration Today, Issue 25.
8
provision was imposed on local government by greater Colonial or State
authorities.
And even when local government was not involved in the provision of water
services — for example, when hundreds of trusts operated as stand-alone
entities alongside their local councils or shires — the dynamics that gave rise to
those trusts were effectively the same as those that bore us local governments.
That is, people coming together and agreeing to delegate responsibility to a
separate authority so that it may pursue the common good on their behalves.
In the twentieth century, particularly in its latter decades, the auspices of the
State gradually expanded to encompass the provision of water services. The
many waves of reform and restructuring that ensued have given rise to the
industry represented in this room today.
In Melbourne the story was a different; but not that different. The pressures of a
rapidly growing population just meant that this history was played out more
quickly than elsewhere. Clearly the establishment, empowerment and ultimate
dismemberment of the mighty Melbourne Metropolitan Board of Works
(MMBW), derived from the authority of the State. And that authority can be
conceptualised in the terms of social contract theory.
So we have two alternative starting points. We could start with the observation
about the direct participation of the people in creating local water providers.
Alternatively, we could take as our starting point the aegis of the State in
legitimating the water businesses as they exist today. In either case, the
authority delegated to those water businesses can usefully be conceptualised in
terms of a social contract.
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*
Before I turn to the final part of this story, I need to stress one very important
feature of social contract theory.
The social contract is a completely abstract construct. None of the great
philosophers to whom I referred earlier, remotely suggested that individuals
ever came together to ‘sign on the dotted line’ of a social contract. Even the US
Declaration of Independence and Constitution are never argued to represent a
social contract. These documents only sought to give expression to some of the
ideas and consequences that emerge from social contract theory.
The social contract is not a written document — rather, social contract theory
represents a set of ideas that can help us conceptualise the origins of political
society and political authority; nothing more, nothing less. But in helping us
conceptualise the origins of authority, these ideas can help us to understand how
authority ought to be exercised by those in whom it is vested.
*
The final destination on this short tour through history takes us to Melbourne in
the twenty first century. On 13 June 2012, we woke to the headlines shown in
Figure 1.
This was an extraordinary moment in the history of the Victorian water
industry. The story ran for over a week. For three days, it appeared on the front
page of The Age. It drew editorial comment from both The Age and the Herald
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Sun; and it was given extensive radio and television coverage. It even received
mention in the two national newspapers.
Figure 1: The Age (13 June 2012, page 1)
The events of these few days ought not be quickly forgotten. As I will suggest
in a moment, their significance is quite profound.
So what led to this moment; this outburst of wrath?
Briefly recapping events:3
3
For a more detailed exposition see: Essential Services Commission (2012) Monitoring the return of the
unrequired desalination payments (July). Available at: www.esc.vic.gov.au
11
 In 2009, the Melbourne water businesses proposed, and the Essential
Services Commission accepted, that tariffs for the period 2009 to 2013 ought
to include a component for the desalination plant. At the time, the best
available information about the likely costs of the project came from a
departmental feasibility study which also foreshadowed that the plant would
be available midway through the 2011-12.
 As a result, from the commencement of that year, Melbourne customers’
water bills would include a component relating to the costs of the plant. And,
indeed, from 1 July 2011 this is precisely what happened.
 Then, in early 2012, it became apparent that the plant would not commence
operations on schedule. Delays were announced. Nonetheless, the water
businesses were continuing to collect desal-related payments from customers
and were expecting to continue doing so.
 This became apparent when the water businesses released their draft water
plans at the end of May showing that, over the two years between 2011 and
2013, customers would be paying about $300 million more than was needed
for payments to the desal-operator in the same period. The draft water plans
proposed ‘returning’ these funds (with interest) to customers over the period
2013 to 2018 in the form of slightly lower prices than would have otherwise
been the case.
Within two weeks of those water plans being published, we witnessed the
headlines of 13 June 2012 and the community indignation that erupted in
ensuing days.
*
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Since June, I have spent a great deal of time reflecting on these events. Not the
mechanics of the overpayment; that is relatively easy to explain; but rather, the
real insights to be gained from what we observed in the community reaction.
What lies beneath the surface of the relationship between the community and
the water industry? What in that relationship can explain the profound sense of
indignation that we witnessed? After all, if it erupted once, it can erupt again;
and possibly with far more abject consequences.
Yes, we could dismiss the reaction to the so-called “water bill bungle” as ‘just
one of those things’. Life and business are full of failings and misfortunes.
Things go wrong. That’s life. Get over it.
I would caution otherwise. This was not ‘just one of those things’.
Of course, in any business, stuff-ups come and stuff-ups go. A couple of years
ago, Toyota recalled millions of vehicles worldwide due to a potential failure in
the braking system of its cars. I have no idea how many hundreds of thousands
of Australians Toyota put at risk but we did not see the community rise
indignantly against Toyota.
Last October, Qantas grounded its entire fleet: inconveniencing tens of
thousands of travellers and greatly jeopardising its future custom. While there
was heated debate about whether it had acted wisely, we did not see the
community rise in fury against Qantas.
What then makes the water industry so different? Why did one seemingly
inopportune action by the water industry unleash such wrathful sentiments
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about the industry’s competence — and, indeed, its legitimacy? And, how is
this relevant to this year’s VicWater conference on ‘water industry resilience’?
I submit that if we fail to explore and understand the eruption of indignation that
we witnessed in June, then no matter what is discussed over the next two days,
and no matter what mitigation strategies you implement in your businesses —
none of that will properly ensure your ‘resilience’. As I will argue, upholding
the ‘resilience’ of your business — indeed, your very existence — is a far more
complex challenge than just buttressing your systems against operational
failure.
*
In June, the water industry’s legitimacy came into question more quickly than
anyone had thought remotely possible. And this was despite the industry
having spent the last decade investing extensively in developing its ‘brand’ as a
socially responsible sector leading the community through the disruptions of a
horror-drought. But all that goodwill seemed to evaporate in an instant; ten
years of investment written-off by one headline. How could it be?
This is where social contract theory proves insightful.
From social contract theory we learn that we ought to think about authority —
your authority to exist — as something that arises from an agreement between
the people. In other words, you exist not because governments have created
you but because the people have agreed amongst themselves that you should
exist. Five million Victorians have come together, in this theoretical construct,
and agreed that you should exist in order to provide them with certain services.
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Again, I must stress, that this is a hypothetical exercise only. Social contract
theory is only a model for thinking about the source of authority and the
responsibilities that accompany it. But one important consequences of this
hypothetical way of thinking about your authority, is to realise that the water
industry is not a party to the social contract that governs it. This contract is
struck, and continues to be struck and re-struck, amongst individual members of
society. As far as the industry is concerned, its legitimacy is sustained only
insofar as it continues to uphold its delegated authority in accordance with the
social contract between the citizens.
It is also worth noting that there is a marked difference between the social
contact, to which water businesses are not a party, and service contracts, to
which they are a party. I will return to the issue of social contracts versus
service contracts in a moment.
Perhaps a more tangible way of thinking about the social contract is to ask:
What would a social contact look like if five million Victorians chose to enter
into it?
But how many individual agreements would a social contract between five
million Victorians entail?
One early thinker, Jean Jacques Rousseau, envisaged that there would be one
social contract and all the citizens would gather, as required from time-to-time,
to exercise the contract. But then, he lived in the city-republic of Geneva, where
such idyllic outcomes seemed at least plausible.
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Five million Victorians could not plausibly come together, even hypothetically,
in the way envisaged by Rousseau. Therefore, we need to think about the social
contract in somewhat different terms.
Let us suppose that each Victorian interacts during the course of their day-today lives with one thousand other Victorians. This might include family
members, friends and acquaintances, work colleagues, a child’s school teacher,
a gym instructor, the nice young man at the fruit shop, etc, etc. So the social
contract involves five million Victorians entering into agreements with one
thousand other Victorians. Of course, people are continuously moving in and
out of each other’s agreements. New work colleagues arrive and others depart.
Kids change schools. We stop attending the gym despite paying a year’s
subscription; etc, etc.
So how many potential agreements comprise the social contract if we have five
million Victorians constantly engaging and re-engaging with one thousand other
Victorians?
The answer is astounding. The number of potential agreements into which five
million Victorians might enter with one thousand other Victorians is: 2 x 104,131
(or two followed by 4,131 zeros).
This number is inconceivably large. It has no place in nature. There are
nowhere near that many atoms in the entire universe. Despite this, this is the
number that provides the Victorian water industry with its legitimacy to operate;
to exist. Conversely, this is the number that will be unleashed against the water
industry if it does not act in accordance with the rights delegated to it by the
citizens. This is the potential number of agreements that will have failed; will
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have been betrayed; will have been voided — if the industry fails to uphold the
rights delegated to it under the social contract.
*
Returning to the events of mid-June…
It might be the case that the public indignation that we witnessed was no more
than the outburst that would have accompanied any business that had been
‘outed’ for overcharging its customers. Perhaps. Perhaps.
I submit, though, that it would be a gross error of judgement by all those
associated with the water industry (including its regulators4) to dismiss these
events as just an episode about overcharging customers.
Recall the US Constitution and the right of Americans to bear arms.
That right was based on social contract theory and the premise that the people
can seize back the delegation of authority when the party of that authority has
failed to exercise it dutifully. When authority fails to protect the rights of
individuals, those individuals can terminate the delegation; and they can do so
using lethal force.
The events of June 2012 ought to be seen in this light.
4
In this context, the term “regulator” should be read as widely as possible.
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In that middle week of June, the community exercised a metaphoric right to
bear arms under the social contract. The community reached for its metaphoric
muskets and fired some warning shots over the heads of the industry. In doing
so, the community was reminding the industry that it existed by virtue of the
community’s authority. The community was reminding the industry that it has
no authority in its own right; it only has delegated authority. The actions of the
industry had led individuals across the community to question whether the
water industry had properly exercised the powers delegated to it; had exercised
those powers in pursuit of the common weal.
On this occasion, the industry and its regulators walked away intact and, I trust,
equally chastened. But that is not to say that they will do so again next time.
*
What of ‘resilience’ then? From these events, what can we learn about water
industry resilience?
To answer these questions, we first need to distinguish between social contracts
and service contracts.
Service contracts are those agreements you have with your customers to deliver
specified services at an agreed price and subject to certain terms and conditions.
In many regards, your service contracts are not that different from the service
contracts that exist everywhere else in the economy. To the extent that they do
differ, it is because you operate as local-monopolies and your service contracts
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are implicit and non-voluntary. (I have discussed that special status in my
previous presentations to VicWater.5,6)
When I look at the excellent agenda for this conference, I cannot help but
observe its focus on the resilience of operations; or what I have called ‘service
contracts’ — that is, the capacity to maintain service delivery despite the many
unknowns that confront the industry. Importantly, this includes maintaining
organisational capacity in the wake of change, disruption or adversity.
Let me state without equivocation that buttressing your systems against
operational failure is a very significant challenge confronting the water industry.
I commend the conference organisers for drawing attention to these issues. But I
also posit that framing a discussion about the water industry’s ‘resilience’ solely
in terms of its ongoing capacity to fulfil its service contracts, is to miss the very
challenge that is particular to this industry.
All industries face risks and all industries confront uncertainty. All industries
face the perils of misjudging these risks, making bad decisions or taking the
wrong actions; and, in so doing, damaging the integrity of their service
contracts; present and future. I have already mentioned the two examples of
Toyota and Qantas. When firms in a competitive market ‘blow’ their services
contracts, that market will extract its revenge ruthlessly and dispassionately —
for example, through loss of sales and market share; reduced earnings, profits
and stock prices. For these firms, ‘resilience’ is defined solely in terms of their
capacity to endure these losses and rebound. Their punishment is exacted by
the market; their penance is served in the market; and their rehabilitation is
5
Ben-David, Ron (2011) Economic regulation of the water sector. How can we know the dancer from the
dance? VicWater Annual Conference (8 September 2011)
6
Ben-David, Ron (2010) Governance and the water industry: The challenge of defining, creating and
delivering value. VicWater 2010 Annual Conference (2 September 2010)
19
manifested through the market. In other words, the market is the only medium
within which their resilience is given expression. Nothing lies beyond.
The water industry also has service contracts. But unlike firms in a competitive
market, if your service contracts fail, then punishment cannot be exacted by the
market; your penance cannot be served in the market; and your rehabilitation
cannot be manifested through the market. Therefore, something must lie
beyond.
There must be another medium within which you, as entities, exist and your
resilience is expressed. Something else must be out there that provides the
medium within which your resilience can be defined; there must be something
else beyond your service contracts with customers. But what is that medium?
The answer, I suggest, is: the Social Contract. The social contract is the
medium within which you exist. It is the medium within which you succeed or
you fail. And if you fail, it is the medium within which you are punished. And if
that punishment is not lethal, then the social contract is the medium within
which your penance is served and your rehabilitation can be manifested. In
other words, it is only through the social contract that you express your
‘resilience’.
*
I know this theorising is all rather abstruse. But I also have no doubt that, if we
are to really learn from the events of June and what they can tell us about water
industry resilience, then we cannot dismiss those events as ‘just one of those
things’.
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For now, then, I will set aside the high theory and I will conclude this
discussion by drawing a picture that, I hope, will challenge you to think quite
differently about your ‘resilience’; to think about your ‘resilience’ in terms of
the social contract, rather than in the more familiar terms of a service contract.
To do so, I will draw on some imagery from the work of a twentieth century
social contract theorist. John Rawls sought to identify a set of universal
principles that would govern society. To help him with this endeavour, he
imagined something called a 'veil of ignorance' — a hypothetical device that
conceals all personal details about individuals: their characteristics and their
abilities, their preferences and their social status. And though we know nothing
about these individuals, Rawls asks us to imagine the kind of society in which
they would choose to live.
Let me apply a similar technique to our problem about ‘resilience’ by asking
you to imagine two individuals; each is cloaked beneath his-or-her own ‘veil of
ignorance’.
We know nothing about them or what they care about; and we never will. We
can make no assumptions about who they might be. Whether they are young or
old? Male or female? Rich or poor? Working or retired? Employed or
unemployed? Single or family bound? Owner-occupiers or tenants? Ablebodied or disabled? Informed or unaware? Generous or belligerent? Forthright
or reserved? Optimistic or pessimistic? etc, etc. There is no way even to
determine whether the two individuals under the veils are similar or different in
their characteristics. (Moreover, in this thought experiment, the two individuals
also know nothing about each other.)
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Within this thought experiment, we know only one thing about the two veiled
individuals — and that is: they are discussing you, the water industry; and you,
as individual water authorities. And in that discussion, they are trying to decide
whether they should delegate to you the responsibility for delivering water
services to them. Think about it like this: Your fate rests entirely in the hands
of two completely anonymous individuals.
Your fate is completely in their hands but you know nothing about them or what
they care about. All you can ever know is that they must come to an agreement;
and in order to reach an agreement each person must trust his-or-her own
judgement and each person must trust the other person’s judgement — these are
judgements about you and your worthiness of their trust.
And that is the critical implication of social contract theory. It relies on mutual
trust and mutual confidence between the citizens. In delegating authority to you
(as water authorities), each person has to take responsibility not just for the
services they receive, but also for the outcomes produced for the other person.
But remember, as water authorities, you are not part of this discussion; you are
not a party to the social contract. You have no say over the content or design of
the social contract. You are merely the consequence of a social contract among
members of the community. The only matter that rests within you bailiwick is
to prove or disprove the success of the social contract agreed by the citizens;
and you do so by your decisions and your actions.
Under such circumstances, how do you ensure that the discussion between two
anonymous individuals — a discussion about your future — is favourable?
What do you need to do to ensure that two completely anonymous individuals
will agree that you ought to continue to exist? How do you ensure that they
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continue to express confidence and faith in you: the Victorian water industry?
How do you ensure that they continue to have confidence in each other’s
judgement about your competence?
While this might only be a thought experiment, the answers to these questions
go to the very core of my alternative definition of ‘resilience’ for the water
industry.
If by your decisions and actions you fail to uphold the faith and trust that
members of the community have placed not just in you, but also in each other,
in agreeing to delegate certain responsibilities to you, then they may withdraw
that authority. If by your decisions and your actions you fail to uphold the
social contract that underpins your existence, then you will eventually fail the
only true test of your resilience.
And so, it all boils down to this:
Irrespective of whether you are a water authority that is urban or rural, regional
or metropolitan, retail or wholesale — the events of June should be understood
as follows. Ultimately, your resilience is not about the robustness of your assets
(built and natural), your systems, your operations or your people. Your true
resilience is, and will be, forever measured by the robustness of the
community’s faith and trust in you; the community’s faith and trust that you are
exercising your delegated authority properly; that you have not forgotten that
your authority comes from them; that you are upholding their interests: not your
own.
—
END
—
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