The 2006 World Cup is on. TV sets are the most precious commodities at this time when people, the world over, struggle to be abreast with the latest match. Watching the teams battle it out and the referee arbitrating elicits interesting lessons on governance.

Let us compare the role of government to that of a referee in soccer. The referee is not a player. We have incidences where the referee influences the outcome of a game by unfairly awarding penalties that make a team in his favor win. Referees and their linesmen (assistant referees) sometimes ignore “offside” and give red cards unfairly. When this happens, the best team rarely reaches the league finals.

The concrete test comes when such an ill prepared team plays against teams that won out of merit. Victory never comes home.

In the world of economic soccer, individuals are the players and the government is the referee. When a government favors some businesses at the expense of others, the economic game is messed. When it continually awards “red cards” to those it does not favor, a poor team is presented to the international economic market and victory can never be secured.

This issue examines the awesome responsibility on both the “players” and the “referees” in the economic soccer.