Can a government be bought?

Question

This is more of a thought experiment, but can a government choose to list itself on the market and be bought? For example, if I somehow make a deal with a country's government, can I assume their sovereignty, have their seat on the UN, and make use of their military, economy, resources, lands, ...? Or similarly, they could still diplomatically retain their position (other countries will still acknowledge the incumbent government as legitimate) when I am the actual person who makes all the decisions.

There is no precedent on this, nor there are any specific provisions for this in any constitution, but I just want to know the most "technically" answer possible.

Answer 1

The closest historical precedent is that the Congo Free State, more or less coterminous with the contemporary country with the same name, which was the personal property of Leopold II of Belgium, as recognized by the General Act of the Berlin Conference, was sold to Belgium in 1908, whereupon it became a colony of Belgium, then later an independent nation.

Answer 2

What is a country and who that country’s government is is a matter of international consensus

For example, China is a country recognised by most of the countries in the world. For most of them, the government is the CCP and the capital is Beijing, for a small number, the government is the KMT based in Taipei.

Myanmar is recognised by most nations. Right now it is under the control of its military but most nations would not recognise them as the legitimate government.

Domestic law

In most countries today, the current legal system would not permit what you suggest. For example, in the UK, the government is Parliament under the doctrine of Parliamentary Sovereignty. However, at some point in the past, the government was the King and, in theory, he could have sold his position.

It has happened in the past although things are usually a bit more complicated than “Here’s some gold, now I’m the King”.

Answer 3

Wow, quite the question. Let's break it down into two parts: international law and domestic law.

International law. Well, there's plenty of autocratic governments that have seats in the UN and are recognized under international law, so I don't think there's an issue here.

Domestic law. Here's the much bigger issue. You'd have to examine the foundation upon which each state's government's authority rests (in the US, this is the Constitution) to see whether this is possible. It's certainly not in the United States. I think the only places this would be possible would be those states where the government in power's authority really is founded wholly on a takeover by force. The more unfettered power a leader has over a geographic territory, the more possible this becomes. To take an extreme example, if you own an island in the middle of the ocean, and you are solely in charge of it, and anyone who comes to live there has to assent to your complete rule, then...why couldn't you sell control of it? Now, where do you find recognized state's even marginally analogous to this in the real world? You look for states with brutal dictators, essentially.

NOTE: there are definitely some who think even the US gov is bought and paid for by corporate interest. That's a whole other discussion...

Answer 4

There are various ways to look at this, but they all boil down to "technically, yes":

From a domestic law point of view, the country's Constitution, written or unwritten, will likely have definitions of how power is transferred. That might be "elected by universal suffrage", or "whoever inherits the Crown has absolute power", or it might include multiple bodies holding each other in check. However, Constitutions can always be changed, either within their own terms (e.g. passing an Amendment in the USA) or simply by force (pieces of paper don't protect well against tanks). So, first you declare absolute rule, then you sell that absolute rule to the highest bidder.

From an international law point of view, things are actually pretty similar. There may be Treaties that you would have to break somewhere along this process, but just like the Constitution you just ripped up, they're only as strong as anyone willing to enforce them. If the country was a member of the EU, for instance, it would certainly be kicked out for violating the relevant treaties; but that wouldn't stop it being a country.

This leads on to the subtler question of international recognition. Other governments, and international bodies like the UN, might declare your rule "illegitimate", and might even go so far as to recognise some opposition organisation as the "real" government. They might impose sanctions of one sort or another which would be inconvenient; they're quite unlikely to actually invade. In practice, there are plenty of "illegitimate" governments which so clearly are in control of countries that the international community has no choice but to deal with them as such. It took twenty years, but the UN eventually reassigned China's seat to those with de facto power.

Which brings us, finally, to the internal reality of the country. If you have absolute power, you can declare that every piece of land, every factory, everything in the country, is now your personal property. If you already control the military, the government, and the judiciary, there's nobody left to dispute that claim. The reality on the ground will be that you can control and exploit those assets at will, unless and until someone challenges your rule. Whether you acquired that absolute power by birth, violence, or buying it from someone else, makes no difference that I can see.

Answer 5

You can buy a government (assuming it wants to sell) but there is no guarantee of international recognition of such a deal.

Ultimately, the government of a country controls the domestic law. There is no much point to speculate whether domestic law will approve such a sale as those who would sell will have all the powers to change it anyway (otherwise they're not the government).

So, if a group of people fully in charge of a country really want to quit with heaps of cash, they will take the deal, change the law if needed, and fly away.

Note that there would be no way to enforce such a contract if the government you are buying takes the money and refuses to go — unless you have an army capable to compel them.

Regarding international recognition, again, the UN may just reject to honour such a transition of power and deem that the people of the country are the real current government, not those big bucks guys who think they've made an acquisition.

Answer 6

I believe there is a historical example (in the context of long history between the parties, not by an open auction): The Equivalent, a sum of 398,085 pounds sterling paid to Scotland by England to grease the Acts of Union 1707, which in fact melted the sovereignty of Scotland into the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It mostly went to pay off investors in the Darien Scheme, which had wrecked the Scottish economy in the decades before the Act of Union. The 1791 poem by Scottish poet Robert Burns concludes "We were bought and sold for English gold, such a parcel of rogues in a nation!"