Government and Egalitarianism

Joel asked: "can government exist in an egalitarian society?"

Government can absolutely exist in an egalitarian society, though it would likely be quite different from the current government we have. It would be, I suspect, much closer to a true democracy.

How would such a government work? It may well be rather like the minimalist government that the libertarians seem so fond of envisioning. In an ideal egalitarian society (and please bear with me, as an ideal can form a starting point and give us direction to real world applications), the people governed would gather whenever the situation required, and debate until a consensus was formed about how to best address a particular issue. Compromise has, of course, never been a particular strong suit of humanity, but it is necessary for our species to learn such if we ever want to have a truly egalitarian society.

In this theoretical egalitarian society, "government" involvement would be minimal. There would be little need for a government outside of maintaining fair relationships between communities, and perhaps some minimal amount of law enforcement for grievous offenses. Beyond this, the community would be more or less self-sufficient, producing what it can, trading for what it needs but cannot produce, itself. Such would necessitate a move toward communal thinking versus individualism, a shift from our Western mindset towards a more "primitive" way of thinking that puts value on the survival of the community as a whole over any particular individual. This does not negate the value of the individual. It simply relegates the individual to one part of an interconnected whole, performing a valuable service for the community in return for the mutual support of the community.

Given this theoretical model, what aspects of it may be applicable to the "real world," and how might we go about instituting them?