by Brandon Burley and The Redemption Project
One of the most common sources of frustration in public life is simple:
People expect one office to do what another office actually controls
Governors, sheriffs, courts, legislatures — each has different authority.
But those differences aren’t always widely understood.
So expectations rise… and then reality doesn’t match them.
That gap creates frustration.
Not always because something went wrong, but because the structure wasn’t clear in the first place.
So I ask my students:
Which office do people misunderstand the most?