This is a great analogy. I can think of one area in which it might be different though. In smaller HOAs such as mine, the HOA almost never takes any action of its own volition. It's almost always the result of some neighbor making a complaint forcing the HOA's hand, then the neighbor hides behind whatever action they compel the HOA to make. The HOA becomes the boogeyman and goes on the news, while the actual complainant gets to remain safely anonymous.
I've seen corporate firms that run HOAs professionally where they run a much more proactive/activist HOA, but in the case of my neighborhood we didn't like the results so we fired them. It was too much hawkishness about rules and the fees were heading through the roof. The more leisurely neighbor-complaint model seems to work better unfortunately. It's more efficient, even though it's quite a cowardly system if you ask me. It's better than the alternatives such as having anarchy.
I've seen corporate firms that run HOAs professionally where they run a much more proactive/activist HOA, but in the case of my neighborhood we didn't like the results so we fired them. It was too much hawkishness about rules and the fees were heading through the roof. The more leisurely neighbor-complaint model seems to work better unfortunately. It's more efficient, even though it's quite a cowardly system if you ask me. It's better than the alternatives such as having anarchy.