speaking of china...

I heard once upon a time, not so long ago and probably at work, an interesting contrast between the governments of China and the United States. I can't verify the accuracy of it but it's an interesting thought, and I tend to believe it's true at least to some extent.

As the story goes, in China the top government officials (presumably cabinet-level positions, leaders' staff, etc.) are often scientists and engineers, showing that the Chinese place a high value on innovative government and are willing to work at figuring out solutions to societal problems. With China's overly pragmatic approach to running itself, I think the evidence generally supports this. But in the United States, similar positions of leadership and support are far more often filled with lawyers and businessmen. This tends to show that Americans are more interested in figuring out how to get around a problem or profiting from it than actually solving it. Again, I think the body of evidence at hand supports such a conclusion. As I recall, the guy saying this was serious about the qualification differences but stating the implications in a tongue-in-cheek kinda way. But I think he's at least partially right.

A lot of these differences are due to worldview. (Yeah, I know. Okay, no kidding, every man-made construct has a lot to do with worldview. But follow along.) Since a communist/socialist government is built on atheism and utilitarian ideals, it follows that its rulers are going to believe that they are not only responsible for solving society's ills* on their own accord but that they are actually capable of doing it. This, of course, is nonsense, as man can't solve problems that are inherent in his nature. But that won't stop some from trying. The U.S., on the other hand, is built on the ideals of limited government and a higher power that must be relied upon. Thus, in theory, our rulers wouldn't see their role as trying to solve all of society's problems but rather to just guide it in the right direction and protect its people's rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And so the utilitarian approach is shunned in favor of something more...abstract? Scientists and engineers would, of course, tend to throw wishy-washy stuff out the window in favor of hard facts and pragmatic solutions. (How this abstractness bit fits with lawyers and businessmen being rulers I don't know, but maybe you can figure it out. I admit that the America half of this argument really craps itself when compared to today's political climate.)

Another cause that can't be overlooked is the different education systems in the two nations. This ties in with worldview, though, so I won't go into detail here. In summary, China places much more value on technical fields and the education to support progress in those fields, so not only will it tend to look more favorably upon leadership from that arena but it will also have more qualified scientists and engineers to draw upon as leaders. There's much more to the education angle but I'll address that in a later post.

The main cause, though, is closely tied to the way each nation's rulers are put in place. If China's communist government doesn't have to worry so much about losing power due to displeasure among the masses, it has the flexibility to tackle problems it thinks need to be solved and not give a rip whether or not the majority of the population agrees or can even recognize the problem. And it is in the rulers' best interests to put in place people who can actually solve the problem so that their government stays in power. The United States' republican (little "r") government, on the other hand, has a responsibility to act in accordance with the wishes of the citizens that put it in place and elected certain people to run it. So its rulers maintain their authority not necessarily by solving problems and advancing society but by assuring they are re-elected by their peers. So the obvious implication is that perception is everything and credible solutions matter only insofar as they affect perception. Is it hard to believe, then, that those in power will be the ones who are best at convincing people they're the leaders of choice through persuasive arguments or fistfulls of dollars? Not at all. Is this a good way to choose leaders? You decide.

Now lest anyone think I'm converting to communism or something, let me add that it's obvious which system of government is better. Sure, perhaps communism would be better in the freak instances where the needle-in-a-haystack great (in all ways) ruler has both the power and the wisdom to use it well, but its pitfalls are far worse and far more probable than those of democracy. Such is the case with a system of government built entirely around man's ability to fix his own mess. But nonetheless, every ideology and every culture has its pluses and minuses. We would be wise to learn from not only the mistakes of others but their successes as well.

----------
* One of these "ills" is the desire and/or ability of the people to get in the way of the ruling government's wishes. So such governments aren't actually out for the best wishes of the people but rather the best wishes of themselves. Sometimes this coincides with what is wanted or needed by the populace and sometimes it doesn't.