I think using randomized trials to search for successful policies is more likely to happen in China than in the United States. Large chunks of Chinese policy are not up for discussion, let alone experimentation, but their authoritarian leaders are mostlyengineers and can just mandate policy.
I’ve been seeing this meme a lot lately, that the PRC leadership are engineers. It seems to be used in an implicit sense of ‘they are practically scientists, and will be cool & rational & open to broader application of the scientific method (whatever their other failings), and we can generally expect rational actions of them’.
This bothers me.
There’s the obvious point that even if they are rational actors, they may share few of our values and their rationality be a bad thing from our point of view; it’s a common interpretation of the Party that it is ruthless, murderous, and determined to keep China intact and under its control (and there are racial undertones here of Han supremacy).
It’s not clear at all that engineering is associated with the better parts of the scientific tradition and with rationality in general, given the connection between engineers and terrorism (and creationism is mentioned).
I would seek out information on what the PRC leadership actually thinks and does. What you find in the media is extremely misleading when it comes to the modern Chinese Communist Party (contrary to popular belief it has undergone considerable political reform as well as economic reform). Indeed, the PRC actually does already roll out policy in an experimental way before making it widespread. I recommend reading Mark Leonard’s What Does China Think? for a short, popular introduction. David Shambaugh’s China’s Communist Party: Atrophy and Adaptation is a scholarly account that gives an idea of what’s going on in China’s many think tanks.
Note: I’m not condoning the Chinese Communist Party’s actions or recommending their political system. It’s just one area where I’ve done some research and discovered the truth is very, very far from what’s ordinarily presented. The PRC leadership have, as far as I can tell, at least been trying to build a meritocratic political system in which there are no general elections but a great deal of experimentation in ways to elicit and respond to feedback from the citizenship. Whether they’ve succeeded or not is another matter. At the very least they’ve managed to create a system where power is exchanged peacefully and the leadership has a relatively high level of education.
David Shambaugh’s China’s Communist Party: Atrophy and Adaptation is a scholarly account that gives an idea of what’s going on in China’s many think tanks.
I don’t look at Chinese politics and immediately think rational. I don’t see or expect much rationality from Chinese leaders with respect to Taiwan for instance. But why are so many of China’s top leaders educated as engineers? I don’t know what process they go through to gain political power in China, but it sure seems to lead to different demographics than for US politicians.
One piece of Chinese policy that seems pretty smart/rational is their long term infrastructure projects. Even if keeping the Chinese Communist Party in power is their first priority, long term thinking is a high priority for them. From the news of big infrastructure projects I’ve read about, China has much clearer thinking on infrastructure than the US.
For the types of policy that aren’t tabooed, China is more likely to be able to experiment than the US—if for no other reason than that they don’t care about hurting people for the ‘greater good’ (not necessarily a good thing). Also, they are less accountable to local people for their actions, so “Not in my backyard” is much less of a constraint.
One piece of Chinese policy that seems pretty smart/rational is their long term infrastructure projects. Even if keeping the Chinese Communist Party in power is their first priority, long term thinking is a high priority for them. From the news of big infrastructure projects I’ve read about, China has much clearer thinking on infrastructure than the US.
Smart from one point of view, perhaps.
I see a great deal of criticism of it—that the investments are terrible, the market is over-saturated, things like high-speed rail are leading to perverse consequences like migrants overloading the bus system to avoid the necessarily high-priced tickets, and the whole shebang is basically welfare to keep the house of cards going until someone finally eats all the bad debt from the railroads (http://chovanec.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/beijings-bad-debt-bailout-problem-solved/) and other big projects you laud.
I think using randomized trials to search for successful policies is more likely to happen in China than in the United States. Large chunks of Chinese policy are not up for discussion, let alone experimentation, but their authoritarian leaders are mostly engineers and can just mandate policy.
I’ve been seeing this meme a lot lately, that the PRC leadership are engineers. It seems to be used in an implicit sense of ‘they are practically scientists, and will be cool & rational & open to broader application of the scientific method (whatever their other failings), and we can generally expect rational actions of them’.
This bothers me.
There’s the obvious point that even if they are rational actors, they may share few of our values and their rationality be a bad thing from our point of view; it’s a common interpretation of the Party that it is ruthless, murderous, and determined to keep China intact and under its control (and there are racial undertones here of Han supremacy).
It’s not clear at all that engineering is associated with the better parts of the scientific tradition and with rationality in general, given the connection between engineers and terrorism (and creationism is mentioned).
I would seek out information on what the PRC leadership actually thinks and does. What you find in the media is extremely misleading when it comes to the modern Chinese Communist Party (contrary to popular belief it has undergone considerable political reform as well as economic reform). Indeed, the PRC actually does already roll out policy in an experimental way before making it widespread. I recommend reading Mark Leonard’s What Does China Think? for a short, popular introduction. David Shambaugh’s China’s Communist Party: Atrophy and Adaptation is a scholarly account that gives an idea of what’s going on in China’s many think tanks.
Note: I’m not condoning the Chinese Communist Party’s actions or recommending their political system. It’s just one area where I’ve done some research and discovered the truth is very, very far from what’s ordinarily presented. The PRC leadership have, as far as I can tell, at least been trying to build a meritocratic political system in which there are no general elections but a great deal of experimentation in ways to elicit and respond to feedback from the citizenship. Whether they’ve succeeded or not is another matter. At the very least they’ve managed to create a system where power is exchanged peacefully and the leadership has a relatively high level of education.
One of the things that seems to be emphasized in what I’ve read is how difficult it is for Westerners to understand what is going on inside the Party, but the reviews of that sound interesting (especially the talk http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/events/2008/0415_china/20080415_china.pdf ), so I’ll put it on my list.
I don’t look at Chinese politics and immediately think rational. I don’t see or expect much rationality from Chinese leaders with respect to Taiwan for instance. But why are so many of China’s top leaders educated as engineers? I don’t know what process they go through to gain political power in China, but it sure seems to lead to different demographics than for US politicians.
One piece of Chinese policy that seems pretty smart/rational is their long term infrastructure projects. Even if keeping the Chinese Communist Party in power is their first priority, long term thinking is a high priority for them. From the news of big infrastructure projects I’ve read about, China has much clearer thinking on infrastructure than the US.
For the types of policy that aren’t tabooed, China is more likely to be able to experiment than the US—if for no other reason than that they don’t care about hurting people for the ‘greater good’ (not necessarily a good thing). Also, they are less accountable to local people for their actions, so “Not in my backyard” is much less of a constraint.
Smart from one point of view, perhaps.
I see a great deal of criticism of it—that the investments are terrible, the market is over-saturated, things like high-speed rail are leading to perverse consequences like migrants overloading the bus system to avoid the necessarily high-priced tickets, and the whole shebang is basically welfare to keep the house of cards going until someone finally eats all the bad debt from the railroads (http://chovanec.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/beijings-bad-debt-bailout-problem-solved/) and other big projects you laud.