I wonder how much this is about people in general, and how much is an effect of selection. People who do not have strong preference for status, usually do not get to the situation where they have to choose whether to be a president of a state that is losing the war. People who do not have strong preference for being #1 in the Soviet Union, usually do not become a General Secretary.
I agree with this paragraph.
And that is kinda a common knowledge; I don’t remember the exact words now, but it goes something like “the power should not be given to those who desire it, but to those who don’t”.
That seems, naively, like a good plan. I agree that in practice it does not work well. Here’s an argument to add to yours -
Let’s look at two common political systems
Monarchy- The advantages of a monarchy to the selectorate are
1. That the leader is not selected for status seeking, unlike a warlord
2. Leader selection has a high shilling point around the lineage, keeping warlords out
Democracy—Most democracies accept that leaders will be status seeking. They then use voting and constitutions to force these status-seeking actors to serve our interests.
Democracies have generally produced more utility for their citizens than monarchy
My pet theory: High status individuals are selected for status seeking. But they are also selected for organizational skill, charisma, intelligence, predictive ability, etc.
Makes sense; people who have useful skills should be more successful in status seeking, ceteris paribus.
You won’t get people who are best at given skills, but some combination of high status seeking and good enough skills. In monarchy… you get people who were trained in relevant skills from birth, but maybe they just don’t have the talent, or don’t care. Also, an ambitious politician can also train their kids from birth; the political dynasties do exist in democracies—probably much more than we realize, if we don’t only look at the presidents’ surnames, but consider the “ruling class” in general. (Heck, I just looked into Wikipedia and found that Barack Obama is a relative of George W. Bush. What?!)
I agree with this paragraph.
That seems, naively, like a good plan. I agree that in practice it does not work well. Here’s an argument to add to yours -
Let’s look at two common political systems
Monarchy- The advantages of a monarchy to the selectorate are
1. That the leader is not selected for status seeking, unlike a warlord
2. Leader selection has a high shilling point around the lineage, keeping warlords out
Democracy—Most democracies accept that leaders will be status seeking. They then use voting and constitutions to force these status-seeking actors to serve our interests.
Democracies have generally produced more utility for their citizens than monarchy
My pet theory: High status individuals are selected for status seeking. But they are also selected for organizational skill, charisma, intelligence, predictive ability, etc.
Makes sense; people who have useful skills should be more successful in status seeking, ceteris paribus.
You won’t get people who are best at given skills, but some combination of high status seeking and good enough skills. In monarchy… you get people who were trained in relevant skills from birth, but maybe they just don’t have the talent, or don’t care. Also, an ambitious politician can also train their kids from birth; the political dynasties do exist in democracies—probably much more than we realize, if we don’t only look at the presidents’ surnames, but consider the “ruling class” in general. (Heck, I just looked into Wikipedia and found that Barack Obama is a relative of George W. Bush. What?!)