I believe technical competence is uncorrelated to adminisitrative effectiveness.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Hsien_Loong
I don't. Many Asian nations (including Singapore, China, etc.) are largely governed by engineering majors and I do believe this has been helpful for improving administrative effectiveness. This stands in stark contrast to countries where governance is dominated by either lawyers (the US) or military members (many other developing nations).
Our last two presidents have professional degrees from the same institution (Harvard) and they do not govern in the same fashion in most areas other than counter-terrorism. China also doesn't choose it's politicians via elections, thus someone who is highly technical and let me stereotype here for a second... most likely not charismatic and/or having developed a sense of political empathy... facets that a lawyer or career manager (MBA) are more likely to develop, would be able to move up in the ranks (in the CCP in this case).
However, this doesn't really reflect on HOW someone chooses to implement policy or govern, comparing China vs U.S. is apples and oranges because you can't legitimately protest the CCP, this isn't the case of the major parties in the U.S. Thus the policies will be molded to some extent of popular opinion, which is normally not true in a dictatorship.
However, it extends far beyond the head of state. All levels of government in Chinese government are dominated by engineers instead of lawyers or career politicians.
> However, this doesn't really reflect on HOW someone chooses to implement policy or govern
Of course it does. We even have a word for it: technocracy. There are dramatic differences and if you don't think that then I'm curious why you delved into perpetrating negative stereotypes about engineers.
On my somewhat poorly worded point about engineers on average being less interpersonal than a typical lawyer/mba. I don't view such attributes negatively; my intention was to point out that engineers' day-to-day jobs don't normally involve work oriented social interaction with people they don't know(i.e. someone other than their team). Putting it another way a lawyer/manager without strong interpersonal skills has a lower career ceiling than an engineer with personality trait. Thus it isn't unreasonable to assume said fields attract different types of people. Thus governance being a partial function of what subject someone opted for in school would in my opinion act as a very small variable in contrast to why X person choose said subject.
> Of course it does. We even have a word for it: technocracy.
It's an apples to oranges comparison if it's China(or Singapore) vs. the U.S. The governments of the former don't have anything close to real representation for it's people(More China than Singapore), thus the policy makers don't have to seriously consider popular opinion outside of keeping the populace from revolting, which is a far cry from the American system where an individual politician can be unseated within a short time frame.
Law and politics warp your view of the world because everything becomes a subjective, debatable matter of opinion.
Politics is especially dangerous because the definition of a successful argument is one that increases your power. Facts are tangential at best, distracting and unwelcome at worst.
The corresponding problem for people with STEM backgrounds is a lack of understanding that this is how politics works. If your approach is based on facts, model-building, and reality testing, it's incredibly easy to be blindsided by a career politician - or career manager - who only cares about public opinion, and is perfectly prepared to lie professionally if they make more money and/or gain more power from it.
I have found this disturbing view among many of the bay-area programmer friends I have - that life is a cut-and-dry game in which the losers in life deserve nothing - which I do not agree with. The animosity that the programmers face as a community in SFO may be down precisely to their view of others.
Plenty of STEM majors appreciate soft virtues and are large-hearted. In fact, I'd argue that lawyers are far more likely to see the evil in everyone (it's practically their job_ and to be oppose to mercy.
Indeed.
It's important to keep in mind that a technocratic leader will likely not do well or have effective results in a political system dominated by lawyers (as Hoover shows).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Merkel#Early_life_and_e...