Would you prefer government by engineers or lawyers? | Hacker News Reader

Would you prefer government by engineers or lawyers?

theatlantic.com

8 pointsjgeada10 comments

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

> In ancient Athenian democracy, sortition was the traditional and primary method for appointing political officials, and its use was regarded as a principal characteristic of democracy.[5][6] Sortition is often classified as a method for both direct democracy and deliberative democracy.

No one that thinks they should lead, should actually lead in my opinion.

https://archive.today/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/arch...

https://archive.is/uijFH

The modern US is notoriously run for lawyers, by lawyers, and every facet of everything is contoured by what lawyers want. But does this lead to a viable country or is it a path to paralysis?

Neither. I'd prefer an actually representative government.

I like to think about bicameral legislatures where the houses are really different. How about one full of lawyers (know how to write law) and one full of non-lawyers (have empathy for "the rest of us")

The non-lawyers speak (for the rest of "us") and the lawyers listen and interpret?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicameral_mentality

That's called 'populism' right? 'Do things the way real everyday people, the average voter, wants them to be done'. It's not just a path to disaster - it's an immediate, acute disaster for any society.

No, that's not what I'm talking about. Rather, I'm talking about the representatives coming from a background that reflects that of the people, rather than being dominated by lawyers, engineers, businesspeople, or other special interests.

That's different from just "doing everything the average voter wants done." That approach could be done even if the representatives weren't from diverse backgrounds.

> I'd prefer an actually representative government.

Your representatives are predominantly lawyers.

40% are lawyers, and 25% are business/banking.

What the author misses is the fact that lawyers in American politics have been supplanted by businessmen (with a significant admixture of celebrities). This vitiates his point about the importance of rules.

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