China is run by engineers (really)
This month’s IEEE Spectrum just turned up, and features an in-depth look at the state of technology in China. Excellent reading, whether you have a current interest in China or not.
Among the interesting sidebars, a note that all 9 members of the Chinese Politburo have an engineering background:
- Hu Jintao - Tsinghua University, water conservancy engineering
- Huang Ju, Tsinghua University, electrical engineering
- Jia Qinglin, Hebei Engineering College, department of electrical power
- Li Changchun, Harbin Institute of Technology, department of electrical machinery
- Luo Gan, Freiberg University of Mining and Technology
- Wen Jiabao, Beijing Institute of Geology, department of geology and minerals
- Wu Bangguo, Tsinghua University, radio engineering
- Wu Guanzheng, Tsinghua University, power department
- Zeng Qinghong, Beijing Institute of Technology, automatic control department
I had a suspicion that the US Cabinet is mostly lawyers, so I thought I would take a quick look:
- Mike Johanns, Dept of Agriculture - Creighton University - lawyer
- Carlos Gutierrez, Dept of Commerce - Monterrey Institute of Technology - Business
- Donald Rumsfeld, Dept of Defense - Princeton, A.B.
- Margaret Spellings, Dept of Education - Univ of Houston, political science, journalism
- Samuel W. Bodman, Dept of Energy - Cornell BS ChemEng, MIT ScD
- Michael Leavitt, Dept of HHS - Southern Utah University, economics, business
- Michael Chertoff, Dept of Homeland Security - Harvard - lawyer
- Alphonso Jackson, Dept of HUD - Washington University - lawyer
- Gale A. Norton, Dept of Interior - University of Denver - lawyer
- Alberto Gonzales, Dept of Justice - Harvard - lawyer
- Elaine Chao, Dept of Labor - Harvard - MBA
- Condoleezza Rice, Dept of State - Univ of Denver - PhD, international studies
- Norman Y. Mineta, Dept of Transportation - UC Berkeley - MBA
- John W. Snow, Dept of Treasury - Univ of Virginia - PhD, economics, George Washington University law degree
- Jim Nicholson, Dept of VA - West Point
- Dick Cheney, Vice President - Univ of Wyoming, BA, MA
- Joshua Bolten, Office of Management and Budget - Stanford - lawyer
- Stephen L. Johnson, EPA - George Washington University - MS - Pathology
- Andrew H. Card, Jr, Chief of Staff - Univ of South Carolina - BS Engineering
- Rob Portman, US Trade Ambassador - lawyer
- John P. Walters, Office of Drug Control Policy - University of Toledo, MA
The US political system is vastly different than China’s, so the US cabinet isn’t exactly equivalent to the Chinese Politburo, and everyone working at this level of government has significant political skills, but it’s interesting to observe the emphasis given to lawyering in the US cabinet.
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October 20th, 2007 at 11:45 am
[…] Yesterday Jasper Becker, publisher of Asia Weekly and the author of Dragon Rising (among many other titles), gave an informal talk about the 17th National Party Congress (which as Bradley mentioned, began today) , at a dim sum brunch hosted by the Yale Club of Beijing. At some point he pointed out that China’s leadership is unique in that all nine members of the politburo come from an engineering background (President Hu Jintao, FYI, has a degree in hydraulic engineering),as opposed to the lawyer types you’ll find amongst politicans in the West and elsewhere (Tony Blair, Bill Clinton). (Random fact of the day: “Little Bush,” as the Chinese call him, is the first American president to hold a Masters in business administration.) […]
February 12th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
There goes my theory about engineers being better human beings