Kratein

Everyone knows about me and my crazy politics - legalise pretty much everything, complete net neutrality, corporations have a duty to society and not just to themselves, governments rarely (if ever) have the best interests of the people at heart, we should rise up and govern ourselves...

...so it may seem a bit odd that I'm now advocating a technocracy.

The thing is, as patronising as I sound, what people want and what's actually good for them may not be the same thing - hence you get people with actual qualifications to run the country instead of relying on a bunch of lawyers and novelists. Thus teachers/educators/psychologists run the schools, scientists are in charge of science, economists run the Treasury...

...It's not perfect - no political system will ever be - and I can imagine that there'd be almighty arguments about funding. The head of state would probably have to be a world-class diplomat just to stop the Cabinet from tearing itself apart. But individual ministries would probably do well.

There are two things I don't like about this arrangement. The first is that it's not particularly democratic - ordinary people probably wouldn't get that involved in the business of the nation. The second is that it shouldn't even be a necessary arrangement in the first place - people should already be educated enough to make informed decisions about things, decisions which won't tank the economy, cause violent uprisings around the country or leave children illiterate and innumerate by the time they finish primary school.

They aren't.

Some people don't understand statistics or science; still others do not understand psychology, sociology or economics.

Instead, they rely on the media, which frequently gets facts wrong, distorts statistics, prizes scare-stories and anecdotal evidence above truth, mistakes PR stunts for science, and gleefully pushes simple, populist worldviews on an audience which doesn't know better.

There are many books and articles available for anyone who wants to know more about this (I particularly recommend Bad Science by Ben Goldacre and Flat Earth News by Nick Davies), but the people who read them tend to be more educated anyway, and more likely to seek out that kind of information. The ones who really need it are the ones who don't know it exists in the first place, don't care, don't have the time...

...They're not only vulnerable to the media - they're perfect bait for politicians who can sway them with simplistic arguments, empty rhetoric and misquoted figures (or absolute bullshit, if that's the way you roll).

So, stupid people doing stupid things. Nothing new, only worries a few nerds - the rest of us should laugh at them, right? There's nothing to worry about, is there?

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups. Never underestimate the damage they can do when they turn to the business of running something as large and complex as a country. Ignoring any and all evidence, they will hand out harsh sentences to anyone even tangentially involved in the riots (creating resentment and social instability, as well as crowding prisons to bursting), deport them (straining diplomatic relations and putting a hole in the budget), introduce Islamophobic and anti-immigrant measures (immigration could boost an economy desperately in need of a kick up the backside, and Islamophobia...well...no civilised society should discriminate against any race or religion), and generally tanking the economy. That was my cursory look at what they would do - I could have gone into much more detail.

I want a democracy - I want people to rule their own country. But as long as the majority are populists, thinking only what the media and politicians tell them to think, I will favour technocracy. I will favour educated, qualified people doing what they know is right, rather than uneducated, unqualified people being driven by appeals to emotion.

There is a solution to this problem - a very effective one - but it will take years to implement, and it will not be popular. It's called education.

Every person should have at least a cursory knowledge of:
    Some people may say that this is a lot to ask someone to learn, and they'd be right. I'm still learning - it's taken me years and I still only have a very basic idea of what I'm doing. It'll probably take me a lifetime to be able to hold an intelligent discussion on even one of those topics. Still, that's no excuse for not even looking into them in the first place - even knowing a few basic facts helps immensely.

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