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More personal observations about national governance

I have in the past decades commented on national governance and forms  of government. The first article was in 2008

1.   Fragilityof modern civilization – some personal observationstp://www.sciencenet.cn/m/user_content.aspx?id=223319

2.   Parkinson's Law and theFuture of America  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-2028.html

3.   Machiavalli'sdictum http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-3214.html

4.   Democracyand The Arrow Impossibility Theorem  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-4695.html

5.   Changing andChallenging China  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-298255.html

6.   The limits ofDemocracy http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-439119.html

7.   Will the 21stCentury Belong to China?  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=1565&do=blog&id=462590

8.   The Dark Side of Meritocracy  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-505370.html

9.  Democracy vs. Meritocracy and Term Limitshttp://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-736976.html

10.              Democracy and the Short Term View  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-750725.html

11.              Democracy vs Meritocratic Authoritarianism (II)  http://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-805196.html

12.              衣食饱後知廉恥 - The Beijing Model vs. Democracyhttp://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-842346.html

The most recent was 11 months ago. Last week I happened to listened tothe NPR TED radio hour about “the meaning of WORK” http://www.npr.org/podcasts/510298/ted-radio-hour and the Super Chicken Theory (Google this URL and listen to the talk).  Basically it was a social experiment involving two group of chickens:  one group of average chickens, and another group of highly selected and productive chickens. After several generations, the group of average chickens survived quite well and are prosperous while the group of super chickens end up killing each other through competition and about to go extinct. This is a comment on individuality and aggressive competition – the basis of capitalism and democracy.

Another manifestation of this phenomenon is the recent best selling book of Thomas Piketty (Captial in the 21^stCentury) in which he  proposed the inherent inequity under capitalism resulting in the inevitable  income gap between the rich and the poor.

Taking these two themes together, one might speculate if the current American political  gridlock and social problems can be explained on such bases. Certainly  America prides herself on individualism and competition. Almost every kid is taught  to be self-reliant and working hard. Independence and competition are built into our physic since very young. But is the “Super-Chicken theory” beginning to raise its ugly head in the US  civilization? Is the WEST heading for self destruction in another couple of generations?

On the other hand, the eastern philosophy seems to emphasize  group identity over individualism, social harmony over aggressive competition,  and meritocratic authoritarianism over populist democracy. This is why China is often  referred to as a civilization state rather than a nation. Who is to say that the Chinese model may not be the better alternative? This is certainly food for thought and stuff political philosopher will debate for the next  hundreds of year if humans survive that long.