An Engineer to Run Japan
It seems the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) smoked the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in today`s national election, ending the LDP`s five decade rule over Japan. Change comes slowly here, I guess. And "change" seemed to be the theme in the 2 week campaign. 2 weeks. Imagine only having to endure Obama/Clinton/McCain/Bush/Kerry/Gore/Whoever for a grand total of 2 weeks per election! Sweet. No such luck, I suppose. Americans prefer those two year marathons instead. Anyway, as the new guys cruise into power to change Japan, the country will get Yukio Hatoyama as Prime Minister. He`s an engineer trained at Tokyo University in Japan and Stanford University in California. It might be interesting to have a Ph.D. engineer running the place for while. A different way of thinking is certainly needed.
Update: Some post-election details on Yukio from the Washington Post.
Two weeks is definitely better then two years, though it was pretty clear where things were headed a year ago. I think the result was really a vote of no confidence in the Abe -> Fukuda -> Aso and the blundering of the LDP, rather then a vote for the DPJ.
I am still undecided about the new Prime Minister. I think it will take the DPJ some time to adjust to their new position before start being an effective government, so its probably good they have a large majority. If Hatoyama's statements are more then rhetoric he has a big enough mandate from the electorate to make serious changes.
Posted by Edward Middleton on August 31, 2009 at 10:15 PM JST #
His campaign brochure says that his engineering degree is in "mathematical engineering and information physics" (東京大学工学部 計数工学科卒業).
Other sources also show that his Ph.D. is in industrial engineering.
Posted by W. Wayne Liauh on September 01, 2009 at 02:17 AM JST #
yah, I think having an engineer could be interesting. he`s a very smart guy, so hopefully we won`t be as embarrassed as we`ve been in the past with some of the statement coming from JP pols. :) One can only hope. Engineers as political leaders is somewhat rare here and in the U.S. The last engineer president in the US was Jimmy Carter in the mid 1970s.
Posted by Jim Grisanzio on September 01, 2009 at 09:50 PM JST #
What I am most interested is that, as an engineer/engineering professor (not just any engineer, but a "mathematical and information" engineer) and, more importantly, as a maverick (he met his wife when she was still married--his goal was not to marry the best single woman in the world, but the best woman, period), he should be more receptive to non-Windows, non-Mac based computer operating systems. More than any other politician in the world.
And Japan desperately needs this kind of free thinking.
So, perhaps--just perhaps--we can try to recruit him to become a Solaris/OpenSolaris user/enthusiast? Perhaps sending him a copy of Jaris as a start?
I always have this belief that many of Japan's current problems are tied to the decades-long Intel/Microsoft dominance in the IP industry. The near-absolute dominance of Japanese-localized Windows in Japan has caused Japanese software users and developers to be almost totally isolated (what I had termed "localization-locked") from the rest of the world (history has a peculiar way of repeating itself, doesn't it?)
In order for Japan to begin selling software and software-related services to the rest of the world, Japan must leverage its resources to make universally acceptable an operating system of which localization is merely an interchangeable interface and not an embedded part.
As the second largest economy in the world, Japan has a lot of resources to leverage against. And, as the person who has just decimated the ruling party that his grand father founded, Hatoyama may be the best person to break the doldrums.
So, our congratulatory wire to Dr. Yukio Hatoyama probably should include something like this: Can Sun/Oracle help? :-)
Posted by W. Wayne Liauh on September 02, 2009 at 03:34 AM JST #
@Wayne
Really, you're most interested in the new engineer PM promoting FOSS and de-emphasizing Windows? That strikes me as pie in the sky. He's bound to have his hands full with other stuff. Heck, I'd like to see Japan end whaling, and leave blue fin tuna stocks alone for a while so they recover, but I'm sure he'll be busy enough as it is.
Incidentally, engineers have a poor track record as politicians in the U.S., Hoover, Carter, both were disastrous. The common thread seems to be that engineers don't understand politics, thinking that, like every engineering problem, political/economic problems can be dealt with as an engineering exercise. But that's not how politics works. To begin with, economics is a "dirty science", and engineers aren't usually economists anyways -- there often are multiple plausible arguments for doing one thing or another (or not doing any), and there's not enough large scale experiments (and when they happen, say, in Zimbabwe, Cuba, ..., many here and elsewhere are too willing to ignore or argue away the results). And as you can see from the health care reform debates, simple, dry engineering ("bending the cost curve") is not enough.
Posted by Nico on September 02, 2009 at 05:43 AM JST #
@nico
there are engineers and there are engineers. Also, having an engineering degree does not make him/her an engineer for life. E.g., I have a Ph.D in chemical engineering, but I also have a law degree. Marc Andreessen was a computer programmer, but he is now, as we all know, a big time VC. Are we engineers or are we not? The answer is probably more "no" than "yes", but at least for me, the engineering training does help. And sometimes it has helped a lot.
It's unfortunate that both of the two engineer/politician presidents in the US did not leave an enviable track record. But Hoover was a civil engineer and Carter was trained as a submarine nuclear engineer. This was one of the two key points that I tried to impress: Mr. Hatoyama was an engineer of a much more general discipline. Whether that made any difference, your guess is just as good as mine.
Back to the issue of "engineers as politicians". One of the key factors IMO that China was able to move so fast is that ALL of the nine standing committee members in the politburo are engineers. China's former president was an electrical engineer, the current president Hu Jingtao has a degree in hydraulic engineering from "the MIT of China" (Tsinghua University), and the next-in-line president Xi Jinpin also has a chemical engineering degree and a law degree. Even its security chief, Zhou Yongkang, was a highly respected petroleum engineer for quite a few years (I actually had a chance of working with the Hon. Zhou Yongkang back when I was a petroleum engineer sent by Exxon to China). China's politics may be corrupt at the local level, but it does run a very clean and very efficient central government. Something you might expect from a group of engineers.
Anyway, I don't know how valid it is to use our own experience in the west to predict what might or might not happen in the East. The political environment in Japan is also vastly different than that in China. The two are simply incomparable. But, of course, I can make dreams as wild as I want--since I don't have to assume no responsibility.
Posted by W. Wayne Liauh on September 02, 2009 at 08:55 AM JST #