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> The vast majority of technocrats in government service are political appointees chosen "Vast majority" seems like an exaggeration. But your point is exactly
by wahern 5y ago
> The vast majority of technocrats in government service are political appointees chosen
"Vast majority" seems like an exaggeration. But your point is exactly the first thing that came to mind, particularly when the author said that we should study the phenomenon of technocratic power. People do study it; that's how we get terms like regulatory capture.
- mattkrause 5y agoYeah, that can't possibly be correct. The Department of Defense employs two million people, and literally none of them are empowered to start a war. There are a lot of experts in munitions and logistics and everything else and job is to inform and execute the decisions made by the political parts of the government. Their counterparts elsewhere in the Civil Service do the same. It seems kind of obvious to me that a democracy has to have this structure: if the technocrats were directly setting high-level policy, what would the political appointees even do? Likewise, you need more implementers than steer-era.