Power of the Worthy

Anti-COVID protests are raging in China, and this is a good reason to talk about meritocracy.

Few people imagine the scale of Chinese quarantines. Testing of the entire population of large cities every 72/48 hours. Small children taken from sick parents. Workers who are locked up in their factories for weeks and months. The very real prospect of hunger in apartments with welded doors. People who can't get out of fires.

A feature of the Chinese bureaucracy is its meritocratic nature. The success of a Chinese official directly depends not only on the level of his education (therefore, getting into Peking University or Qinhua is the dream of any student; compare with the Soviet nomenclature, in which graduating from a prestigious university rather hindered, rather than helped in career growth), but also on his success as a leader, first of all - from the economic growth in the entrusted region and the volume of attracted investments.

Yes, as a result, China is already getting an aging, shrinking population with very low fertility, not even close to becoming a rich country like Japan. The reason is the one-child policy (already actually canceled, but which managed to change the very social norms - ideas about an acceptable family size) and 300 million internal migrants - from the village to the city, living on bird's rights (without permanent registration - hukou), not even able to send the child to the city school. The birth rate is catastrophically low, but parents without children can engage in economic growth. Yes, growth for the sake of growth, with ghost towns and empty highways. Yes, a fantastically low level of mutual trust in society, fixed by research (why does the Communist Party need mutual trust? Where there is trust, there is self-organization, and if there is self-organization, why is the Communist Party needed?).

But with the task that was set before them, the Chinese officials coped brilliantly. Per capita GDP has grown 18(!) times over thirty years - and this is at parity, in nominal terms - 40 times. Xi, having come to power, in addition engaged in the establishment of an iron order (under the sauce of fighting corruption), forcing all officials to clutch their hearts at the words "Party Commission for Discipline Inspection." Add to this the most advanced facial recognition systems, the universal transition to electronic money, the widespread use of Big Data in government, provided in abundance by half a billion Chinese people who spend half their lives on Weibo, and so on. As a result, Xi has at his disposal a competent, efficient and obedient state apparatus, in which career growth is built on meritocratic principles.

And how did he use it? And this is how he ordered it - closing entire cities for the most severe quarantines because of one sick person. Politics, the senselessness of which has long been obvious to everyone, from the townsfolk to the highest party officials. A single screen of unknown origin that appeared on Weibo, promising to ease the quarantine measures after the 20th CCP Congress, led to a flurry on Chinese stock exchanges. The screen turned out to be fake, but the dream of people to someday get out of this hell of lockdowns is so strong that people are ready to believe anything.

But is this a unique case? Look, Napoleon, who became emperor, got a huge army of revolutionary France, which went through many years of battles with all of Europe. In this army, only those who showed themselves to be a good and brave commander in dozens of battles became generals. Both yesterday's aristocrat and yesterday's peasant could become a general - meritocracy in all its glory. Hitler got an army in which the best officers of the First World War were generals - those who, in more than four years of fighting, proved to be the best in countless battles against the French, British, Canadians, Australians, Russians, Italians, Serbs, Belgians, Arabs and so on. list. Take the list of commanders of the armies and corps of the Wehrmacht for May 1940 - and look for people there who were promoted to the highest positions due to their origin, intrigues, connections, and not thanks to their achievements in the First World War. (Lieutenant Guderian in 1914 commanded a heavy radio station, and in the fall of 1917 he was already the head of the operational department of the army headquarters; in the Red Army, such positions, by the way, were occupied by major generals).

And how did Napoleon and Hitler dispose of the magnificent armies at their disposal? With all these invincible divisions capable of achieving incredible, unheard-of victories? Both burned their countries in the fire of endless war, depriving them of the lion's share of young men and bringing their enemies to their own capitals.

Andropov and his student Gorbachev saw that in the midst of the ocean of inefficiency of the Soviet economy, a mighty island of the military-industrial complex was rising, capable of producing a competitive product and even competing on an equal footing (not in everything, but in many respects) with the Americans. While the light industry could not arrange the production of more or less decent shoes, the military-industrial complex built the Buran and other technical miracles. Within the military-industrial complex, strictly meritocratic principles operated: the success of a designer was determined not so much by his political loyalty or ability to weave intrigues, as in the party nomenclature, the army and special services, but by his ability to think well. The design bureaus competed fiercely for orders with each other and for technical superiority with the collective West. No one doubted the exceptional intellectual and managerial abilities of the famous Soviet aviation, space, and nuclear designers.

Deng Xiaoping, who came to power at the end of 1978, had before his eyes instead of the Chinese economy a scorched field, controlled by no one knows how - all that was left after Mao's Cultural Revolution. In general, he did not have any special alternatives to the market: Beijing already poorly controlled what was happening in the regions. Andropov, who came to power more than three years later, had an effective military-industrial complex in front of his eyes (built, once again, on meritocratic principles). Both he and Gorbachev made great efforts to turn the entire Soviet economy into one huge military-industrial complex: starting with the anti-alcohol campaign and the struggle for discipline, and ending with the introduction of universal state acceptance (which used to be only at defense enterprises). People from the military-industrial complex were actively promoted to the highest levels of power, mechanical engineering was declared a super-priority of the party. The result ... however, everyone already knows it.

A meritocratic system can be fantastically effective at accomplishing its intended goals. And this is where her main problem lies: the one at whose disposal she ends up can set impossible tasks for her - and she will try to complete them until she breaks the back of herself and everyone around her.

For many centuries in China there was a system of examinations for officials. Only those who demonstrated outstanding abilities could occupy high positions. The officials had a clear task: to maintain the order of things established by tradition, to squeeze merchants, from whom there is still no use, to maintain peace and tranquility. And in general, with rare exceptions, Chinese officials succeeded. While in Europe robber barons, adventurers, pirates, conquistadors, condottieres, slave traders, bankers, profit-hungry industrialists, dooming worthy and virtuous fathers of families to loss of work and starvation, intellectual rebels who rejected both Aristotle and St. Augustine - in general, while all this trash was rushing around Europe, Chinese officials served the teachings of Confucius, sacredly guarding the established order once and for all.

And then strange iron ships sailed to their shores, about which Confucius did not say anything. And the established order was replaced by chaos - once and for all.

Vasily Topolev 2022-12-01