lifestyle leader

The Browser has brought my attention to a very interesting article from The Economist which explores the differences in professional backgrounds for political leaders around the world.

Some findings:
Lawyers dominate democracies, Africa is full of military veterans (quelle surprise), Egypt likes academics; Brazil, doctors; and South Korea, civil servants. What caught my attention, however, was the predominance of engineer-politicians in China. Many of the top dogs, including the Prime Minister, President and previous President, were trained as engineers. Here is The Economist's explanation for why this might be:

The presence of so many engineer-politicians in China goes hand in hand with a certain way of thinking. An engineer’s job, at least in theory, is to ensure things work, that the bridge stays up or the dam holds. The process by which projects get built is usually secondary. That also seems true of Chinese politics, in which government often rides roughshod over critics. Engineers are supposed to focus on the long term; buildings have no merit if they will collapse after a few years. So it is understandable that an authoritarian country like China, where development is the priority and spending on infrastructure is colossal, should push engineers to the top.

Can anyone think of any other possible reasons?

This passage reminded me of another area of work dominated by engineers: terrorism. I noticed this trend and mentioned it to an undergraduate professor of mine who specialized in political thought in the Middle East. He confirmed that, yes, this was quite common: engineers and doctors make good terrorists because they are "do-ers" and less likely to argue about theology/ideology. Instead, it's all about putting ideas into practice. Sure enough, the al-Qaeda recruitment handbook recommends recruiting among the non-religious, particularly at colleges/universities, for precisely this reason.

So obviously I'm not suggesting that all terrorists are engineers, or that all engineers are terrorists, or even that all Chinese politicians are terrorists. Disclaimers aside, however, the parallel between terrorist groups and China's leadership is an interesting idea to play with. In both cases there is a strong ideological/theological foundation which the academics can quibble over, and, when it comes to getting things done, they turn to the engineers.