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Government Efficiency and Network Theory

Posted by kdawson on Mon May 12, 2008 02:12 AM
from the far-too-many-cooks dept.
Government Math News Science
Science News reports on a study relating (in a loose way) the efficiency of a national government with the size of its cabinet. Researchers in Vienna found that the development level of countries, as a proxy for the efficiency of their governments, is in general lower for countries with more members in the national cabinets. They then went on to model cabinet members as nodes in a network and found support for the observed correlation. There was even specific evidence for the decades-old observation of English historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson that decision-making is severely impaired in committees of more than 20 people. The US is getting close to Parkinson's cutoff, at 17.
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  • Well, that explains... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 12 2008, @02:18AM (#23375222)

    There was even specific evidence for the decades-old observation of English historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson that decision-making is severely impaired in committees of more than 20 people.
    Well that explains the ISO.

    Oh, and the corruption of course.

    • Re:Well, that explains... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ShieldW0lf (601553) on Monday May 12 2008, @08:13AM (#23376950) Journal
      Slavery is a good deal more efficient than negotiating with unions. An Emperor is a good deal more efficient than Democracy. Do we want to live in a perfectly efficient world? No. We do not. 99% of the foolish, arrogant ideas held by those in positions of authority should be prevented from ever being pursued in a serious fashion.

      Efficiency, ultra-violence, ultra-realism and secret prison camps. Gee, where does this all lead?

  • National governments (Score:4, Interesting)

    by I_am_the_cheese (1264298) on Monday May 12 2008, @02:21AM (#23375236)
    This can, at best, describe the cabinet-level and section of the governments. With many different structures, a poor measure at best. A proper study would require many more measurements, and be weighted by the decision powers given to various levels of government. The Japanese diet, for instance, is much more powerful than the president and his cabinet.

    • Re:National governments (Score:5, Funny)

      by edittard (805475) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:47AM (#23375532)

      The Japanese diet, for instance, is much more powerful than the president and his cabinet.
      I apologise to rice and raw fish. Seems I underestimated them!

    • This is particularly true... (Score:5, Informative)

      by patio11 (857072) on Monday May 12 2008, @04:25AM (#23375640)
      ... as Japan does not have a president.
      • He's so weak, he doesn't even have an office or title! He's just some unpaid guy in the basement trying his best to hold onto his stapler.
    • The Japanese Diet is the legislature, equivalent to Congress. The Japanese Cabinet is called the, um, Cabinet.
    • Also, a cabinet is only as good as its leader, making the cutoff of 20 far lower for the U.S. right now ... I would suggest a number like 4, or 1 ...

    • Re:National governments (Score:4, Interesting)

      by paanta (640245) on Monday May 12 2008, @07:57AM (#23376774) Homepage
      "Stefan Thurner, a physicist at the Medical University of Vienna, and his collaborators looked at the overall efficiency of virtually every government on the globe, as measured by United Nations and World Bank indicators taking into account factors such as literacy, life expectancy and wealth"

      The big problem with this is that it's assuming the government has significant control over literacy, wealth and life expectancy. Literacy and life expectancy are strongly related to wealth, and wealth is related to a bunch of geographical factors. I didn't read the study, but did it compare a country only to its neighbors/other countries on its continent? Because it should have. Also, is there any way to separate causation and correlation here?

      Perhaps Weak Country -> Weak Government -> Political Mayhem -> Large Committees of People With Divergent Opinions.

      P.S. Be suspicious of any political/social science research done by physicists.
  • sounds like something I should model in the next version of this:

    http://www.democracygame.com/ [democracygame.com]

    It already represents ministers as nodes in a neural network.
    Can't say it surprises me in the least tbh.

  • Government inefficiency is good. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WK2 (1072560) on Monday May 12 2008, @02:29AM (#23375262) Homepage
    Government inefficiency is a good thing. Bureaucracies (attempt to) keep the government slow and sane. The extreme alternative is a dictatorship, which is much more efficient.

    • Re:Government inefficiency is good. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Chuck Chunder (21021) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:10AM (#23375394) Homepage Journal
      Efficient in the sense that they don't bother working much on a whole heap of areas and just concentrate on oppression.

      Dictatorships don't tend to get more done, they just try to do less. Perhaps that is efficient in some sense but not, I think, in a particularly useful one.

      You are right though, for governmental systems that are somewhat more answerable to the public inefficiency is one thing that stops governments doing too many things the people aren't interested in as there tend to be enough things the people are interested in to keep them fairly occupied.

      • Re:Government inefficiency is good. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by n dot l (1099033) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:49AM (#23375538)

        Efficient in the sense that they don't bother working much on a whole heap of areas and just concentrate on oppression.
        Well, yes and no. Stalin, for example, built Russia back up from the brink of disaster (Soviet losses were staggeringly large during WWII) and into a nation the rest of the world feared for nearly half a century. This was no small task - it involved the reconstruction of the cities the Germans had razed, modernizing many others, rebuilding his military, development of the USSR's nuclear weapons program, etc. That was no small task. He did that and he oppressed the people he ruled over.

        I don't think the number of priorities has much to do with efficiency (by any measure) in the long run. Authoritarian regimes can get a lot done in a very short period, and history has proven that time and again (I think we all remember reading about all the kings that inherited a disaster and had built an empire by the time they died in school). The trouble is that they're extremely sensitive to corruption, internal power struggles, and simple human vanity. When the strong leader dies, those who inherit his power often do tremendous damage simply bickering with each other over who gets to rule exactly what. And then when the next great ruler steps up and takes control we find that they first go throughout the country destroying a great many things in order to rebuild them in their own likeness. And in both cases we find that the bottom rung officials are corrupt as all hell since they're not accountable to anyone but their own superiors, who are often at great distance and too indifferent to bother listening to the people's complaints.

        • (I think we all remember reading about all the kings that inherited a disaster and had built an empire by the time they died in school).
          Really? I can't seem to recall reading about any empire-building kings who died in school. And I think I'd remember a thing like that.
        • Well, yes and no. Stalin, for example, built Russia back up from the brink of disaster (Soviet losses were staggeringly large during WWII)
          And now kids, let's ask why Soviet losses were quite so high during "The Great Patriotic War". The answer? Koba's little purges leading up to and during the war.
          • You have to consider that there were 4 countries that got trashed in the war:
            france, germany -> both given lots of money to rebuild
            japan -> given even more money because somebody made them glow
            russia -> not given any money, in fact some historians think that America wanted to stay out of WWII as long as possible as they liked the fact that Russia was getting crushed.

            Russia was almost ruined by the end of WWII to turn it round and become a supper power isnt easy (irrespective of their failures as a

      • Dictatorships don't tend to get more done, they just try to do less.
        I take it you've never tried getting someone in a public service role in the UK to do something then?

      • I would argue that it's good for a government to take time to study complex issues to make sensible, deliberate decisions. Inefficiency merely slows that process and creates the appearance of deliberation to mask debilitation.

        The US government is based on an evolutionary process of change. It's not designed to make fundamental changes quickly or capriciously.

        Earmarks notwithstanding. Just who's looking at their ears anyway?

    • In general I'd say yes, but their measures of efficiency were literacy, life expectancy and wealth - all measures that are generally better in capitalist countries with smaller governments. In this case, government "efficiency" is a good thing.
    • Are there meeting twenty men?
      Hours will pass by, dumb and dull.
      If there are instead just ten,
      There's a chance of a result.

      The work is skillfully and quickly done
      Only if there's a committee of one.
    • A crippled government is a good government.

      Ideally you have one that can react to a crisis (natural disaster or invasion) but is very, very slow to get anything else done. The less meddling the bettter.

      I'ds actually like it if the government was required to spend 50% of its time debating and repealing existing law, instead of just layering on more and more.
    • I wonder what the measure as efficientcy, dicisions made or % of decisions that where 'right'(asin did not get revoked at a latter date) or number of right decisions?
      I only want a government with a high % of right decisions no matter how few of them they make.

      A 1 man cabinet will make lots of decisions very fast, but will not get any right except for stuff he knows about, but a cabinet with 20 members will probably take its time but each member will contribute their expertise.

      I think the problem is simply c

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Stradivarius (7490)
      I disagree on several counts:

      1. I don't believe the alternative to poor government (inefficiency) need be worse government (such as dictatorship). Also, dictatorships traditionally have not been terribly efficient at much other than enriching the dictator and his friends.

      2. While well-considered policies take time to figure out, I see little evidence that the slowness that bureaucracies promote has had any corresponding positive effect on quality or sanity. On the contrary - these bloated organizations see

        • Re:Government inefficiency is good. (Score:5, Funny)

          by Thanshin (1188877) on Monday May 12 2008, @04:25AM (#23375638)

          Isn't everything the opposite in Soviet Russia?
          Yes, in soviet Russia, when women say "No", they mean "No".

          Wait, no, it's the opposite, when they say "Yes", they mean "No".

          No, wait, it's "Yes" when they say "Yes".

          Anyway, in soviet Russia, unlike you, we men do perfectly understand women.

  • Yes but it's confounded. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by red_crayon (202742) on Monday May 12 2008, @02:30AM (#23375272)
    We don't have a randomized experiment here, with cabinet size
    being manipulated... countries get the cabinets they choose
    (sort of).

    More complex problems (to begin with) -?-> larger cabinet.

  • Parkinson's Cutoff? (Score:5, Funny)

    by SpeedyDX (1014595) <speedyphoenix.gmail@com> on Monday May 12 2008, @02:33AM (#23375284)
    I don't know about the Parkinson's Cutoff, but I think at least one former member of the cabinet [youtube.com] surpassed the Alzheimer's Threshold.

    I hope my karma is high enough to withstand this beating. Hmm, I don't recall.

  • Power shift (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ChrisMaple (607946) on Monday May 12 2008, @02:41AM (#23375308)
    Parkinson also noted that when the cabinet exceeded 20 persons it merely indicated that power had shifted away from the cabinet as a unit. Power might be in another group, or in a subset of the group and meets separately to get the real work done.

    Around 20 members, people start making prepared statements rather than using meetings as think tanks. Real work is no longer done in cabinet meetings.

    Since this new study indicates that the government and the nation is less efficient if the cabinet is large, it's an interesting extension of Parkinson's work.

    Many of Parkinson's articles were humorous and he strongly hinted that he had no actual numbers to back up his claims. It's a little surprising to see that the real world aligns with his claims.

  • In that case the US congress uses CSMA/CD.
    • "In that case the US congress uses CSMA/CD."

      Where that stands for "Carry Sufficent Money for Access / Complete Debacle".
  • But... I think it is interesting to consider WHY certain posts are created. Does a separate, cabinet level post really need to exist for homeland security? Wouldn't a secretary of defense occupy that duty?

    Sure, homeland security would be a worthy sub-cabinet level post, but was the homeland security position made into a cabinet position for PR or for truly getting things done?

    • Re:Correlation does not imply causation (Score:5, Funny)

      by jayveekay (735967) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:05AM (#23375374)
      "But... I think it is interesting to consider WHY certain posts are created."

      Some posts are created to amuse, some to inform, some to troll, and some posts are created to designate a 'goal' area in a sporting competition. I hope that you think this post belongs in the first category. :)

      More seriously, I expect that politicians will always create sufficient jobs (of which cabinet posts are just one type) to give their friends the money/power that they want, without much concern for efficiency or effectiveness. How do you think "Brownie" got his job as head of FEMA?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Does a separate, cabinet level post really need to exist for homeland security?

      No. The department itself should not exist at all, nor the rest of the alphabet soup it finds itself in. "Home Security" as it should be done is provided for in the Second Amendment with local training programs for handling, markmanship, gunsmithing and martial arts would be as much "organizing" as needed and that by the members of the local community.

      "I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty th

  • The study actually finds a correlation between a countries HDI (human development index) and the size of its cabinet.

  • Umm...HISTORIAN..???? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I have several of C N Parkinson's books, including a signed first edition of 'Parkinson's Law', from which this example is taken.

    Though he was a history professor, and did some studies, Parkinson's primary claim to fame is not as a historian. He was a writer who wrote historical fiction with a sideline in humorous articles and books.

    This whole study sounds as if it has been taken completely from the (comic) Parkinson proposal which is wiki'ed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coefficient_of_Inefficiency

  • News just in (Score:4, Funny)

    by edittard (805475) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:22AM (#23375442)
    News just in - the quality of soup can suffer when an excessive number of culinary technicians are involved in the preparation. Film at 11.

  • Better coverage (Score:5, Informative)

    by durval (233404) on Monday May 12 2008, @03:38AM (#23375500)
    This article cover the news better: [physicsworld.com]http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/33926 [physicsworld.com]

    It also contains a link to the original paper: [arxiv.org]http://arxiv.org/abs/0804.2202 [arxiv.org]

  • Wait.

    You mean more politicians ='s LESS efficiency!?

    Let's just replace the politicians with scientists. Problem SOLVED.

  • A Cabinet in name only (US) (Score:5, Informative)

    by abbamouse (469716) on Monday May 12 2008, @04:03AM (#23375584) Homepage
    The number of Cabinet members and Cabinet-level departments is much less important in the US than in parliamentary systems.

    Our Cabinet is one in name only. The President has authority over all executive branch decisions, and no Cabinet head can go against his wishes. He can remove them at his leisure and appoint new ones. Although the Senate confirms appointments, it usually does so regardless of whether Senators agree with the policies of the nominee. Instead, it is expected that as long as the nominee isn't scandalous or completely incompetent, he or she will be confirmed.

    Moreover, our Cabinet doesn't really have meetings anymore. It just isn't the case that the heads of the Departments of Veterans Affairs, the Treasury, and the Interor sit around with the President and discuss policy. The executive branch really does its business in smaller groups, many of them wholly distinct form the Cabinet (the National Security Council, for example).
    • Is this just a feature of the current administration, or has it been heading this way for a while and it's unlikely to be changed next year? For instance, in the 1980s during the Hawke Government in Australia, the Prime Minister wasn't a particularly powerful member of the Cabinet. But the current Prime Minister seems to pretty much (want to) run the show on his own. And although the the Governor-General could technically refuse to sack a minister, that's only likely to happen if the Prime Minister doesn't
      • It's pretty much always been that way. The US cabinet is the Prez's set of lieutenants as he/she carries out what Congress tells her/him to do. That's the theory; Nowadays the prez does wuddeverdahek he wants and Congress is a backseat driver.
        IIRC, the constitu mentions the cabinet as sorta an expected thing the prez would have, and that the members are appointed by prez with "the advise and consent" of the Senate. The actual internal relationship isn't described in great detail, but is left up to the
  • Coming up next, our studies investigate the religion of the Pope.
  • Oh, wait, I did that already -- in Russia in early 90's. And all they did was giving up control of everything government had and everything government didn't have, to domestic and foreign "businesses" that proceeded to loot the country...

    I have an idea. Can I be the looting businessman this time, and you all will be cheerleading Libertarians?

    Pretty please?

    With sugar on top?

  • Rule of thumb (Score:3, Funny)

    by debrain (29228) on Monday May 12 2008, @06:40AM (#23376246) Journal
    A fairly sage quote I remember from somewhere is:

    The intelligence of a committee is equal to the intelligence of the dumbest member of the committee divided by the number of people on it.

  • "It's a good thing we're not gettin' all the government we're payin' for."
    The LAST thing the USA needs now is an efficient presidency.
    I want my gubbermint to run slowly enuf that we the people have time to get outraged, organized, wake up the couch potatoes and cure their apathy, and get the rest of the political system moving (legally) against the prezdint's ideers.

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