January 16, 2011

Inefficiency of Dictatorship

I used to think that dictatorship may be more efficient (in a sense) than democracy, as the orders by the dictator could not be challenged and would be carried out without delay. While reading Prisoner of the State (by Ziyang Zhao), I am now coming to realize that dictatorship may have more inefficiencies in its own regard - despite the existence of a dictator, people who work under him or her still has their own takes on issues which differ from that of the dictator. However, they dare not express their opinions directly to their boss. The only thing they can do is to carry out something mediocre, not exactly what has been dictated, nor what they believe would be best. While everyone doing the same, each making his or her work fall short of what their boss asked for, the government can never be really efficient.

January 1, 2011

Books read in 2010

Books in English:
  • Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
  • G. Polya, How to Solve It: A New Aspect of Mathematical Method
  • Jostein Gaarder, Sophie's World: A Novel about the History of Philosophy
  • Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner
  • Loraine Blaxter, Christina Hughes, and Malcolm Tight, How to Research
  • Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers: The Story of Success
  • Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being
  • Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie
  • Tobias Oetiker, The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2e
  • Yutang Lin, Moment in Peking
Books in Chinese:
  • 柏杨 《丑陋的中国人》
  • 王文山 《美国名校全奖得主申请资料写作范例》
  • 许轶、曾舒煜 《留美申请白皮书》
  • 韩寒 《1988:我想和这个世界谈谈》
  • 韩寒(主编) 《独唱团》