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Friday, June 5, 2026
Xi Jinping gives China’s crack scientists new jobs inside government
Xi Jinping gives China’s crack scientists new jobs inside government
https://www.economist.com/china/2026/06/04/xi-jinping-gives-chinas-crack-scientists-new-jobs-inside-government
IT IS OFTEN said that China is ruled by engineers. In fact, it is ruled by people with engineering degrees. President Xi Jinping, who studied chemical engineering, has probably not looked at a flow chart since his university days. Upon leaving school he went to work in the government for one of his father’s old pals. Like Mr Xi, most of China’s top leaders have spent their adult lives climbing the ranks of the Communist Party. Now, as China races to beat America to new technologies, true boffins are being given more power.
Some of China’s most prominent chemists, physicists and computer scientists are being drawn into the party’s upper ranks. Recent research by Li Cheng and Zhao Xiuye of the University of Hong Kong shows that more “academicians”, an elite group of career scientists elected by China’s academic bodies, are joining the party leadership and government. The number of such scientists with seats on the party’s decision-making Central Committee has doubled in the past decade to 29 of the roughly 350 members. They are said to have been elevated to help set policies, and to guide capital and talent towards China’s innovation machine.
Some of the experts remain in academia as presidents of universities and leaders of national laboratories. Others have hung up their lab coats for government jobs. Huang Ru, a leading specialist in microelectronics, spent most of her career as a professor at Peking University. This year Ms Huang was made a vice-chair of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the state planning agency, to oversee efforts to build home-grown semiconductors. She joins Xiangli Bin. Though not formally an “academician”, he helped build Beidou (China’s answer to America’s GPS navigation system). Mr Xiangli was appointed vice-chair in 2024 and helps implement innovation policy.
The drive for technological self-reliance is a whole-of-government effort. Huai Jinpeng, the education minister, for example, is an expert in networked computing systems of the sort needed to link up data centres. His deputy minister is a physicist who was most recently in charge of Zhejiang University, known for turning out talented engineers for China’s artificial-intelligence labs. Both have seats on the Central Committee. It is likely that some of the academicians are members of an opaque party body called the Central Science and Technology Commission, created in 2023 to bring China’s innovation drive directly under party control.
So far, Messrs Li and Zhao noted in a report for ThinkChina, a news site, that no recognised academician has made it onto the party’s 24-member Politburo. Yet that body, too, has grown brainier: five of its members selected in 2022 could boast of serious scientific careers.
The personnel changes reflect a push to bring patriotic outside talent into policymaking in a critical area. Qian Xuesen, the father of China’s project to acquire ballistic missiles, was given a seat on the Central Committee in 1969. As it was then, competition with America may be a disciplining factor today. Whereas other areas of policy, such as the economy, can be beset by ideological miasma, China’s leadership demands results from its campaign to build new technologies. A technocratic approach may offer related advantages.
Bringing in outsiders may also be politically convenient. Academics often lack deep networks inside the government and are therefore politically weak and unthreatening to those who hold power. It also means they are less likely to be part of corrupt cliques. Back in 2022, anti-corruption authorities cleaned out a network of officials in charge of disbursing the China Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund, known as the “Big Fund”, for apparently pilfering from its 343bn yuan ($51bn) in assets. A new team has been brought in to manage semiconductor industrial policy as a result, say analysts.
https://www.economist.com/china/2026/06/04/xi-jinping-gives-chinas-crack-scientists-new-jobs-inside-government
IT IS OFTEN said that China is ruled by engineers. In fact, it is ruled by people with engineering degrees. President Xi Jinping, who studied chemical engineering, has probably not looked at a flow chart since his university days. Upon leaving school he went to work in the government for one of his father’s old pals. Like Mr Xi, most of China’s top leaders have spent their adult lives climbing the ranks of the Communist Party. Now, as China races to beat America to new technologies, true boffins are being given more power.
Some of China’s most prominent chemists, physicists and computer scientists are being drawn into the party’s upper ranks. Recent research by Li Cheng and Zhao Xiuye of the University of Hong Kong shows that more “academicians”, an elite group of career scientists elected by China’s academic bodies, are joining the party leadership and government. The number of such scientists with seats on the party’s decision-making Central Committee has doubled in the past decade to 29 of the roughly 350 members. They are said to have been elevated to help set policies, and to guide capital and talent towards China’s innovation machine.
Some of the experts remain in academia as presidents of universities and leaders of national laboratories. Others have hung up their lab coats for government jobs. Huang Ru, a leading specialist in microelectronics, spent most of her career as a professor at Peking University. This year Ms Huang was made a vice-chair of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the state planning agency, to oversee efforts to build home-grown semiconductors. She joins Xiangli Bin. Though not formally an “academician”, he helped build Beidou (China’s answer to America’s GPS navigation system). Mr Xiangli was appointed vice-chair in 2024 and helps implement innovation policy.
The drive for technological self-reliance is a whole-of-government effort. Huai Jinpeng, the education minister, for example, is an expert in networked computing systems of the sort needed to link up data centres. His deputy minister is a physicist who was most recently in charge of Zhejiang University, known for turning out talented engineers for China’s artificial-intelligence labs. Both have seats on the Central Committee. It is likely that some of the academicians are members of an opaque party body called the Central Science and Technology Commission, created in 2023 to bring China’s innovation drive directly under party control.
So far, Messrs Li and Zhao noted in a report for ThinkChina, a news site, that no recognised academician has made it onto the party’s 24-member Politburo. Yet that body, too, has grown brainier: five of its members selected in 2022 could boast of serious scientific careers.
The personnel changes reflect a push to bring patriotic outside talent into policymaking in a critical area. Qian Xuesen, the father of China’s project to acquire ballistic missiles, was given a seat on the Central Committee in 1969. As it was then, competition with America may be a disciplining factor today. Whereas other areas of policy, such as the economy, can be beset by ideological miasma, China’s leadership demands results from its campaign to build new technologies. A technocratic approach may offer related advantages.
Bringing in outsiders may also be politically convenient. Academics often lack deep networks inside the government and are therefore politically weak and unthreatening to those who hold power. It also means they are less likely to be part of corrupt cliques. Back in 2022, anti-corruption authorities cleaned out a network of officials in charge of disbursing the China Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund, known as the “Big Fund”, for apparently pilfering from its 343bn yuan ($51bn) in assets. A new team has been brought in to manage semiconductor industrial policy as a result, say analysts.
Wednesday, June 3, 2026
Wrongdoing at NIF
Is it OK to push a NIF FTE employee into EIT status by purposely falsifying (SKAs) of that employee’s historical skill set? Hmm, maybe ask LSEO Superintendent
non-degreed not technically skilled or accredited Ron Darbee, how this actually works. Prospective tech workers beware. Suicides occurred during this man’s leadership, sad and preventable for sure if only LLNL established “lessons learned” practices actually applied here. but nope.Tuesday, June 2, 2026
A culture of incompetence at the DOE
A funny excerpt from the article:
" A recent proposed DOE standard for the efficiency of the distribution transformers used by electrical utilities were so weak that even the utilities thought they needed to be strengthened! "
Wednesday, May 27, 2026
Cold fusion breakthroughs
https://youtu.be/vifpBK5WI4E?si=kiSRMJjZDpboDmJL
"Recent cold fusion breakthroughs" cited in video -- record amounts of money going into various companies which attempt to commercialize it.
Tuesday, May 26, 2026
Sending messages to the past
https://youtu.be/RZrHrw1ubqs?si=HY4UFjJAtvA-ju8J
These Physicists Claim They Can Send Messages To The Past
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