The engineer vs. the lawyer

Dan Wang’s new book, Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future (W.W. Norton & Company, 288 pp.), offers a fresh perspective on the rivalry between America and China. Forget the old frame of capitalism versus communism or democracy versus dictatorship. Wang offers something simpler but striking: China is run by engineers; America, on the other hand, is run by lawyers.

Wang has a point. Look at China’s leadership. President Xi Jinping studied chemical engineering. His predecessor trained in hydropower engineering. Before him, the leader was an electrical engineer. Across Beijing’s halls of power, you’ll find men (but very few women) who once built bridges, designed dams, or solved technical puzzles. In Washington, the story is very different. Roughly half of Congress holds law degrees. America’s leaders learned to argue, draft, and regulate, often focusing on blocking instead of building.

Wang says this training shapes how each country acts. Engineers build quickly and fix mistakes later. Lawyers pore over every detail, following rules and avoiding risks. The results speak for themselves. China lays down seven subway lines in four years. New York hasn’t approved a major new line in almost two decades.

Wang’s lens explains a lot. Why can China cover rooftops with solar panels at record speed? Why do they have sleek high-speed trains linking their cities while America’s infrastructure crumbles? It isn’t just money or ideology. It’s mindset, and this mindset is crippling the country.

American leaders get trapped in the process. Every project must survive endless reviews, hearings, lawsuits, and regulations. These safeguards protect rights and prevent disasters, but they also drag projects out for decades.

China’s engineers care less about perfect compliance and more about visible results. When they decided to expand their navy, they didn’t debate it for years. They built warships at a pace the world could see. When they wanted new cities, they didn’t debate them for decades. They built entire skylines in a few short years. When they wanted factories, they didn’t hesitate. They rose almost overnight, turning fields into industrial hubs.

Wang also points to America’s lost engineering culture. This was once a nation that laid the transcontinental railroad, built the interstate system, and put men on the moon. Building big was part of being American. Now, America, once the builder of empires, files lawsuits instead of laying steel.

Wang’s book praises China’s engineer-led system for its dazzling feats but misses its deep flaws. The same mindset that raises skyscrapers also reduces people to parts, bricks in a wall to be stacked and shifted, problems to be managed rather than citizens with rights. The author stumbles when he suggests America should copy and paste the Chinese model.

Yes, lawyers often deserve their bad reputation. Too many chase ambulances. Too many twist rules for corporations. Too many hide behind legal loopholes. Americans are right to groan when lawyers promise solutions they rarely deliver.

Yet lawyers also defend freedoms that engineers might bulldoze. When courts oppose illegal government orders, they keep liberty intact. When lawyers take polluters to task, families get cleaner air and safer water. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., now head of Health and Human Services in the Trump administration, spent decades as an environmental lawyer doing precisely that. In China, this would never have been possible. A man like Kennedy would have been silenced, or worse, arrested and disappeared into the system. In the end, in America, it’s the courtroom, not the construction site, where the limits of power are guarded.

Wang seems almost nostalgic for Robert Moses, the urban planner who smashed through opposition to build New York highways. But Moses destroyed neighborhoods, mostly poor and minority, in the name of “progress.” America cannot afford to relive that history.

The book also casually overlooks the brutal costs of China’s engineering obsession. The one-child policy wasn’t just a mistake. It was a human rights disaster, leaving millions scarred by forced abortions and sterilizations. The zero-COVID lockdowns weren’t just a matter of firm governance. They trapped millions in their homes for months, sometimes without food or medicine. To call these errors of efficiency is to ignore their human toll.

Wang also suggests America should welcome Chinese companies to build our infrastructure. But can we really trust firms forced by law to share data with Beijing? Handing them our roads and grids would be handing leverage to a rival military power.

Wang is right that America has lost its building spirit. But the cure isn’t to mimic China’s authoritarian efficiency. The cure is to rediscover our own heritage of engineering and invention while keeping our legal guardrails intact.

The problem isn’t too many lawyers. The problem is too little faith in our ability to build. We’ve forgotten that American ingenuity once drove railroads across a continent and sent men to the moon. The Hoover Dam, the Golden Gate Bridge, and the Apollo program weren’t accidents. They were proof that a free people, armed with tools and will, could shape the future with their own hands. Today, sadly, that confidence has dimmed. We argue, delay, and doubt instead of daring to build.

Rather than envy China’s speed, America should reclaim its strengths: innovation, liberty, and respect for human dignity. More emphasis should be placed on guiding the next generation into engineering—whether computer, chemical, mechanical, or civil—so they can shape the nation’s future.

When China builds, it shows us what efficiency looks like. When America builds, it shows the world what freedom can achieve. That’s the difference between steel and spirit. One can be copied. The other can’t.