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Chapter 614 The so-called checks and balances

No matter how good a system is, it has to be implemented by people, so the so-called balance achieved by this system will sooner or later collapse due to human factors.

This is the experience that Yuwen Weicheng got after reading historical books. At this moment, he was in the study of the East Palace, looking at the draft of "Book of Jin", hoping to find arguments from the history that happened so that he could ask his father for some questions.

The Sima family's Jin State has been invaded for more than a hundred years. During this period, historians compiled "History of Jin" or "Jin Ji", and there were more than 20 books, and there were 18 books about "History of Jin" that were circulated in the world.

Now, the court has decided to revise the Book of Jin, and Yuwen Weicheng has read the first draft.

Among them, he is concerned about a historical event.

How did the complete set of power checks and balances system constructed by Emperor Wu of Jin Sima Yan for his incompetent prince Sima Zhong collapse?

Sima Yan's crown prince Sima Zhong, later Emperor Hui of Jin, had an intellectual problem. He once said "Why not eat meat minced meat" and was taught by Yuwen Wen as a negative example.

However, Yuwen Weicheng also heard the comment from his father: Sima Zhong is not an idiot, he just has a low IQ. After all, he later said the conscience of "This is Ji Shizhong's blood, don't go."

The reason why I said "why not eat meat minced meat" is nothing more than being raised in the deep palace since I was young, so I didn't know the sufferings of the people.

So why did Sima Yan establish such a low-level prince as the crown prince?

Yuwen Weicheng made an analysis by himself.

Sima Yan faced pressure from his mother's brother and King Sima You of Qi. Sima You was adopted to his uncle Sima Shi as his heir and performed well. The government and the people demanded that Sima You be the crown prince be very loud.

Sima Yan is not a son without normal intelligence. Queen Yang gave birth to third sons for him, the eldest son died young, the second son Sima Zhong and the third son Sima Jian, and Sima Jian were normal.

The crown prince of the country was appointed as the chief. If Sima Yan wanted to pass the throne to his son instead of his younger brother Sima You, he could only protect Sima Zhong as the crown prince. Otherwise, if Sima Zhong was abandoned and Sima Jian changed to Sima Jian, he would not be able to avoid the second choice, Sima You, the most popular King of Qi.

In addition, Sima Zhong's son Sima Yu was smart since childhood, and Sima Yan felt that the emperor's grandson would definitely become a good emperor in the future.

So, even though everyone knows that Sima Zhong has an intellectual problem, Sima Yan stung his neck and said that his son is fine.

However, he also knew that if his incompetent son became emperor, something might happen, so he designed a power check and balance structure to ensure that the Sima family and his Sima Yan's direct bloodline will be permanent.

This power checks and balance structure consists of two foreign relatives, namely the Yang family (Sima Zhong's mother family), the Jia family (Sima Zhong's wife family), the royal family kings and the aristocratic forces, which restrain each other, and the central and local governments check and balance each other.

In the center, there is a "three-legged tripod" between two foreign relatives (Yang and Jia) and the regent lords. The game between the center and the local government, and the mutual constraints between the foreign relatives and the royal family kings, no one can grow bigger, and can only respect the emperor as the common ruler.

This system of checks and balances for power is extremely exquisite and impeccable. As long as it is maintained smoothly for twenty or thirty years, when Sima Zhong dies and Sima Yu succeeds to the throne, the country will be truly stable.

However, this is just Sima Yan's wishful thinking.

The reason is very simple. Yuwen Weicheng believes that whether it is architecture or system, it emphasizes "rationality", and the important component of architecture and system is people, and people are irrational.

Reason and irrationality are opposites. Isn’t it ridiculous to let irrational people maintain a system that emphasizes rationality?

And the facts prove this: the so-called checks and balances soon showed a fatal crack in the power game.

In the first round, the relative Yang, who was obsessed with profit, attacked the king of the regents, drove the king of the regents out of Beijing. The Yang family took over the central authority, and the relative Jia, was dormant.

In the second round, the relative Jia family of the foreigners joined forces with other sects to attack Yang family.

In the third round, Queen Jia Nanfeng incited internal strife of the sect king, reaped the benefits of the fisherman, and successfully squeezed out the sect king's power from the center and controlled the emperor Sima Zhong alone.

The above three rounds of competition mainly occurred in the center (the capital). After three rounds of purges, the aristocratic forces have suffered heavy losses and have become supporting roles in the power struggle drama. The Jia family is dominant, and the central government's checks and balances have collapsed.

In the fourth round, the king of sect attacked and eliminated the relative Jia family.

In the fifth round, around the control of the emperor and the position of the "Crown Prince", a civil war broke out between the sect kings, and the balance between the center and the place collapsed.

At this point, the power checks and balance structure that Sima Yan had devoted all his efforts to build for his son during his lifetime disappeared. Not only that, the civil war between the clan kings had more serious consequences.

Yuwen Weicheng learns from history and does not believe that the so-called power checks and balances structure or system can be effectively maintained because he feels that the system depends on people to implement, and people are always selfish (irrational).

According to the power check and balance structure constructed by Sima Yan, the relatives of the subjects, Yang, Jia, Zongwang and noble, all became the murderers of the disintegration of the structure because of their own selfish intentions.

It can be seen that no matter what skin a carefully constructed power checks and balances structure or system is covered with, as long as its operating subject is human, sooner or later, checks and balances will collapse due to human reasons.

As for the current New Political Affairs Hall meeting, Yuwen Weicheng has carefully studied it and feels that sooner or later there will be problems: it will evolve into a party struggle.

In the Han Dynasty, there were party struggles, literati and officials formed various interest groups, and then the struggle between these interest groups was called party struggles.

Now, there are already ten officials in the three high-ranking officials who have already had the possibility of developing their own parties. Now that the number of participants in the Political Affairs Hall meeting has been expanded to more than 100, it is inevitable that these people will form cliques.

So the party began to attack the differences, attack each other and argue with each other, and the government and the country were in chaos, delaying national affairs.

Fighting interests will sooner or later break through the moral bottom line. In order to stumbling over political enemies, you will do everything you can. Then you will retaliate or attack each other without any bottom line. You will ruin my good things, and I will ruin your good things.

Of course, the meeting of the Political Affairs Hall is not a shrew, and the sects on the surface do not turn against each other, but they can use all kinds of dirty tricks.

For example, take a stumbling method to make officials of the other sect make mistakes in government and military affairs, and then take the opportunity to attack and make a shock to the tiger, so as to crack down on the reputation of the hostile faction.

The damage caused to national interests is not within the scope of these people's consideration.

Yuwen Weicheng has read many historical books and hates the harm caused by party struggles. He believes that this is a serious internal strife within the dynasty. No matter who wins and who loses, it will damage the foundation of rule, and sooner or later it will trigger various serious crises.

Yuwen Weicheng felt that no matter who is the emperor, if he has some ability, he should strictly suppress the party struggle. Once the emperor cannot stop the party struggle, it means that the emperor has lost control of the political situation.

If the owner of a trading company cannot resolve the internal strife between the shopkeepers, then the business will be completed sooner or later, and the country will do the same.

But now, my father directly opened the door to the emergence of party struggles in terms of the system, and called it "check and balance of power". Yuwen Weicheng attended the Political Affairs Hall meeting in the past few days and witnessed many fierce debates with his own eyes. The sense of crisis in his heart is getting bigger and bigger.

Any kind of power checks and balances structure or system emphasizes rationality, however, the subject of these structures and systems is human, and humans are irrational.

Isn’t it ridiculous to hope that irrational people will maintain the rationality of the system?

Yuwen Weicheng put away the information, looked at the sunset outside the window, and fell into deep thought.
Chapter completed!
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