This is the definition I am using:
a system, organization, or society in which people are chosen and moved into positions of success, power, and influence on the basis of their demonstrated abilities and merit.
Like eugenics, it's just another way for racists to push their racism under the guise of "science". It's not "corruptible", it comes pre-corrupted.
I don't.
The core issue: Who determines merit, ability, and position? The people who write the rules are the actual government, and governments secure their own power. Like every flawless paper-government system, it crumples as soon as the human element wets the paper.
However, assuming the rule book could be written flawlessly, with "perfect" selfless humans writing the initial rules and then removing themselves from power, there are unsolved issues:
- Popularity contests in determining merit. (I like Johnny Depp better than Amber. Who loses more status?)
- Comparing apples to oranges. (Are Athletes or Artists more worthy, what about the Plumbers and Mailmen?)
- Power corrupts.
- Do morals and ethics have a say in merit? (Save the entire planet, then start kicking cats. Still a hero?)
- How long does a merit last? (When a champion, or athlete, is no longer fit, are they de-positioned? Look at Rome.)
- Brilliant mathematicians get rewarded with what? (Better supercomputers, or political power? What qualifies them to make policy?)
For anyone interested, Wikipedia provides some arguments against meritocracy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_meritocracy
Meritocracy is argued to be a myth because, despite being promoted as an open and accessible method of achieving upward class mobility under neoliberal or free market capitalism, wealth disparity and limited class mobility remain widespread, regardless of individual work ethic.
The word was coined as satire. Brain-dead
liberalscentrists took it seriously and, here we are.I have been sadly disappointed by my 1958 book, The Rise of the Meritocracy. I coined a word which has gone into general circulation, especially in the United States, and most recently found a prominent place in the speeches of Mr Blair.
The book was a satire meant to be a warning (which needless to say has not been heeded) against what might happen to Britain between 1958 and the imagined final revolt against the meritocracy in 2033.
Edited because too many people don't know what liberal means.
SO LONG AS IT IS ACTUAL MERITOCRACY,
and not just privilege's gaslighting about it ( via making-certain that the poorest have inferior-nutrition, inferior-air-quality, worse-pollution, inferior-education, inferior-healthcare, etc ),
then yes, I hold it is The Proper Way.
However, it REQUIRES a truly-level playing-field, and not a 2-tiered "level" playing-field.
The Scandinavian system of ONLY public-schooling, so there is only 1 tier of education-quality, is a required component.
Student nutrition needs to be guaranteed.
Healthcare needs to work properly, for all.
Livingwage needs to be for all full-time work, and companies that try to hire only part-time for the real-work, have to have the profit-benefit of such hamstringing-of-many-lives cut from them all, permanently.
Fairness requries careful systematic, & openly-honest enforcement, because the DarkHexad: narcissism/machiavellianism/sociopathy-psychopathy/nihilism/sadism/systemic-dishonesty ALWAYS seeks to enforce abusive-exploitation, and it is underhandedly aggressive, and natural in our human nature.
Not mitigating it == accommodating it.
Salut, Namaste, & Kaizen, eh?
_ /\ _
That's too vague a definition. Like, if person A is an accomplished athlete, the best basketball player ever, I do not think his position of power or success should be, say, president. I think this is actually a very dangerous mindset derived from the capitalistic notion that success determines your--I'll call it value. If you're successful, you must be smart; If you're smart, you can be anything, even the president. Success is equal to wealth in these talking circles, and it sort of ends up as a backwards meritocracy. You gain merit measured by your success (wealth) instead of the other way around
But if you define it as a place in which positions of authority are given to people who have proven themselves knowledgeable and capable in the field in which the position of authority is being granted, I do believe in it in principle. I say that because principle and practice are rarely the same in politics and sociology. There are countless other factors that will impact your "success" that are not actually based on your expertise in the field. Better people have designed public transport, electric cars, social media, and spaceships than Elon Musk, yet the man sits in a position of tremendous influence. In a just meritocracy, we would never have heard his name
Which brings about the point that we have certain ideas as a culture (or maybe system) that awards some merits disproportionately more than others. Some will say his merit is in being a ruthless business man. He's good at that, I guess, so he should be the leader of the company. His "merit" of being a bad human being is being disproportionately rewarded compared to the merit of the scientists that actually design his spaceships, and the engineers that make them work. Meritocracy only really works in a closed system. The most capable archaeologist will be the head of the expedition. If you let the ideas go beyond that, and start comparing apples to oranges, you start seeing instead a system's idea of what's important, and by extension that of the society built in that system
Depends what you mean by "believe in". Could it work? Sure, why not. Do we live in one? Hell fuck no.
Absolutely not. Demographic data shows it's shit, income distribution data is best explained by a random walk process (neat graphic explainer here), and all the data on startups and investing show that there's no free lunch; capitalism actually does ensure everything gives the same steady return on average.
Every rich person won some sort of lottery. Even the bona-fide engineers are never the only ones that could have invented whatever thing - as technical person myself.
Why not? The people most qualified should have the positions. The amount of qualified people and said positions probably don't always match and people may not want the jobs they qualify for though, But I think it's an ideal to strive for.
This is a copy of a reply to @godzillabacter@lemmy.world :
Just to make it clear the definition that I used does not talk about choosing people for tasks they are suited for, but rather putting them in positions of power, success, and influence.
What's the difference? The people most deserving of power, success, and influence would be the most qualified to handle it.
Yes, but being good at something does not necessarily correlate to being good at managing others doing that thing.
This is especially pronounced in sales, where good salespeople get promoted to management, before immediately discovering that it requires a totally different skillset and they've basically changed fields entirely.
Managing people is "something.". It's a skill. In an ideal meritocracy, managers would be good at managing.
Ok, I just wanted to make sure if that is what you were saying.
Peeps proposing lots of good reasons against, but I'll just say: is a system where a reality show host can threaten our democracy really better?
I'm pretty sure the US IS considered meritocratic. There are just countless other factors that also impact your ability to succeed
Don't organisations already follow this? Atleast for their workers.
People getting into a public or private job have to show that they are eligible.Regarding meritocracy at level of society:
I think it's going to be difficult in reality.- Who appraises the merit of people? Who defines, maintains and updates the standards/methods used for the appraisal?
- Is there a system for continuous quality check? It'd be needed to maintain the system as a meritocracy.
- How is the quality check system preserved in the system?
- Who appraises those who appraise?
In the case of an organisation, the leaders/owners of the org can choose workers with merit. But the owners themselves are not appraised, right? Unless they are in some co-operative org or so.
Perfect meritocracy seems very difficult to implement for the whole of society.
I think democracy(which gives due importance to scientific temper and obviously human life) is a decent enough system. We can iterate on it to bring up the merit in the society and its people as a whole
