I don't understand this point of view. It sounds like, by calling it a lie, your real complaint is the ways attempts at meritocracy have fallen short of being an actual meritocracy. That being the case, isn't meritocracy still the correct ideal that we should be doing a better job of striving for?
If this is not how you feel, what is the word for the appropriate assignment strategy that we should be strive to use to decide who gets jobs and promotions?
> Meritocracy is an idea, not a specification-- there is no one true meritocracy implementation. The discussion needs to start from there.
Im not convinced it does. If you want to say meritocracy says merely that we should try to hire the best people all things considered then no-one would disagree. The disagreement is precisely about which things it's appropriate to consider.
Typically meritocratic systems in practice make the assumption that it is possible to determine merit outside the context of a specific team. I think this assumption is highly suspect. Merit is not a fixed characteristic of the individual but rather an emergent property of them in their context and in relationship with those around them.
> mentions meritocracy as an evil, not a goal to strive for?
I think the main objection to "meritocracy" is that often there is no real meritocracy, and people use it as a way to ignore claims that the place isn't a meritocracy.
Organisation: We're a meritocracy!
Member: I'm getting unfairly treated based on race/gender/etc.
Org: That's impossible, we're a meritocracy!
> Meritocracy implies nothing about fairness or a level playing field. Meritocracy implies the person with the best skills gets the job.
This only works if you completely disregard the entire process through which someone attains skills. If this is indeed what Meritocracy is then it's even less adequate as a system than I previously believed.
> The only way to fix what you've brought up is to have all children be taken from their parents at birth and raised in an equal opportunity community akin to The Giver. Is that what you want?
False dichotomy. There is no possibility of a system between totalitarian child rearing by the state and a system rigged entirely and completely for the wealthy? Spare me.
> It seems to me you're indexing too heavily on the "merit" in meritocracy. When most people, myself included, talk about meritocracy they are simply referring to systems where people are ranked based on capability or performance in some task.
You were not talking about a "meritocracy", which would already be a problem considering that it doesn't hinge on merit[1], but a "pure meritocracy".
If you use "pure meritocracy" to refer to a system where neither pure performance nor merit are used to rank people, and call it "too fair", then you are twisting the meaning of the words "meritocracy" and "fairness" into something unrecognizable.
Such a system does not evaluate people based on capability or performance.
Such a system certainly does not evaluate people based solely on their merits.
Such a system cannot be called meritocratic, or fair. To do so is ridiculous.
[1] Because amongst the "initial resources" you speak of there are also wealth and connections, which do not improve "capability or performance in some task", which only improve the chances of someone obtaining and keeping the job.
>The issue is the opacity of the concept of merit. How do you distinguish being a meritocracy in some good sense from insisting you are a meritocracy and thus poisoning any discussion that you are not one?
>When people criticize the word "Meritocracy" they are not criticizing the concept but the usage.
I don't agree - there is a subset of people that criticize meritocracy as a concept because they believe the idea of 'merit' is inherently racist and classist - if you start at a different level, it becomes more difficult for you to accrue 'merit' and so that needs to be balanced and taken into account. Some people believe this is much more important than hiring or promoting on 'merit'
>If you have even a half hearted belief in meritocracy that represents a failure of epic proportions.
I'm curious, what do you think "half hearted belief in meritocracy" consist of? From the rest of your comment, it sounds like any sort of economic system where you can earn money without the effort of yourself (ie. investment) isn't meritocratic?
>I would say that it often has the same outcome as a meritocratic system.
Doesn't that seem even a little bit condemnatory of your conception of merit? Your meritocracy is frequently indistinguishable from aristocracy. That once in a while they differ isn't a great credit, it's damning with faint praise.
>I feel like what you are saying is that merit is independent of the training and experiences you receive. I define merit as the ability to perform the given task well. With that definition, you have to include training and experience because they have effects on ability to perform. So if you exclude training and experiences, what do you mean by merit?
Then why call it a meritocracy? Call it a knowledgocracy or something of that sort. Again, I find merit to be something that comes from within not from without. The asian girl's advantage over the black girl is entirely from without so it shouldn't be considered - they should have an equal chance to be admitted.
> An inbuilt assumption of what you say is that you believe in meritocracy, specifically that the powerful and wealthy are that way at least part by merit.
That is not what a meritocracy is. Meritocracy means our brightest and most capable lead us, instead of democracy where it is basically whoever can play the political game the best.
>If anyone is aware of an environment where meritocracy exists in this industry I’d love to know about it.
Did you know the term meritocracy was originally intended as a negative idea[1]. The value of modern work is so subjective that it's almost impossible to measure. It's probably best to jettison any idea that you will be promoted based on any sort of rational assessment.
> ... we want critical roles to be performed by competent people.
Yes. Over the last few years, we've seen the problems caused by having critical jobs performed by less than competent people. (I'm sure you can fill in your own examples.)
The problem is that there are (at least) two kinds of "fake meritocracy". There's credentialism: "This person must me competent; they graduated from Elite Institution". And then there's elitism: "This person must be competent, their parents are rich and famous". Neither tells us much about their actual competence at any specific role. (All right, credentialism tells you that they were competent at graduating from Elite Institution, but we aren't hiring them to have them do that over and over.)
I wonder if part of the reason for the criticism of meritocracy is because of the failings of fake meritocracy. (I suspect that another part of it is a complaint that those who win the meritocracy game get too much of the rewards, which I think is a fair criticism.)
> Still, you can not seriously ask of tech companies to hire the poor girl from the slum
True, but that doesn't make meritocracy an ideal. It's just how things are.
> As I said, I don't see why Meritocracy could not be part of the solution.
Again, how is meritocracy different from the status quo, then? But the reason your meritocracy is a problem more than a solution is twofold: first, it focuses effort on the wrong people (those who have success without merit) rather than those who need society's help. If your system is first let's wrestle power from those who have it without merit and only then turn our attention to the real problem, then your priorities are messed up. Second, it does all this by believing it somehow rewards merit while it really rewards privilege combined with some merit. A system not calling itself a meritocracy at least acknowledges its own unfairness.
A core problem is what this means. A lot of people insist that we previously lived in a meritocracy and that things like admissions tests are pure representations of this meritocracy, so that moving away from these systems is an attack on a purely level playing field of meritocracy.
But we don't all agree with this. The same people who you criticize do not agree that we have achieved equality of opportunity. Not even close. For a very clear example, we see wealth opening huge numbers of doors for people regardless of actual merit, either through access to training, or access to connections, or as a backstop that enables people to take risks.
What you consider hostility to these concepts, other people think are essential to achieving these concepts.
> "as for your statement that "meritocracy doesn't really value merit" you'll have to explain that one."
I explained it before, but hopefully I'll do a better job this time...
How do you measure merit? You cannot measure merit without measuring success.
Success can be achieved by more than just merit alone, privilege is another key factor in success, yet there are no mechanisms to distinguish between success based on merit and success based on privilege. In most cases it'll be a mixture of the two anyway, it's hard to find successful people who were born into completely hostile circumstances, or find successful people who had every possible external advantage but didn't have some ability to convert this into success.
In short, meritocracies measure success, they don't measure merit, as merit cannot be measured directly, it can only be inferred by success, and success has multiple contributing factors, of which merit is only one.
Furthermore, meritocracies tend to favour certain types of success. For example, in school, the abilities of an academically gifted kid are more likely to be recognised compared to a kid that's good at telling jokes, even though they're both valuable traits.
> What principle should tech companies use for hiring? And other companies, too?
Whatever works for them. But companies, at least in America, are not in the business of fixing society but that of making profit. As long as they remember that's what they're doing it's OK. I just think it makes them look stupid if they consider themselves to be some sort of utopia.
> the anti-meritocracy crowd seems to think privileged people can never have merit.
No. But "merit" is the least contribution to success. Otherwise, you'd think all merit is concentrated in about a billion people living in the West. Most success is 90% luck and 10% merit. Also, calling people "anti-meritocracy" is kinda funny, as meritocracy was intended as a parody of society. It was never intended to be taken seriously. I'm not against any kind of parody. I'm certainly pro-meritocracy: I think it's funny as hell.
> Why not simply stick to the facts "cancer was cured, how much is that worth to me", rather than making moral judgements on the people who cured it?
I'm not making a moral judgement. I just don't think that people lucky enough to have opportunities should be worshipped as being more than that. But most importantly, I'm not sure why that would necessarily mean they're the best people to rule society.
> Also, how can you argue against meritocracy with the argument it "focuses on people who have success without merit", when Meritocracy demands exactly the opposite of that?
Again, meritocracy is a parody. It demands nothing other than your laughter at our society's hypocrisy. But if I imagine how people who think it was meant as anything other than a joke take it to mean, I think: okay, so how does meritocracy differ from the system we have now in the eyes of people who don't see it as a joke? I mean, that Harvard guy already has the power. The answer is that these people think that if you're well-nourished, well-educated and study hard at Harvard, then you're fundamentally more deserving than someone who's well nourished and well educated, but gets into Harvard because his parent are super-rich and make a big contribution. Meritocracy implies that the second guy has less merit than the first, while the truth is that they're both mostly lucky, only the first guy works hard in addition to being lucky.
Any system that focuses on taking power from the vanishingly small number of people more fortunate than its believers is, in my opinion, seriously flawed. I prefer systems that focus on those less fortunate than me.
I don't understand this point of view. It sounds like, by calling it a lie, your real complaint is the ways attempts at meritocracy have fallen short of being an actual meritocracy. That being the case, isn't meritocracy still the correct ideal that we should be doing a better job of striving for?
If this is not how you feel, what is the word for the appropriate assignment strategy that we should be strive to use to decide who gets jobs and promotions?
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