Meritocracy revisited
I've been thinking again about meritocracy, prompted in part by reading Adrian Wooldridge's bracing book The Aristocracy of Talent. From one angle, the Paula Principle is exactly about meritocracy: it deals with our failure to reward talent and competence fairly and appropriately. So it's been very welcome to have had access to such a broadly-informed and readable volume. The notion of meritocracy is itself contested, as shown by a recent Intelligence Squared debate between Wooldridge and the Harvard philosopher Michael Sandel. Sandel's view is that merit is fine but meritocracy is not: it is a system of rule that allows those who rise to the top to justify their winnings.…
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