In 1958, British sociologist Michael Young wrote a dystopian satirical novel called The Rise of the Meritocracy. The book skewered standardized testing and credentialing, imagining how elites could employ them to secure corruptive power. Young’s book was popular but his arrows missed their mark. The novel helped to speed meritocracy’s presence in the zeitgeist, for the public ignored Young’s critiques. We now talk about meritocracies as sensible ways of sorting people by personal achievement and ability. Rarely are meritocracies viewed as problematic. But is this necessarily how we want opportunity and power to be distributed? We have all earned our successes and failures, right? Or was Young on to something?
Harvard political philosopher Michael Sandel picked up the question in his provocative 2020 book, The Tyranny of Merit: Can We Find the Common Good? Sandel, an ambitious thinker, is well-suited for the task, having written extensively on justice, liberalism, and the moral opportunities and limits of markets. He is a slippery thinker, too, skilled and confident in many domains, and an accomplished public personality.
Sandel uses the William Singer admission scandal (Varsity Blues) as an entry point to the topic. Many believe education to be inherently meritocratic, with the smartest and most hard-working advancing. Singer’s scheme, securing money from ethically compromised parents to assure their children’s acceptance into elite colleges, certainly serves as evidence of higher education’s weak systems and susceptibility to money. Sandel argues that the problem run deeper, stemming from growing inequality and the pervasive purchase of merit by the wealthy. Admissions is not the only issue at stake.
The very concept of merit adds to the complexity. No one definition can or possibly could exist. Meretricious for what ends? Nor can merit be defined separately from assertions about free will. Meritocratic thinking, Sandel warns, invariably tends to equate the good with the great, and can lead to all manner of other assumptions. For example, our collective faith in markets, “the rhetoric of rising,” has captured thinking and policy. It is nearly axiomatic in the US that the wealthy are deserving of their wealth. Sandel emphasizes that if we believe this, so too are the poor to blame for their poverty. The mindset can be extended to nations, historical movements and more. This kind of simplistic thinking recurs with frightening regularity. Thankfully, it can be effectively refuted with knowledge and closer analysis. Where are luck, contingency and externalities in the equation? Sandel raises these and other point, moving quickly across realms, from the biblical story of Job to the collapse of the Soviet Union, as he frames his argument. The writing is assured and entertaining.
As Sandel jumps from ancient Greece to American politics, contemporary issues invariably emerge as the focus of his attention. He looks at how political parties mobilize elites, how technocracy can conflict with democracy, and the many ways that anger and resentment fuel populism. Sandel cautions that judgements of value often easily slide into judgements of merit. Sandel references key political theorists, such as Hayek and Rawls. Both rejected meritocracies as ways of distributing economic rewards. Ignoring these worthies, general sentiment nonetheless has consistently associated wealth with merit.
Education is a recurring topic in the book, for Sandel posits that “credentialism” is the last acceptable prejudice. This is one of many memorable assertions running through Tyranny of Merit. The high-level sorting of people and talent, Sandel observes, is shouldered in America by colleges and universities. While there may be fine reasons for entrusting this awesome social responsibility to academia, it comes with great costs for students, society and even the institutions themselves. SATs and standardized testing, Sandel stresses, did not so much replace the hereditary elite as shift the education’s priorities. Advocates of meritocracy in higher education admissions and evaluations, such as Harvard president James Conant, ultimately failed in transforming college into an engine of social mobility, Sandel asserts. Elite institutions mostly educate the children of elites. Meritocratic rhetoric, accordingly, gives those in elite institutions a belief that they have “earned” their status. Students do work hard, Sandel agrees, but many, many students could work hard and flourish at elite institutions.
For all who work in higher education, the claims are well-known and well-recognized. There is no system-wide impetus for fairness. Those that have more resources are more likely to enroll and succeed at institutions that have more resources, influence and social capital. Those that have less are more likely to be found at institutions with less. And those that have even less are even more likely to miss out entirely on higher education. Fewer than 40% of all Americans have earned a college degree.
So what, then, do we make of The Tyranny of Merit? Sandel’s book is inherently provocative, bristling with sharp observations. It straddles realms, political, philosophical and political, which gives it breadth but often less depth. The book is expansive without being systematic.
Harvard is Sandel’s default perspective. There’s nothing wrong with that, provided that we fully appreciate that Harvard is not, nor can be, understood as representative of higher education. There are massive differences between elite institutions and the vast majority of colleges that educate the vast majority of students. Significant distinctions remain between publics and privates. Private institutions’ primary responsibility is to their institution. Public institutions, by definition, have other ends. The Tyranny of Merit is not concerned with these questions. Nor is it about crafting better policy. Instead, Sandel’s larger aim is to question the thinking and practice that has elevated some and not others. Meritocracies, he cautions, can be toxic.
Sandel believes that the common good, north star of democracy, comes about through community and honest discussion. While he did not reference Benjamin Barber’s strong democracy, that is exactly what the book’s conclusion seeks. He calls for humility, a more generous public life, for “citizens from different walks of life [to] encounter each other in common spaces and public spaces.” He stresses that “we are not self-made and self-sufficient.” Ever attentive to the strength of cooperation and power of contingency in shaping lives, Professor Michael Sandel would find much to appreciate in the values and practice of our community colleges. Interestingly, he might find them more suited to his values than Harvard.
David Potash