Merit: a consensual value with contradictory applications

The term meritocracy was introduced by the sociologist Michael Young in 1958, in a satirical work describing a society in which ranking by measured merit would produce a new aristocracy, convinced of its legitimacy and all the harsher towards those it leaves behind. The word was then adopted as praise, which is a remarkable case of reversal of meaning.

This origin recalls something useful: the question has never been whether merit exists, but what is produced by a society that organises its positions according to a measured merit, and according to which measure.

Young himself returned to his book decades later to deplore the use that had been made of it. The detail is instructive: a concept forged to warn can become an argument, once separated from the reasoning that produced it.

The first bears on the nature of the contribution: effort supplied, result obtained, talent employed, risk assumed, social usefulness. These criteria do not put the same people at the top, and choosing one rather than another is already a political decision.

The second bears on the share attributable to the person. If part of the result comes from social origin, health, network or chance, should recognition bear on the raw result or on the distance travelled? Both answers are defensible, and they lead to opposite policies.

The third bears on the extent of what merit authorises: a higher income, a position of decision, social consideration, priority access to certain services, transmission to one's children. One may recognise merit and refuse that it should found some of these consequences.

Young's central argument, often neglected, bore not on the winner but on the loser. In a society where positions are allocated by chance or by birth, failure has no moral meaning. In a society that allocates them by merit, failure becomes a verdict on the person.

This point is independent of the level of inequality: a society with little inequality but entirely meritocratic may produce a humiliation that a more unequal society does not, where rank claims to say nothing about worth. It is one of the few arguments that does not reduce to an economic trade-off.

A person may strongly support the recognition of merit and refuse that it should found very large gaps, or the reverse. Seen from outside, that combination seems hesitant; it is in reality precise, since it answers the three questions above differently.

That is also why a single question about merit mainly measures adherence to the word. Positions part company on concrete cases: two people supplying the same effort for a different result, or the same result obtained with unequal starting means.

Two candidates obtain the same result in a competitive examination. One benefited from a favourable environment, the other progressed far more from an unfavourable starting point. Should they be treated identically, since the result is identical, or should the distance travelled be taken into account?

There is no technically correct answer: both positions are defensible, and each attaches to a distinct conception of what is being recognised. Knowing which you choose says more about your convictions than any declaration of principle about merit.