Abstract
[...]because of its openness to new talent wherever it appears, a true meritocracy could plausibly claim to be more fully the "rule of the best" than any hereditary aristocracy. [...]after one generation a meritocracy simply becomes an enclaved class. [...]the families in which such children are raised will likely impart to them the habit of reading, study, learning, and discussion, as well as a fairly uniform set of social skills and approved attitudes, tastes, and political views, thus bestowing upon them a cluster of advantages that those without such advantages will find hard even to comprehend, let alone duplicate. [...]does the meritocratic elite glide into being an enclaved elite, one that can claim with utter sincerity, even though the system of selection is absurdly skewed, that it is still a genuinely meritocratic elite. [...]when one considers the steep decline of opportunity for those Americans who must live outside the magic circle of meritocratic validation — those middle- and working-class Americans who must deal with the steady erosion of unskilled and semi-skilled jobs, the downward pressure on wages and employment caused by the steady export of jobs and steady import of immigrants competing for the diminishing number of low-skill jobs that remain, and the open condescension with which such people’s anxieties and fears are regarded by meritocratic elite culture — it is not surprising that a growing edge of bitterness and anger, even rage, has crept into what passes for our national discourse. [...]is a situation from which we are still emerging, in which the putative experts turned out not to be experts at all.