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Adrian Wooldridge

The Aristocracy of Talent: How Meritocracy Made the Modern World Hardcover – July 13, 2021

by Adrian Wooldridge (Author)

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The Times (UK) book of the year! Meritocracy: the idea that people should be advanced according to their talents rather than their birth. While this initially seemed like a novel concept, by the end of the twentieth century it had become the world's ruling ideology. How did this happen, and why is meritocracy now under attack from both right and left?

In The Aristocracy of Talent, esteemed journalist and historian Adrian Wooldridge traces the history of meritocracy forged by the politicians and officials who introduced the revolutionary principle of open competition, the psychologists who devised methods for measuring natural mental abilities, and the educationalists who built ladders of educational opportunity. He looks outside western cultures and shows what transformative effects it has had everywhere it has been adopted, especially once women were brought into the meritocratic system.

Wooldridge also shows how meritocracy has now become corrupted and argues that the recent stalling of social mobility is the result of failure to complete the meritocratic revolution. Rather than abandoning meritocracy, he says, we should call for its renewal.

Print length

504 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Skyhorse
Publication date

July 13, 2021
Dimensions

6 x 1.4 x 9.25 inches
ISBN-10

1510768610
ISBN-13

978-1510768611
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From the Publisher

Adrian Wooldridge business book of the year 2021 longlisted

Times Literary Supplement quote anecdotes and statistics


	What You Should Know About Politics . . . But Don't, Fourth Edition	The Case for Color-Blind Equality in an Age of Identity Politics	Poverty Safari	Affirmative Action Puzzle	Your Special Education Rights
	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Erudite, thoughtful and magnificently entertaining book."
--James Marriott, The Times (London)

"Unfailingly entertaining, effortlessly drawing on a wealth of anecdote and statistics." --Times Literary Supplement

"This unique and fascinating history explains why the blame now being piled upon meritocracy is misplaced—and that assigning responsibilities to the people best able to discharge them really is better than the time-honored customs of corruption, patronage, nepotism, and hereditary castes. Wooldridge upends many common assumptions and provides an indispensable back story to this fraught and pressing issue."
--Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University

"Wonderful...The Aristocracy of Talent provides an important and needed corrective to contemporary critiques of meritocracy. It puts meritocracy in an illuminating historical and cross-cultural perspective that shows how critical the judgment of people by their talents rather than their bloodlines or connections has been to creating the modern world. Highly recommended."
--Francis Fukuyama, Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies

"This is an important, fascinating and superbly written book. The Aristocracy of Talent pulls the rug out from under the current assault on meritocracy. How quickly we forget that reformers struggled for centuries to displace privilege of birth with merit-based judgments. Rejecting merit in favor of equal outcomes, Adrian Wooldridge persuasively argues, is like handing the keys of the future to China and other cultures focused on results. Does the assault on core values leave you at a loss for words? Read this book."
--Philip K Howard, author of The Death of Common Sense and founder of Common Good

"Wooldridge... makes intelligent contributions to the fraught cultural debate about the value--or lack thereof--of meritocracy." --Brooke Allen, The Hudson Review

About the Author

Adrian Wooldridge is the political editor and a columnist at the Economist. He earned a doctorate in history from Oxford University, where he was a Fellow of All Souls College. He is the author of ten previous books, including Capitalism in America co-written with Alan Greenspan and seven co-written with John Micklethwait: The Wake-Up Call, The Witch Doctors, A Future Perfect, The Company, The Right Nation, God is Back, and The Fourth Revolution.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Skyhorse (July 13, 2021)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 504 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1510768610
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1510768611
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.55 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1.4 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #408,198 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #179 in Labor & Industrial Economic Relations (Books)
- #236 in Political Economy
- #575 in Economic Conditions (Books)

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Edwin A. Locke

A great book, with some reservations

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 3, 2022

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The Aristocracy of Talent

This is a mostly brilliant, courageous, and very important book in many respects. First, it presents a fascinating history of the issue of selection based on talent from Plato to the present. Second, it shows that recognizing and rewarding talent is pro-progress and pro-life. Third, the author explains how talent recognition is properly based heavily on the use of objective tests, especially cognitive ability (IQ) tests, but he does not recommend locking them in (through government tracking) for life at an early age. IQ is mainly genetic and that IQ tests are not racist. Higher IQ leads to better outcomes among all groups. The author strongly favors finding talented people from poor families and supporting their education with scholarships. Fourth, the author argues that meritocracy is moral in that it allows everyone to have the chance to fully utilize whatever talents they have while totally rejecting the idea that everyone must come out the same. Fifth, he fully supports the concept of a Constitutional Republic that protects rights rather than a pure democracy (unlimited majority or mob rule). In sum, this book primarily pro-justice and pro-individualism and, as such, is a very valuable antidote to the hateful attacks on merit by leftists who relentlessly push to replace individual merit with quotas for favored collectives. I should add that the author does NOT say that people should base their self-esteem on income or status-seeking but rather on what they are able to achieve in their own work. He thinks, correctly I think, that the elite universities are snobbish, but I did a bit of research and found that Harvard gives 50% of its students need-based scholarships and 20% full scholarships. It is clear that he would like more scholarships at all levels.

I have some reservations about the book. (i) He wants more government involvement in people’s lives than I would support, such as government involvement in news broadcasting and he is not 100% opposed to affirmative action. (ii) He wants government bureaucrats to be intelligent, ok fine, but he does not say that there should be many fewer of them with less power; and (iii) he wants intelligent people to feel in some form duty above self and implies that people should feel some guilt about wanting to better their own lives and the lives of their children, which means that people should not fully use their ability for their own benefit. These altruist-statist premises somewhat undermine an otherwise great book.

12 people found this helpful

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Two cheers for an erudite, entertaining, and well-written defense of merit ...

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 21, 2021

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...also chock full of dubious ideas & omissions.

Meritocracy is a deceptively ambiguous word and this author's own definitions only emerge in his final chapter--even then in poor focus. Until then the reader must infer from elusive clues what he means. An overlong discourse on the importance of Plato's "Republic" near the beginning is the first clue. Another is his tendency to dismiss personal traits like perseverance, deference of reward, integrity, or a strong work ethic as "mere training"--something to be academically separated from true "ability", i.e., doing well on IQ tests--which he seems to see as the essence of merit. And high merit is to be rewarded by an education fitting the student to join the "Aristocracy of Talent" in governing those who flunked the tests.

The expansive middle of the book, particularly his wonderfully amusing historical anecdotes about hereditary aristocrats' incompetence and how the rising ideas of the enlightenment reduced them from royal dictators to items of tabloid gossip is wonderful. And his warnings about abandoning merit just when it's ascendant in the rest of the world--especially China--is timely. Many will find some faults with some of the author's arguments but at least he can create an entertaining narrative in spite of some gaping blind spots.

For example: His focus on the problems of racial inequality of income and education in the U.S. has numerous taboo subjects, like the teachers' unions' strangle hold on inner city schools. Their rigid focus on lavish retirement benefits combines perversely with an ironclad tenure for lazy or burned-out teachers to create an Aristocracy of Incompetence where merit is most sorely needed. Unions also underwrite expensive political campaigns to thwart charter schools or any innovation that threatens union control. This contributes to a rapidly widening gap in educational attitudes between blacks & almost all other ethnicities (not just whites).

An ignored elephant in the room is the importance of culture to merit. Why do Jews or Asians rise so disproportionately to elite positions in academia and commerce? This happens all over the planet--often in spite of strong local prejudices and explicit legal discrimination. Such obvious facts once generated Jewish quotas in academia, and are today cited almost exclusively for reducing Asian student enrollments. The impact of culture--positive or negative-- on success deserves frontal consideration in any discussion of merit--not just as a gripe for identity racists.

Also taboo is mentioning the existence of numerous black intellectuals (Tom Sowell, John McWhorter, Jason Riley to name a few) who challenge "structural racism" as a cause of the failure of black families to rise after the fall of Jim Crow. Many point out that black families had been poor, but most were as strong and as committed to education and upward mobility as white families--until subjected to corrosive disincentives of welfare subsidies. The good intentions of the 60's were enacted in political haste and they backfired slowly but disastrously. Meritocracy--however you define it--cannot backfill this growing gap without a fundamental change of focus. The solutions currently contemplated--more white guilt, identity politics, and racial reparations will only deepen it.

Nor is there a credible plan in the "Conclusions" chapter for addressing it. No army of Meritocrats can solve problems that go unacknowledged. There are some worthy observations in that final chapter, but they're lost in a thicket of mediocre & outright bad ones. Lacking a unifying vision--or even concise definition--of his subject, he needs a long chapter to make his points. Mostly he backtracks to the vision of Plato's ideal of the lofty philosopher-king whose massive intellect and the ascetic ways in which he was groomed for absolute power make him invulnerable to the mob (people), the generals, and merchant interests--and to removal from office. He seems to be the author's ideal meritocrat, and he believes that Plato's vision can be adapted to the modern world.

This seems a poor choice of muses. As he concedes early on, Plato's vision is seen by many as a blueprint for the totalitarian state. Plato's republic seems an analog of Sparta's. The philosopher-king and his many subjects (and slaves) are not unlike Sparta's minority warrior caste and many helots (slaves). All are bound together in rigid rules of behavior and training. Everybody's place is defined by authority. Plato doesn't ask which ideas, opinions, or songs the king should censor, he asks which ones the king should permit. The Republic is the original formula for all Utopian plans to come: a top-down authority enforcing a rigid uniformity, a suppression of individuality, and an expectation of willing (or unwilling) obedience. Authority always trumps human nature. The only check on the philosopher-king is his early indoctrination. The inevitable corruptions of power were one of Plato's many blind spots.

So how can Plato's dream be civilized for the modern world? The author will need most of that last chapter and a maze of digressions to explain that. Better you should read it for yourself. But be skeptical.

20 people found this helpful

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GrieferTroll_13

Fascinating read

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 5, 2021

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I listened to an interview with the author on the John Bachelor Show which caught my attention. I was quite pleased to find the book so interesting and essential for addressing many trending challenges facing the West.

One person found this helpful

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A M

A comprehensive review and thought-provoking ideas

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 18, 2022

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The book presents a comprehensive and scholarly review of the history of meritocracy. The final chapter also presents some thought-provoking ideas on how to promote meritocracy.

One person found this helpful

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FrankP

The book disappoints

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 7, 2023

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I wanted to like this book, I really did. I began to wonder about the objectivity of the author when he made some vicious personal comments about politicians he didn't like. That made me read the book more carefully looking for other biases. The early chapters of the book are a good summary of where meritocracy began and compared it to other approaches.

The author is British (nothing wrong with that) and his interpretation of what was happening in America is an academic approach, as if he read about what was going on with merit in the US but didn't have a cultural understanding of it. His opinions lean heavily on items that were relatively unknown outside of academic circles.

Chapters 14 through 16 read more like a polemic against people he dislikes, primarily the British upper class and the uber-rich. Rather than focus on the small minority of the top socio-economic strata, he completely misses the chance to discuss the much broader classes of society where meritocracy is far more important. The ability to move from lower to middle class and from middle class to upper middle class based on your own abilities.

One person found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Serious Reader

Makes powerful arguements on the importance and evolution of talent. Well written too!

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on August 1, 2021

Verified Purchase

Loved this book, a wonderfully written history of the evolution of talent and its' role in various economies around the world. Amusing and insightful.

Alexandra

Meritocratic Misconceptions

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 21, 2021

Verified Purchase

History has always had meritocrat's. Vespasian in 69AD, Thomas Cromwell in 1533, Napoleon in 1804, and Thatcher in 1979, to name but a few. No matter the time or the society, those with the will and the wit to do so have always risen.

Meritocracy itself is not a political system, for all systems of government are inherently meritocratic is some fashion. An aristocratic house - no matter how old – can fall in a generation or two when held in the hands of unworthy heirs. A king or emperor who is not suited to his throne will lose it in equal measure (Richard II and Charles I). Meritocracy is that which allows those borne into privilege to retain it. History is made in this way on meritocratic values. Thus, any attempt to pen a history of meritocracy itself, as Wooldridge has done so here, would simply be a history of humanity.

‘We should nevertheless be cautious about rejecting an idea that is so central to modernity.’ Really? What is worth preserving? Modernity is a word synonymous with decline. The decline of art, design, nations and mental health. All have crippled under the heavy mantle off modernity. All that has replaced them is a partisan private sphere and a generation of unhappy individuals. Regardless of whether meritocracy can really be claimed as a modern idea (see those above), I doubt this argument would convert any decenters to the meritocratic cause.

The one powerful point made in this work is that meritocracy is worth preserving in order to prevent equality of outcome. A dangerous and despotic principle which is incapable success and its attempts deadly beyond imagination. It is not then worth preserving as an item if modernity, but that of tradition and stability. This argument is this works greatest rallying cry. As this works sole convincing argument, it alone has the weight to pull in support from opposition on the right.

It is the mark of an educated mind to entertain an idea without accepting it. Unfortunately, this work entertains the anti-meritocratic idea too well for too long, without rebuke. As a result, I found myself more convinced than ever of the faults of meritocracy, which -as Charles Ryder so eloquently put it - has taken us to a place ‘where wealth is no longer gorgeous and power has no dignity’. Unlike their aristocratic predecessors, todays meritocrats network at tech and finance conferences (rather than racecourse and regattas). As a result, we are now deprived of pleasure, instead being forced to listen to repulsives drone on about crypto currencies and new tech. I should sooner know my place and some enjoyment!

Overall, this book lacks direction. It is based on the misconception that meritocracy is somehow endangered. Of course the rise has been made harder for many by the closure of most grammar schools, but only slightly. The old avenues are just as open now as they have always been. The military still needs officers (recent data shows they are desperately so) and those who do not have the right qualifications - on account of poor education - are able to rise through the ranks on their own merit. This is but one avenue through which all are free to rise. The Aristocracy of Talent strikes me yet another book which was the product of an author with too much free time during lockdown and a desperate attempt to fill it.

I commend Wooldridge all the same for wishing to prevent those ‘horrible people’ who ‘want to build neo-Georgian houses’ (Ben Pentreath - Financial Times 2017) from solidifying their power for their children, good on him… I couldn’t agree more.

12 people found this helpful

Kenneth Cukier (or family)

insightful and important - and a pure joy to read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 6, 2021

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Everything Adrian Wooldridge writes is just fresh, illuminating and memorable. Here he turns his attention to one of the greatest differences between our own day and the past: the ability of individuals to chose their destiny, by dint of hard work and natural ability. (Yes, these two things are in tension...) It has unleashed economic productivity in addition to individual freedom -- but today is in jeopardy. His narrative arcs from Plato to today's China, with insights and lovely witticisms at every step. His analysis of women and meritocracy is particularly shrewd. A colleague, he's the model of the careful and accessible thinker. A pure joy to read.

11 people found this helpful

Denise L

A mind-stretching book that makes you question all of your initial assumptions about meritocracy

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 3, 2021

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Adrian Wooldridge has successfully remade (at least for me!) the case for meritocracy by considering its influence within a historical and contemporary context. I admit that, in recent years, I've struggled with the notion of meritocracy and started to side with criticisms on both the left and right. Wooldridge has convinced me otherwise by examining the positive impact that meritocracy has had over the past thousand years as well as the downsides of today's "Pluto meritocracy" in the West. I think everyone should read this book -- especially the so-called "cognitive elite" he cites in the book -- not least because every page is full of insight but mostly because it addresses the "smugness" of people like us and makes us think more deeply about our moral duty to society's injustices and inequalities. Wooldridge is also terribly funny and I found myself chuckling out loud quite a bit, in additional to regular outbursts of "Wow this is an incredible book". Thank you for an excellent read!

6 people found this helpful

J F G Shearmur

Readable and very stimulating

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 9, 2022

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This seemed to me a fascinating read, and I was struck that it provided interesting discussion, and really useful references, on all kinds of points. I think that the author's case for a modified meritocracy is a powerful one. But there seemed to me three elements missing. The first was: how about suggestions for the development of institutions which are more genuinely meritocratic than those that we have - in the sense of being less easily corruptible by the rich? The author suggests how these might work, but not how they can be set up in competition with existing institutions. The second was, that he seemed to me not to address the real problem of how one addresses the situation of the less talented feeling not only that they have lost out, but that they deserve to be at the bottom of the heap. What is needed, here, are institutional suggestions (how about, say, the development of housing which, like in older villages, mixes housing of different kinds, and the encouragement of ideas about responsibility for those who live close to you: just an idea which I am sure that others can improve on.) The third was an appreciation of the way in which some key talents - consider, say, those of the younger Alan Sugar - can operate in the public interest, without needing any kind of meritocratic credentials. Not only is market behaviour an important qualification to the literature on meritocracies (which tends to be implicitly focussed on bureaucracies, public or commercial); but if this is, indeed, important, it may be really important to think of ways in which the starting up of businesses by individuals can be made easier.

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