James Hankins on Meritocracy Today: The Cases of America and China

Conversations with Bill Kristol

News, Society & Culture, Government, Politics

4.7 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 10 August 2019

⏱️ 64 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What are the roots of our idea of “meritocracy”? Why has meritocracy become a subject of intense scrutiny in our politics? Can there be a legitimate meritocracy? In this Conversation, James Hankins, a professor of history at Harvard University, presents a historically learned and deeply relevant account of the idea of meritocracy. According to Hankins, our current idea of meritocracy is closely tied to the post-French Revolution effort to replace the old hereditary elite with a new elite based on talent or merit. Over time, however, our idea of merit has become more narrowly focused on scientific capability—and has avoided questions about the humanities. Hankins points both to the Renaissance in the West and Confucianism in China as important sources for revitalizing the notion that moral virtue is important to teach, and for prospective rulers to understand. In sum, Hankins presents a fascinating account of meritocracy in China, America, and the West as a whole.

Transcript

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0:00.0	And the Hi, I'm Bill Crystal. Welcome to Conversations. I'm very pleased to be joined today by Professor James Hankins of Harvard University, distinguishedinguished Scholar of the Italian Renaissance,
0:25.0	the political thought thereof.
0:28.0	Very fine teacher, many friends of mine have studied with you here at Harvard,
0:32.0	and you've taught classes with Harvey Mansfield who's been a guest on these
0:35.6	conversations occasionally on what Republican thought in the Renaissance is I right or
0:39.7	just Republicanism from antiquity to the present.
0:43.3	Oh, well, good topic.
0:44.8	We'll have to discuss that sometime, and then you can also educate me and others on all kinds
0:49.3	of thinkers I've never read in the 15th, 16th century, but I thought for today we would discuss the topic you have written about, some recently, and that's very much in the news, which is meritocracy. I was flying up here, this is, and we're talking in what early May of 2019 and I flew up last night to do this conversation among other things and I opened up a magazine and there was a piece right there on meritocracy blues and I thought
1:16.0	well we're having a very topical conversation and you've written interestingly
1:19.6	about it so meritocracy what about it what it? Let's just begin with that.
1:24.4	All right. Well, the word, as everyone knows, I think, now is invented by George Young in his
1:30.5	novel about the meritocracy in 1958, the father of Toby Young by the way.
1:36.5	Michael Young, I think.
1:37.5	No, no, Michael Young is the father of Tobey.
1:39.5	Yeah, you said George Young.
1:40.7	I'm sorry.
1:41.7	I got my young's mixed excuse me excuse me so Michael is the father of
1:44.6	Toby young who writes who writes who writes a spectator today he's very proud of
1:48.3	that his father invented the term meritocracy but the classist of course all complained that because merit is a lot wording
1:56.2	Krasi is a Greek word and so it's an inappropriate expression but the correct
2:01.8	Greek expression would have been aristocracy, but there were obvious reasons why you could not use the term aristocracy to describe what Young was talking about, which is the idea that those with merit should rule. Those who
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