On Meritocracy

Arguably…

In an ideal meritocratic society there should be a matching of the abilities and skills of individuals to the tasks to which they are most suited.  In a situation in which there is more than one candidate putting himself or herself forwards for a task then an independent and objective way of testing who is the most able may be used as a way of determining who should best be performing it. This testing may occur at the point of application or more likely prior to applying through and education system in which the person’s skills and abilities have been developed and also simultaneously assessed. 

Put in this way a meritocracy draws no subjective value difference between tasks (or those who perform them) nor does it imply that any task be better rewarded. In practice in advanced capitalist societies such as the UK. governments have promoted a narrow version of meritocracy in which certain tasks are perceived to have much greater value than others, are rewarded far more highly and for which there is much greater competition. In this narrow meritocracy much time and energy is spent on matching skills and abilities to a certain number of very specific roles and the whole notion of ability itself comes to be defined in relation to its applicability to these relatively few specific high value roles. To not have the ability and skills for these roles is to be in danger of being perceived as having no skills or ability at all.