Meritocratic problems

Theodore Dalrymple writes:

In modern society, people are supposed to shift for themselves, to develop their own lives according to their own conceptions, and to experience what is known as ‘personal growth,’ a process incapable of definition that is supposed to last until five minutes before death. People are no longer born into a social role that they are assigned to fill until they die, simply by virtue of having been born in a certain place to certain parents. In theory, at least, every man in modern society is master of his own fate. Where he ends up is a matter of his own choice and merit.

In so far as modern society actually conforms to this ideal, it obviates the frustration of the man of talent who can get nowhere because of a rigid caste system that keeps him in his place, which is to say where he was born. Not only his, but every, career is open to all the talents. The problem with meritocracy, however, even in its purest imaginable form, is that few people are of exceptional merit. The realisation that the fault lies in us, not in our stars, that we are underlings, is a painful one; and in the nature of things, there are more underlings than what I am tempted to call overlings. A meritocracy is therefore fertile ground for mass resentment.

(Video: "Alain de Botton examines our ideas of success and failure -- and questions the assumptions underlying these two judgments. Is success always earned? Is failure? He makes an eloquent, witty case to move beyond snobbery to find true pleasure in our work." Via TED)