The Aristocracy of Talent: How Meritocracy Made the Modern World by Adrian WooldridgeMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Very interesting look at the history of "meritocracy" and its inevitable "aristocratic" outcome. I can't say I really agreed with his conclusions after all the analysis, but it was still an interesting read. You see how having a "meritocracy" will lead to able people coming to power (if done right), but then they will find a way to consolidate power/wealth/etc. for their families, leading to another aristocracy.
Also, in the conclusions, emulating Singapore's education style is fine, but flaunting that they only dedicate 8% of their focus on humanities seems to be a grave mistake. We are seeing the consequences of much of this now, with silicon valley bros who make fun of humanities suddenly "discovering" some new eternal truth that we've all known about for millennia (I'm not a humanities major by a long shot, having studied business and econ, but I absolutely recognize its merits).
Also, his concluding paragraph on how "the West" can keep ahead of "Asia" is all a bit too jingoistic for me.
Still, read it for the good theory and information from the past.
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