Elitism

Part of a series on
Discrimination
General forms Age Caste Class Color Disability Gender Genotype Hair Height Language Looks Mental condition Race / Ethnicity / Nationality Rank Religion Sex Sexuality Size Species
Specific forms
Social AIDS stigma Adultism Anti-albinism Anti-autism Anti-homelessness Anti-intellectualism Anti-intersex Anti-left handedness Anti-Masonry Audism Binarism Biphobia Cronyism Elitism Ephebiphobia Fatism Genderism Gerontophobia Heteronormativity Heterosexism Homophobia Leprosy stigma Lesbophobia Mentalism Misandry Misogyny Nepotism Pedophobia Pregnancy Reverse Sectarianism Shadism Supremacism Arab Black White Transmisogyny Transphobia Xenophobia
Manifestations Animal cruelty Animal testing Blood libel Blood sport Carnism Class conflict Compulsory sterilization Counter-jihad Cultural genocide Democide Disability hate crime Economic Eliminationism Employment Enemy of the people Ethnic cleansing Ethnic hatred Ethnic joke Ethnocide Forced conversion Freak show Gay bashing Gendercide Genital mutilation Genocide examples Glass ceiling Group libel Hate crime Hate group Hate speech Homeless dumping Housing Indian rolling LGBT hate crime Lavender scare Lynching Meat eating Mortgage Persecution Murder music Occupational segregation Persecution Pogrom Purge Race war Red Scare Religious persecution Scapegoating Segregation academy Sex-selective abortion Slavery Slut-shaming Trans bashing Victimisation White flight White power music Wife selling Witch-hunt
Policies Segregation age racial religious sex Age of candidacy Blood quantum Cleanliness of blood Crime of apartheid Disabilities Jewish Catholic Ethnocracy Gender pay gap Gender roles Gerontocracy Gerrymandering Ghetto benches Internment Jewish quota Jim Crow laws Law for Protection of the Nation McCarthyism MSM blood donor controversy Nonpersons Numerus clausus (as religious or racial quota) Nuremberg Laws One-drop rule Racial quota Racial steering Redlining Same-sex marriage (laws and issues prohibiting) Sodomy law Ugly law Voter suppression
Countermeasures Affirmative action Animal rights Anti-discrimination law Cultural assimilation Cultural pluralism Desegregation Diversity training Empowerment Ethnopluralism Feminism Fighting Discrimination Human rights Intersex rights Masculism Multiculturalism Racial integration Self-determination Social integration Toleration
Related topics Allophilia Anti-cultural sentiment Assimilation Bias Christian privilege Diversity Ethnic penalty Eugenics Intersectionality Male privilege Multiculturalism Neurodiversity Oppression Police brutality Political correctness Power distance Prejudice Racial bias in criminal news Racism by country Regressive left Religious intolerance Second-generation gender bias Snobbery Social exclusion Social stigma Stereotype threat White privilege
Discrimination portal

Elitism is the belief or attitude that individuals who form an elite—a select group of people with a certain ancestry, intrinsic quality, high intellect, wealth, specialized training, experience, talents, whose influence or authority is greater than that of others, whose views on a matter are to be taken more seriously, whose views or actions are more likely to be constructive to society as a whole, or whose extraordinary skills, abilities, or wisdom render them especially fit to govern. In America, the term "elitism" often refers to the concentration of power on the Northeast Corridor and West Coast, where the typical American elite - lawyers, doctors, high-level civil servants (such as White House aides), businesspeople, university lecturers, entrepreneurs and financial advisors in the quarternary sector - reside, often in the university towns they graduated from.^[1]

Alternatively, the term elitism may be used to describe a situation in which power is concentrated in the hands of a limited number of people. Oppositions of elitism include anti-elitism, egalitarianism, populism and political theory of pluralism. Elite theory is the sociological or political science analysis of elite influence in society: elite theorists regard pluralism as a utopian ideal.

'Elitism' also refers to situations in which an individual assumes special 'privileges' and responsibilities in the hope that this arrangement will benefit humanity or themselves. Elitism is closely related to social class and what sociologists call social stratification. Members of the upper classes are sometimes known as the social elite. The term elitism is also sometimes used to denote situations in which a group of people claiming to possess high abilities or simply an in-group or cadre grant themselves extra privileges at the expense of others. This form of elitism may be described as discrimination.

Characteristics

Attributes that identify an elite vary; personal achievement may not be essential. Elitist status can be based on personal achievement, such as degrees from top-rate universities or impressive internships and job offers, it can (in archaic societies) be based on lineage or passed-on fame from parents or grandparents. As a term "Elite" usually describes a person or group of people who are members of the uppermost class of society, and wealth can contribute to that class determination. Personal attributes commonly purported by elitist theorists to be characteristic of the elite include: rigorous study of, or great accomplishment within, a particular field; a long track record of competence in a demanding field; an extensive history of dedication and effort in service to a specific discipline (e.g., medicine or law) or a high degree of accomplishment, training or wisdom within a given field. Elitists tend to favor social systems such as meritocracy, technocracy and plutocracy as opposed to radical democracy, political egalitarianism and populism. Elitists also believe only a few "shakers and movers" truly change society rather than society being changed by the majority of people who only vote and elect the elites into power. To elitists, the public is abjectly powerless and can be manipulated only by the top group of elites.^[2]

Some synonyms for "elite" might be "upper-class" or "aristocratic", indicating that the individual in question has a relatively large degree of control over a society's means of production. This includes those who gain this position due to socioeconomic means and not personal achievement. However, these terms are misleading when discussing elitism as a political theory, because they are often associated with negative "class" connotations and fail to appreciate a more unbiased exploration of the philosophy.

Academic elitism

Elitism in the context of education is the practice of concentrating attention on or allocating funding to the best students, or those students who rank highest in a particular field of endeavour. For example, a politician who promotes advanced classes for students deemed to be highly intelligent might be accused of elitism, even if this were argued to promote an egalitarian goal, such as curing disease. Elitism in education could be based on conventional assessment of learning ability, knowledge, or other abilities. However, an "elite" school can also mean a school for the wealthy or hard to enter.

Anti-elitism

The term elitism and the pejorative title elitist are sometimes used by people who aren't (or, who claim not to be) members of elite organizations. In politics, such terms are often used to disparage a politician's views as out of touch with the interests of the "average Joe". The implication is that the alleged elitist person or group thinks they are better than everyone else, and put themselves before others as a result. Its definition is therefore similar to that of the word "snob". An elitist is not always seen as truly elite, but only privileged. The definition may have different appreciations depending on the political contexts. Since elitism may be viewed as something necessary for creating patterns of good intellectual or professional performance, it can be used also for maintaining conditions of lack of competition and privilege. Notably, elitism may often be confused or mistakenly conflated with meritocracy, either intentionally as an aspect of political rhetoric, or due to a popular misunderstanding of meritocratic systems as elitist.

Egalitarianism

Elitism endorses the exclusion of large numbers of people from positions of privilege or power. Thus, many populists seek the (perceived, if not present in practice) social equality of egalitarianism, populism, socialism, or communism. They may also support affirmative action, social security, luxury taxes, and highly progressive taxes for the wealthiest members of society. All of these measures seek to reduce the difference of power between the elite and the ordinary. However, these measures to reduce difference could be seen as anti-meritocratic in that they avoid rewarding or promoting those who are the most competitive or provide the most effort in their endeavors.

The terms elitism and meritocracy are not equivalent in meaning. Professor Kenneth Paul Tan at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy asserts that "Meritocracy, in trying to 'isolate' merit by treating people with fundamentally unequal backgrounds as superficially the same, can be a practice that ignores and even conceals the real advantages and disadvantages that are unevenly distributed to different segments of an inherently unequal society, a practice that in fact perpetuates this fundamental inequality. In this way, those who are picked by meritocracy as having merit may already have enjoyed unfair advantages from the very beginning, ignored according to the principle of nondiscrimination." ^[3]

See also

References

External links

• Deresiewicz, William (June 2008). The Disadvantages of an Elite Education. "Our best universities have forgotten that the reason they exist is to make minds, not careers." The American Scholar.   Review of William Deresiewicz’s book Excellent Sheep (April 2015), Foreign Affairs
• The dictionary definition of elitism at Wiktionary