The relevance of meritocratic beliefs for redistributive preferences increases with income

This study examines how students in the Netherlands perceive the formal opportunities provided by the educational system to realize their educational aspirations. Drawing on 15 focus groups with 61 students in primary and secondary education, we investigate how students interpret key features of the opportunity structure, such as mobility, selectivity, and stigma, as well as the barriers they perceive in navigating their educational trajectories. We find that students largely align their expectations with the formal structure of the Dutch system but tend to overestimate their freedom to shape their own educational pathways. While they recognize stigma attached to vocational tracks, structural barriers such as discrimination, financial concerns, or limited mobility often go unacknowledged. Instead, students attribute success primarily to individual traits such as motivation and effort, revealing a strong belief in meritocracy even within a highly selective system. This study sheds light on how opportunity structures are perceived by students themselves, offering a lens on how systemic features are internalized. These findings are relevant for other European countries with early tracking and selective educational structures, where similar dynamics may shape students’ aspirations, decision-making, and perceived agency.

Support for redistribution is often dismissed as driven by a morally questionable motive: Malicious envy. Seemingly supporting this notion, in some studies, liberalism was correlated with envy, and envy predicted support for redistribution. However, we argue that these results can be explained by meritocracy beliefs rather than envy; specifically, we hypothesize that liberals are only indirectly prone to envy to the extent that they believe wealth is often not merited. Consequently, we argue that these meritocracy beliefs drive redistribution support, not envy. We found support for our predictions in three surveys and one experiment (total N = 4,171), showing that (a) liberalism only indirectly predicted envy via lowered meritocracy beliefs, and (b) meritocracy beliefs, not envy, (negatively) predicted support for redistribution. Moreover, when an experimental manipulation increased liberals' perceptions of wealth as deserved, their support for redistribution decreased. These findings may inform a more evidence-based debate amid growing inequality.

The paradox of inequality posits that individuals in high-inequality societies paradoxically exhibit stronger meritocratic beliefs, perceiving their societies as systems that reward individuals based on ability and effort rather than social background or connections. This study presents an explanation from the perspective of critical sociology of education, complementing prior research that offers community contextual and psychosocial insights. By analysing the ISSP 2019 dataset, which includes 29 countries or regions, we find that in countries or regions with high income inequality, education serves to legitimise inequality and diminishes individuals' awareness of the structural factors contributing to inequality. Conversely, in those with low inequality, while basic education also functions to legitimise inequality, advanced stages of education possess an enlightening character that enables individuals to be more aware of the structural factors that lead to inequality. Generally, by estimating the interactions between education and country-level income inequality, this study elucidates the factors contributing to the paradox of inequality and reconciles the persistent argument between legitimisation and enlightenment theories of education.

Effective Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) policy depends on both attitudinal endorsement and behavioral enactment. Yet little is known about why individuals support or fail to support D&I policy in either domain. Based on survey data from 2,639 employees in a Dutch organization, we employed k-means clustering to identify five D&I policy support profiles: Champions and Opponents (supportive or resistant in both attitude and behavior), along with three more nuanced groups—Ambivalents (ambivalent in both domains), Bystanders (attitudinally supportive but behaviorally passive), and Reluctants (behaviorally engaged but attitudinally skeptical). To examine underlying reasoning, we applied a mixed-method approach combining qualitative content analysis and Latent Class Analysis. Five distinct reasoning patterns emerged. Mapping these onto support profiles revealed that Champions and Bystanders often expressed ideological endorsement of D&I, while Reluctants voiced critical yet constructive concerns about policy implementation. Opponents expressed meritocratic beliefs or policy unawareness, and Ambivalents reported policy unawareness or inaccessibility. We additionally examined whether these patterns varied across organizational positions (managers vs. employees) and group membership (minority vs. majority). This integrative analysis demonstrates that D&I policy support and resistance are multidimensional and grounded in diverse rationales. Our findings underscore the importance of tailored strategies that address diverse motives behind support, resistance, disengagement, ambivalence, and reluctant compliance.

The belief in meritocracy has been rising over the past few decades in developed countries. While many studies have focused on the belief in meritocracy, its distribution across groups and its effects, much less is known about how beliefs may change as individuals age and undergo major life transitions. Using linear growth models on three waves of panel data from a national youth survey in Singapore, we found that the major life transitions to adulthood – progressing through the education system (e.g., completing tertiary education), transiting from full-time studies to full-time work, getting married and becoming a parent – predicted only marginal intraindividual changes in meritocratic beliefs. Instead, linear growth models consistently pointed to strong starting beliefs amongst Singaporean youths which did not waver over time. These findings suggest that the belief in meritocracy is sticky once it is formed, which highlights the importance of how meritocratic discourse is framed in society.

Conspiracy theories are often viewed as a means to externally attribute ingroup sufferings by blaming them on the actions of powerful groups. Building on this assumption, we tested the hypothesis that the threat induced by facing an internal (vs. external) attribution for an ingroup’s sufferings would result in increased endorsement of an alternative, conspiracy attribution. We also examined how being confronted with an internal attribution for an ingroup’s sufferings impacts people’s sympathy for the author of a conspiracy attribution. In five preregistered experiments (Ntotal = 2,695), being confronted with an internal attribution for an ingroup’s sufferings did not increase the endorsement of conspiracy attributions (BF01 = 37.88, very strong evidence for the null), sympathy for the conspiracy advocate (BF01 = 4.38, some evidence for the null), or self-reported agreement with them (BF01 = 17.70, strong evidence for the null). A potential explanation for these results is the social stigma surrounding conspiracy beliefs – which may result in participants being reluctant to endorse conspiracy attributions. In contrast, stable propensities to internally attribute inequalities (political orientation in Study 1, meritocracy beliefs in Studies 2–3) were negatively associated with all three dependent variables.

Research in cultural class analysis shows that individuals often rely on meritocratic beliefs to justify their social position. Those in prominent roles typically attribute their success to ‘effort’ and ‘talent’, while downplaying or overlooking the influence of external resources and support in shaping their trajectories. However, these claims of ordinariness only partially explain how meritocratic beliefs shape the experiences of upward mobility. Drawing on 42 interviews with upwardly mobile and intergenerationally stable high-level professionals and managers in Lima, this article explores how upwardly mobile Limeños construct narratives about their social trajectories and justify their positions relative to their peers. It reveals that meritocratic narratives function not only as mechanisms of self-validation but also as a way for upwardly mobile individuals to distinguish themselves from their more privileged counterparts, establishing a symbolic boundary between ‘privilege’ and ‘talent’.

ABSTRACT Meritocracy refers to the ideology that reward should be allocated to individuals based on their merits (effort and abilities). Social psychologists have studied it as a universal justice principle in reward allocation and a belief that justifies merit‐based social stratification. Taking a geopolitical stance, we further contextualize meritocracy is a socially and historically situated hierarchy‐legitimizing construct used to reinforce social division of labor and justify social inequality in the post‐industrial neoliberal society, so that the society can excel in global competition. As such, subscription to meritocracy should be associated with higher institutional trust in more mature market economies only. To test this hypothesis, we collated World Values Survey (WVS) data related to institutional trust and meritocracy beliefs from 84,638 participants in 57 societies (47.34% males, mean age = 42.89, SD = 16.43) and society‐level data of these societies’ economic freedom, economic performance, and economic inequality. Institutional trust data were analyzed both at the society level and the individual level. The results showed that at the society level, institutional trust was higher in a society that stronger shared beliefs in meritocracy and had many more economic freedoms. At the individual level, in societies with more economic freedoms, people trusted public institutions more if they held stronger meritocracy beliefs. In contrast, in societies with fewer economic freedoms, institutional trust was higher among people who opposed to meritocracy beliefs.

ABSTRACTInequalities in access to important resources and opportunities between social groups persist throughout societies worldwide. Social psychological research has shown that adults often use meritocratic beliefs to justify the existence of such inequalities. Yet, the developmental origins of meritocratic beliefs have yet to be fully explored. This study investigated how children and young adults (N = 144; 5‐ to 6‐year‐olds, M = 5.83, SD = 0.97; 9‐ to 11‐year‐olds, M = 10.74, SD = 0.68; 18‐ to 22‐year‐olds, M = 19.92, SD = 1.10) factored information about merit into their moral judgments and reasoning about science education resource inequalities between groups of girls and boys. Confirming our hypotheses, participants overall judged inequalities that disadvantaged high‐merit groups more negatively than inequalities that disadvantaged low‐merit groups, regardless of which gender group was disadvantaged. Further, exploratory analyses revealed age‐related differences in judgments of inequalities that disadvantaged girls, but not boys. Whereas all age groups judged inequalities that disadvantaged boys more negatively when boys were described as high‐merit compared to low‐merit, only older children judged inequalities that disadvantaged girls more negatively when girls were described as high‐merit compared to low‐merit. Age‐related differences also emerged for participants’ reasoning about inequalities, such that older children were more likely to reason about merit, and less likely to reason about equality, compared to both younger children and young adults. These novel findings offer insights into how concerns for merit shape individuals’ moral judgments of social inequalities throughout childhood and young adulthood.SummaryOverall, children and young adults judged inequalities of science resources that disadvantaged high‐merit groups more negatively than inequalities that disadvantaged low‐merit groups.More positive judgments of inequalities were associated with a lower likelihood of reasoning about equality and a higher likelihood of reasoning about merit.Older children were more likely to reason about merit and less likely to reason about equality compared to both younger children and young adults.Exploratory analyses showed age‐related differences in the extent to which participants factored merit into their judgments of inequalities that disadvantaged girls, but not boys.

Abstract Racial disparities in educational outcomes persist in the United States. However, little is known about race-related beliefs among early childhood educators (ECEs). ECEs serve as the first representatives of formal education for children from racially and ethnically minoritized backgrounds, even as they navigate a highly stressful and under-supported profession. This study examined race-related beliefs among a racially and ethnically diverse sample of 146 ECEs working in a large urban school district, and investigated differences in race-related beliefs by ECE age, tenure, education, and race/ethnicity. Participating ECEs identified as Asian (43.4%), White (24.0%), Latine (18.6%), and Black (14.0%). Approximately 40% had earned a graduate degree. Subsequent study aims utilized linear regression models to examine ECE daily stressors and burnout symptoms as predictors of race-related beliefs, controlling for ECE race/ethnicity, age, and education. Results demonstrated that ECEs generally reported equitable race-related beliefs. However, older ECEs, ECEs with less than a graduate degree, and ECEs identifying as Asian were also more likely to espouse inequitable beliefs. Controlling for age, race/ethnicity, and education, greater burnout (emotional exhaustion and depersonalization) was related to greater alignment with meritocracy beliefs, more cultural deficit beliefs, and a belief that racism is no longer a problem in America. ECE daily stressors were not significantly related to any race-related beliefs. Findings from the present study highlight areas for intervention to increase equity, including increasing opportunities for higher education for ECEs, and implementing system-wide supports to reduce burnout.

ABSTRACT A significant part of contemporary popular culture portrays the rich as obscene, self-destructive, addicted and deranged. This article analyses the affective intensities circulating around this trope by close reading the award-winning television series Succession and its media reception. Drawing from cultural analyses of the entrepreneurial myth and of the tensions between patrimonial capitalism and the ideals of meritocracy, the article analyses the figure of the obscene rich, the ambiguities such portrayals seem to carry and the experiences of schadenfreude they generate. The article asks what is at stake in the tendency to represent the rich as obscene and analyses the subjectivities and affects this trope creates or postulates both for the rich characters and the audience. Looking beyond the critical concepts of ambiguity and ambivalence, the article asks to what extent the affects around the obscene rich are linked to the contemporary economic formation, characterised by a strong belief in meritocracy but growing dynastic tendencies. It argues that Succession creates a fatalistic sense of no escape, leaving its audiences with ambiguous affects, mixing disgust with envy and moral superiority. Ultimately, the article analyses Succession as a series that fosters a fantasy in which rich dynasties will eventually destroy themselves, or at least suffer, while the rest of us are left entertained.

Meritocracy-the belief that society rewards individual ability, motivation, and hard work-is foundational to many Western nations but the processes by which meritocratic beliefs are communicated to youth is not well understood. The present study used a master narrative (i.e., dominant cultural stories) framework to explore parents' communication of meritocratic messages. Data came from a larger qualitative study of family social class socialization; the interview protocol was designed to elicit information about parents' perspectives on how their families' current social class standing affects their family life, including how they communicate about social class with their children. The sample comprises parents from the United Kingdom (n = 21) and United States (n = 13) with at least one child between the ages of 5 and 17 (N = 34; Mage = 44.1 years; 50% women; 26% Asian; 26% Black; 9% Latinx; 38% white; 44% working class; 6% lower middle class; 38% middle class; 12% upper middle class). Results indicate that all parents incorporated aspects of meritocracy, adhering to individualist views of economic success. Many also resisted dominant narratives such as materialism. Far less frequent was endorsement of a counter narrative to meritocracy (i.e., structural dimensions of social class). (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

This paper explores how women’s leadership aspirations and experiences are shaped by an enduring yet often illusory belief in meritocracy, particularly within high-tech sectors that pride themselves on innovation and data-driven decision making. Drawing on contemporary research (Eagly & Heilman, 2016; Ibarra, Ely & Kolb, 2013; Derks et al., 2016; Rudman & Fairchild, 2004; Fine, 2005; Brescoll, 2016; Hewlett, 2019; Joshi et al., 2015; Cech & Blair-Loy, 2010; Seron et al., 2018), we illustrate how deeply held individualistic and meritocratic ideologies can mask or justify pervasive gender biases in recruitment, promotion, and leadership evaluations. Even as technology-driven businesses advocate a boundary-breaking ethos, women still confront micro-inequities, subtle exclusion from networks, and a “diversity–quality” tradeoff narrative that keeps them on the margins. Through an analysis of content diaries and interview excerpts, the paper shows that women often internalize, rationalize, or minimize inequitable treatment, partly due to cultural norms elevating technical prowess and dismissing socially oriented skills. Moreover, rather than galvanizing collective reform efforts or feminist critiques, many women’s recognition of bias remains fragmented and personalized – an obstacle to broader organizational change. In light of Industry 4.0 transformations – encompassing digital platforms, algorithmic decision making, and disruptive business models – this study urges reevaluations of workplace cultures that unquestioningly assume neutrality. We propose that addressing gender imbalance requires not only boosting women’s participation in data-driven leadership but, more importantly, rethinking how digital-era “meritocracy” can inadvertently replicate old hierarchies. By questioning the assumption that pure technical capability alone ensures fairness, leaders and organizations can generate more inclusive cultures and move toward genuinely transformative practices in the digital age.

IntroductionSeveral countries have experienced a shift toward the privatization and commodification of public goods, welfare policies, and social services. In Latin America, Chile stands out as a paradigmatic case where this trend has led to the extensive marketization of essential services. From a moral economy perspective, the extent to which individuals consider it fair for access to such services to depend on market criteria has been conceptualized as market justice preferences. This study investigates the relationship between perceptions of economic inequality, meritocratic beliefs, and market justice preferences in Chile between 2016 and 2023.MethodsUsing six waves of panel data from the Chilean Longitudinal Social Survey-ELSOC (Nobservations = 8,643; Nindividuals = 1,687), the analysis examines how subjective assessments of inequality shape attitudes toward the role of merit in access to key social services such as healthcare, education, and pensions.ResultsThe findings show that greater perceived inequality is associated with lower market justice preferences. However, individuals who believe that effort is rewarded are more likely to legitimize existing disparities. In contrast, the perception that talent is rewarded shows a negative effect on market justice preferences; an effect that intensifies as perceived inequality increases over time. The study also considers the influence of major social movements during this period, which appear to have reshaped public discourse on justice and fairness.DiscussionThese findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how distributive beliefs evolve in contexts marked by persistent inequality and entrenched neoliberal frameworks. They indicate that while perceptions of inequality tend to undermine support for market justice, meritocratic beliefs-particularly those emphasizing effort-reinforce its legitimacy. By contrast, talent-based meritocratic perceptions weaken it, especially as inequality becomes more salient. The results also suggest that major collective events, such as the 2019 protests, did not fundamentally alter these underlying associations.

Abstract Meritocratic beliefs are often invoked as justification for inequality. We provide evidence on how meritocratic beliefs are shaped by economic rewards and how they contribute to the moral justification of inequality. In a large-scale survey experiment in the US, we show that economic rewards cause a change in beliefs about success depending on effort rather than luck. Exploiting exogenous variation in meritocratic beliefs in a two-stage analysis shows that these beliefs affect the level of inequality people accept. Successful people prefer to remain ignorant about the true underlying reasons for success, and there is no evidence that meritocratic beliefs are moderated by political orientation.

Rags-to-riches narratives are inspiring; however, they may inadvertently perpetuate the meritocratic myth, particularly in contexts of low social mobility. Across five studies, we demonstrate that self-made upward mobility narratives increase people's meritocratic beliefs and motivate them to exert greater effort, especially in low mobility contexts. Watching such narratives is positively associated with meritocratic beliefs in low social mobility conditions (Pilot Study). Recalling such a narrative (Study 1), being exposed to these narratives in a fictitious society (Study 2) or encountering them in specific scenarios from a first-person (Study 3a) or third-person perspective (Study 3b), leads participants to engage in system justification, blame failure and accept or legitimize exploitation through meritocratic beliefs in low mobility contexts. Interpreting such narratives in a non-meritocratic way can mitigate these effects (Study 4). In summary, we uncover a rather small but robust effect: Even and especially in low mobility contexts, exposure to self-made upward mobility narratives strengthens individuals' belief in the power of personal effort. This, in turn, prompts them to justify the system and push themselves harder.

Experimental economists study the Public Goods Game (PGG) to investigate cooperative behavior. This study embedded inequality and income mobility into the PGG to investigate its effect on cooperation. Treatment 1 embedded fixed transfers in-between rounds of the PGG, representing equally distributed income growth. Treatments 2 and 3 embedded variable transfers in-between rounds, representing heterogeneously distributed income growth based on equal proportion of luck and effort (Treatment 2) or a disproportionate amount of luck (Treatment 3). Treatments 2 and 3 also enabled relative income mobility, while treatment 1 restricted any possibility of relative mobility. Results showed that introducing relative income mobility (Treatments 2 and 3) did not lead to greater cooperation (when compared with Treatment 1) among the players. Comparing Treatments 2 and 3, participants contributed more to the PGG when relative income mobility was dependent on effort rather than on luck. Despite theories linking weakened meritocratic beliefs with greater preferences for redistribution, in this study, contribution to the PGG fell when the income mobility process was predominantly luck-based. Unfairness observed in the income mobility process discouraged contribution, even when equity of final outcomes could be achieved through cooperation. This could be because a behavioral component of dissatisfaction against inequity in the income mobility process outweighed the motive of using the PGG to redistribute unfair income. The study also investigated within-treatment behavior of different endowment types (low class, middle class, high class) when various forms of income mobility were integrated. Under these conditions, and when relative income mobility was integrated into the PGG on a predominantly luck-based process, a significant reduction in contribution from the middle class was observed. Endowment inequality did not reduce cooperation, presumably because the associated relative income mobility incorporation into the PGG threatened downward mobility, such that higher-class participants contributed to establish a safety-net.

Governments worldwide have reformed early childhood education (ECE) to equip young people with competitive skills for an increasingly specialized workforce. These reforms have coincided with a widespread acceptance of meritocratic beliefs holding that talent and effort, rather than uncontrollable factors (e.g., luck, social context), determine individuals’ lifetime success and achievement. This study examines whether recent ECE reforms may have promoted an economic meritocratic mindset that favors skills linked to individual competition for future achievement. Data came from a total of 92 documents published between 1999 and 2023, including ECE advisory reports from international organizations and government-endorsed ECE curricula from 53 countries across Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. A step-by-step thematic analysis was conducted through combining qualitative text coding with statistical analyses applied to the emerging themes. Findings show that: (1) while experts and policymakers recognized the importance of ECE access and quality, they defined social cohesion primarily through economic indicators; (2) ECE documents prioritized cognitive skills and –mostly among international organizations– socioemotional skills as key for individual achievement, but citizenship skills were largely omitted; (3) individual agency and responsibility within ECE contexts were defined as central to educational and lifetime success, while uncontrollable factors (e.g., intergenerational transmission of advantage, family origin) were largely neglected; (4) both international organizations and governments strongly embraced an economic meritocratic mindset in ECE, implying that life outcomes mainly depend on talent and effort, obscuring the role of support and solidarity from peers, relatives, communities or institutions. Overall, this study suggests that ECE reforms have globally reinforced the pitfalls of meritocracy by promoting educational policies that prioritize competition over cooperation, individualism over solidarity, and the widespread notion that talent and effort, rather than uncontrollable factors such as luck or social context, determine individuals’ lifetime success in society.

Governments worldwide have reformed early childhood education (ECE) to equip young people with competitive skills for an increasingly specialized workforce. These reforms have coincided with a widespread acceptance of meritocratic beliefs holding that talent and effort, rather than uncontrollable factors (e.g., luck, social context), determine individuals' lifetime success and achievement. This study examines whether recent ECE reforms may have promoted an economic meritocratic mindset that favors skills linked to individual competition for future achievement. Data came from a total of 92 documents published between 1999 and 2023, including ECE advisory reports from international organizations and government-endorsed ECE curricula from 53 countries across Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. A step-by-step thematic analysis was conducted through combining qualitative text coding with statistical analyses applied to the emerging themes. Findings show that: (1) while experts and policymakers recognized the importance of ECE access and quality, they defined social cohesion primarily through economic indicators; (2) ECE documents prioritized cognitive skills and -mostly among international organizations- socioemotional skills as key for individual achievement, but citizenship skills were largely omitted; (3) individual agency and responsibility within ECE contexts were defined as central to educational and lifetime success, while uncontrollable factors (e.g., intergenerational transmission of advantage, family origin) were largely neglected; (4) both international organizations and governments strongly embraced an economic meritocratic mindset in ECE, implying that life outcomes mainly depend on talent and effort, obscuring the role of support and solidarity from peers, relatives, communities or institutions. Overall, this study suggests that ECE reforms have globally reinforced the pitfalls of meritocracy by promoting educational policies that prioritize competition over cooperation, individualism over solidarity, and the widespread notion that talent and effort, rather than uncontrollable factors such as luck or social context, determine individuals' lifetime success in society.