Originally published here.

Thanks to all our presenters and plenary speakers for a really excellent set of discussions on merit and meritocracy at our conference yesterday. In their plenaries, Jo Littler, Nicola Ingram and Daniel Smith offered three wildly different takes on the concept and the work it does in contemporary societies, thinking about the discursive and political shift the idea has undergone ‘from Michael to Toby’, its work in concealing the continued power of both landed and branded gentries, and the impacts it is having on classed selves and bodies in classrooms.

Panel sessions explored more dimensions – the political history of the concept and how we might get past limited ideas of equality of opportunity and individual merit to really imagine egalitarian, collective and communal alternatives; the shaping of young peoples’ future imaginaries within the limited discourse of individualistic merit and success; and the complex ways in which access to and experiences in HE both exhibit the traces of a problematic meritocratic discourse and push back against it. We were particularly delighted to hear lots of innovative ideas from PhD students and early career scholars in those sessions.

We had great, engaged discussions across these topics throughout the day so we heartily thank ALL our participants as well as presenters for their contributions. Some of us will be continuing the discussion at the BSA conference Education Stream Plenary on Wednesday 11th.

Merit or Meritocracy: 60 Years And Counting… was a one-day conference at Newcastle University on 9th April, organised by Anselma Gallinat, Ruth Graham, Lisa Garforth and Geoff Payne of the Sociology Imagining Pasts and Futures Research Cluster with support from the BSA Education Study Group. We also thank the Newcastle University and the School of GPS for their support for this event.