Sandel has no brief against the use of merit to select well-qualified people to perform certain jobs or tasks. In The Tyranny of Merit, Sandel offers a penetrating indictment meritocracy’s false promises and issues a clarion call to all of us – and the center-left in particular – to rediscover the politics of the common good. As the animating ethos of the New Deal and liberal politics well into the 1960s and early 1970s, the idea of “a wider and constantly rising standard of living” both fits seamlessly with Sandel’s own broader arguments against meritocratic society and stands in stark contrast to the “rhetoric of rising” that’s dominated an increasingly technocratic progressive politics for the past four decades. This line isn’t found in the philosopher Michael Sandel’s recent book The Tyranny of Merit, but it very well could have been – and bolstered his already compelling case against meritocracy as American society’s overriding organizing principle.
THE TYRANNY OF MERITOCRACY SERIES
Right before of the memorable conclusion to his address, FDR enumerated a series of “basic things expected by our people of their political and economic systems.” Last of the six “simple, basic things” Roosevelt listed was the “enjoyment of the fruits of scientific progress in a wider and constantly rising standard of living.”
Roosevelt’s 1941 State of the Union address remains justly renowned for its articulation of the Four Freedoms : freedom from want and fear and freedom of worship and speech. FDR delivers his 1941 State of the Union address.
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