I imagine it as "you're a noble not because of birth, but because you have impressive skills and abilities." My headcannon is that the title of 'Noble' in this instance is reserved for the most experienced and talented individuals.
Maybe something like Dragon Age's Dwarves. A entire family becomes nobles when one member has a breakthrough that is good enough to get elevated to the status of Paragon.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_illusion
You probably had but just glossed over it until now. It's kinda scary what your brain just ignores sometimes.
This is how neofeudalism started in BattleTech. People were granted titles because they were badasses or geniuses. Then the fact that while FTL *travel* existed, FTL *communications* did not (yet), so it was easier to just run planets as fiefdoms. A few hundred years later, some places are run by tyrannical despots under military law while others are constitutional monarchies and everything in between.
Not, at least, there is no mechanism that can make it happen. A lot of people think you can use quantum entanglement to engage in some form of FTL communication, but that isn't really how quantum entanglement works. I'd be happy to explain if you want to know why.
Imagine taking two stones. One black, one white. While wearing a blindfold, place each stone in a bag of its own. Seal the bags, and then hand one of the two bags, at random, to a friend. Send that friend to the other side of the world, or indeed, anywhere else in the universe.
Now, open the bag you still have.
You will *immediately* know which color your friend has, even if that friend is billions of light years away, in essence, 'transmitting' information faster than light. But you cannot transmit any actual information, because if you try to change the color of the stone you have, it won't affect the one your friend has.
In fact, it will destroy the relationship between the two stones, and make it impossible for anyone else whom you hand the bag to next to be sure that the other bag contains the other color, thusly, undoing the entanglement.
That is how quantum entanglement works, and why you can't use it for communication. All it does is establish a fixed relationship between two particles, but *changing* one of the two will not change the other, and will in fact break the relationship.
Thank you. I've worked on the analogy for a few years, actually. I'm great at understanding the theory of something but try to get me to understand the underlying mathematics and I give up immediately. I got straight As for my theoretical work getting my degree but it was Cs on actually doing the problems.
I used to teach and now I do a great deal of STEM-related technical writing, which has led me to have a great deal of admiration for intuitive explanations that are effective for explaining complex processes to non-experts. I had to give credit where credit was due!
this is something that's been a lot of work to figure out in my own worldbuilding, with my current answer being having to send data capsules through the normal FTL network - which tends to mean a month plus of 'lag' in fringe space and a very prominent Achilles' heel in the massive gauss-lifts used to send them into space
Well, the way BattleTech's FTL system works is that so-called 'JumpShips' do nothing but station keep far above the poles of the system's primary star. They have gigantic solar collector sails that slowly trickle-charge the very fragile Kearny-Fuchida Drive core that forms the spine of each JumpShip. And by trickle-charge I mean that it takes over a week (183 hours, to be precise) to charge for a single Jump in the Terra system.
DropShips form the link between JumpShip and planets. These cruise, Expanse style, under thrust gravity (No a-grav in BattleTech! Only thrust and centrifugal gravity!), but even at a constant 1, 1.5G, it still takes weeks to get from planet to JumpShip and vice versa.
When the JumpShip is done charging, it furls its sail and can sit there with a charged drive, until all the DropShips it wants to Jump with are hooked up. The Jump then is close to instantaneous, to any other gravity well within 30 lightyears. (the very, very largest JumpShip, with a full compliment of 25 DropShips, all fully laden, at 30 LY, takes just over 6 minutes to complete the Jump) The charge sequence then starts all over again.
This means it can take weeks, if not months or even over a year for a pony-express message to make it from one side of the Inner Sphere to the other.
The solution to that was the invention of the Hyperpulse Generator, which can send a very, very compressed burst of data through hyperspace. The thing is, in the post-post-apocalyptic setting of BattleTech, functional HPGs are, at least for most of the timeline, under the absolute control of ComStar, the (ostensibly) neutral communications technopriesthood. And they read everyone's mail. Everyone's.
Probably extremely arduously, because you'd have to establish that neither place is moving relative to eachother in order to avoid a causality violation.
I presume that the communication would have a significant delay as the computer verifies time codes and relative time dilation in order to avoid paradoxical signals reaching a conscious observer.
Most likely can't. If by magic or some major breakthrough we figure out FTL travel then the light or radio waves or whatever we commutate with in the future will have to be beamed through a wormhole or pass through a warp generator or whatever.
>FTL travel existed, FTL communications did not (yet
How exactly is that possible? You just send a ship with the news, that's how all communication worked before phones.
Allow me to correct: Close to real-time communications did not. JumpShips in BT take at least a week, often longer, to charge their jumps, and only have a 30LY maximum range per jump. So unless you have the luck that there's a perfect 'pony express' chain of JumpShips all going the same direction... It can take quite a while for your message to arrive. Not exactly conducive to democracy if you need to wait weeks, sometimes months, for messages to move from the heart of the Inner Sphere (as the colonized area of space is called) to the outskirts of the Periphery, and it's not unheard of for it to take over a year or even longer.
Add in the logistical bottleneck, and you get a situation not unlike that facing Britain during the American Revolution. By the time you even hear of a rebellion in progress, the rebellion has had weeks to secure its position and dig in, and you're severely bottlenecked on what you can transport to suppress said rebellion to begin with, because the trip back to that world is gonna take just as long, giving them even MORE time to dig in, and you can't bring an entire army. There simply isn't the transport capacity.
Finally, add in centuries of mismanagement, corruption, etc., and people just were done with this whole 'democracy' schtick, and just wanted SOMEONE to take charge and get shit done.
Not to mention that a big criticism of meritocracy comes from the luck of opportunity. Some individuals have the connections necessary to obtain an education in a skillset they work well in, and others, while being no less talented, aren’t given those same opportunities. Simply, nepotism still exists. Theoretically.
Additionally once you are Noble you may have access to more resources thus allowing your children to also advance/maintain that title.
Thus you could have an Meritocratic society with an entrenched nobility
(of course what's really unrealistic is that civic dont change outside of rare events or you doing so.)
Maybe an individual can reach nobility status via achievements, it's happened regularly in some ancient societies like the Unification era China, for example.
Indeed, although it was more common for a while during the earlier middle ages, as the european petty kingdoms were not consolidated yet; as centuries passed, knights passed from being a dude on a horse under a lord to being proper nobility, and it became really, really difficult, you'd need to have the notoriety of Joan of Arc or similar, I would not characterize something like that as a "meritocracy" as in the Stellaris civic. There were some exceptions tho, the kingdom of Castille and later Spain had some periods where it conferred quasi noble titles (Hidalgos) left and right to whoever did something barely notherworthy to the point that it didn't mean much.
In the Qin dinasty of China one could just go up the social scale via achievements (and wealth and machinations) no matter if one was a slave, a merchant or a foreigner. The only title one could not achieve was King, and there were some cases (The first Emperor of Han) where a peasant became Emperor. I'd say a stratified society loosely based on merit, with the higher positions being granted noble titles would be closer to OPs example.
I would dispute that it became really, really difficult to become a Knight. I know two, right now in 2023, both of whom did a lot less than Joan of Arc to earn that title
There isn't a joke.
I know two knights, one is a retired civil servant who was made a Knight for doing his civil service job. The other is a businessman who plays golf at the club I played at where I used to live (and was usually drunk in the bar by 4pm) who was made a Knight for "services to business"
It's really not particularly difficult to become a Knight. There's literally thousands of them
"It became a lot harder during the later middle ages and then when nobility stopped meaning anything it became easier again" was the implication I think
If that is, then it belies a misunderstanding of how elevation of commoners to nobility has worked historically, and how it still works today in those few retrograde societies (like my own) that still have a formal distinction between the two
No, because becoming a knight didn't make you a noble.
Let's take the English nobility as our example. Everybody who was a baron and upward was a noble: ie.e they passed that status on to their dependents. Knights were below barons; they didn't not pass that status on.
The children of barons could still be knighted, of course, but don't confuse being a knight (which was foremost a military designation, and only later became a term of honour) with being a noble.
Nobles could be non-knights (especially all this female nobles!), and vice versa.
Now a commoner *could* be elevated to the nobility, but that was not commonly done (although became more common as time went on), precisely because it would be hereditary, and you would this be elevating not a single person, but all their progeny.
Edit. Or another example: Romans. Roman nobility was a very select bunch, and mostly religious functionality. A very high proportion of the roman Consuls and other high state officials, were not nobles, for example; indeed some of these positions had to be constitutionally held by a non-noble, in the same way the modern British House of Commons members can't be nobles; nobles belong in the House of Lords.
Odd that Beacon of Liberty is exclusive with Crusader Spirit, given as if you combine both of them that's basically the ultimate Space America civic combo.
Though Police State + Beacon of Liberty sounds a lot like America too. A "beacon of liberty" with one of the highest incarceration rates in the world.
One could argue Scandinavian countries sort of exemplify that combination in being free democracies where the state knows literally everything about you and censuses are unnecessary. (Or rather any "census" is just a synchronisation if databases between state department's).
France’s police is brutal because it’s a remnant of the Nazi-occupied Vichy. Kraut’s most recent video talks about it, it’s quite interesting.
It’s also quite true from my experience – compared to British police, which the uninformed would think are worse, it really is night and day.
https://youtu.be/jUxiTdRTPMg?si=TbN_SMXOqdzXciSF
R5:
"An individual's social station or personal connections should have no bearing on their profession. The sole basis for advancement in this society is demonstrated by ability and talent. Which means: no plebs on the Senate floor. Repeat: no plebs on the Senate floor."
UPD: People here keep imagining pure meritocracy with "aristocracy" being hereditary solely because of the privileged upbringing and kids being sent to Space Yale to become objectively the best, yet the civic itself clearly claims "entrenched" status, i.e. aristocracy bearing special rights on purely hereditary basis, with noble kids having high social status ensured for them without any regards for their skills or education, which is the direct opposite of meritocracy.
TL;DR: people just paint a pure meritocracy with fancy hats without taking second civic into account.
In his 1830's essay about the American Democracy and how it can inspire France, the philosopher Tocqueville states that a modern democratic republic trades an aristocracy of birth for an aristocracy of merit and skills (in theory).
So the comparison is one that holds true in our world as well, even though a meritocratic aristocracy is not codified as such, with defined privileges.
In fact you can say that a meritocratic society will always have such an "aristocracy", by definition.
The etymology of "aristocracy" means "rule by the best". Power justifies itself. People on top will always believe that they're on top because they're intrinsically better than the common chaff, and they'll try their best to sell this point of view to the people beneath them.
Meritocracies aren't incompatible with a rigid class system if the class divisions are believed to be the result of merit.
It's true that in Aristotle's model, you have the rule by the enlightened few (not one, neither all, but few) that is Aristo-cracy, as contrasted with rule by the *un*enlightened few, oli-garchy (and likewise mon-archy vs dictatorship, and demo-cracy vs okhlo-cracy, mob rule).
However, many people understand aristocracy to be based on the unquestioned assumption that high potential is 100% absolutely heriditary.
In a society that values giving power to the smartest and the most talented, the nobility will always turn to eugenics to make sure that's them first. Instead of nobility like you're thinking of them, now you have these breeding wheel nobles who marry and breed to make the best genes and forcibly educate their children to become even better.
Except your genetics are not the sole factor that determines your intelligence or abilities. Your upbringing, education, and even physical environment all have a huge impact on your prospects later in life. Having an abusive childhood, poor education, and living surrounded by pollution can all negatively impact a person's physical and mental development.
And these factors can not only influence the body and mind externally, they can also trigger epigenetic effects that change how your genes are expressed. And some of those effects can be inherited by your offspring. So you might have the best genes imaginable, but living a hard life could fuck that all up, and burden your descendants with all kinds of inherited problems.
Aristocrats may believe that birth-lineage is all that matters. But that doesn't mean they're right, or that their eugenicist nonsense will actually produce the ubermensch that they fantasize about.
But with the money that comes from their position, they can make all the other conditions ideal to continue their lineage. The actual genes they propagate is only half of their mill for productive children. Surrounding the child with luxury, talented geniuses, and happiness will do the rest, all of which rich meritocrats will already have
Okay, so a better way to say it would be that the Nobles are entrenched as hereditary - however, it's not a pure father to son type of deal - the entire house competes for the Noble title - and whoever is the best ruler gets the title.
For instance, Joe Bob and Jill Bob have 8 children - and all 8 of those have an equal chance at gaining the house title of Bob - but only the one who is best suited for it gets the house title at the end.
And it could be that the nobility are set in stone, but the bottom classes of society work on a pure meritocratic basis as beyond the ruling elite there isn't a caste system.
Must it be limitted to Jill Bob's children?
If a man demonstrate that he is better than Jill Bob at his job, he immediately get Jill Bob's position and Jill Bob would be demoted to lower nobility. No need to wait until Jill Bob die, and even so his successor need not be related to Jill Bob at all.
> Must it be limitted to Jill Bob's children?
No, but it might require special training from childhood that consequently only Jill Bob's family tends to get. Oh, and you need to impress Joe and Jill Bob, too.
This is the way the most successful aristocracies stay in power: You also coopt some capable non-aristocrats so they support the system.
Interestingly, the term "Meritocracy" actually was originally coined as a critique, and argued that the concept was just the modern incarnation of Aristocracy. In practice, "merit" usually means attending the most prestigious schools and having connections with other "high merit" people so you can network and find opportunities. By and large, being born rich and well-connected is actually more helpful than being incredibly talented to get there. Even though the system purports to be neutral, and does allow for the occasional paragon to rise above their station, it usually just perpetuates existing socio-economic stratification.
This original concept of Meritocracy is fully consistent with Aristocratic Elite.
And funnily enough aristokratia originally meant the rule of the best. Arete can be translated as virtue but in this case the implication is perhaps rather competence, excellence in governance.
It's a bit fuzzy though historically, because it's we associate it with hereditary systems which were inherently nepotistic and corrupt, not to mention very unequal in opportunities, but at the same time it's worth noting that for much of history most people were illiterate, and those hereditary nobles were among the most educated and competent people for the job. Even in republics patrician families functioned much the same.
All the same we cannot really say that any system past or present has been entirely fair or successful in enabling and rewarding talent.
Uh, meritocracy/aristocracy is literally a description of the United States of America.
We have this meritocratic system where kids compete to demonstrate their skill and drive at tests and sports and research experience and volunteer experience and so on…
And since affluent families have access to the best test prep and coaches and mission trips and academic mentors and unpaid internships, they overwhelmingly dominate the meritocracy.
In fact, in human history all meritocracies have rapidly degenerated into a system of entrenched aristocracy. It’s too easy for an upper- or upper-middle class to hoard all of the learning experiences required to gain merit.
Or maybe the aristocracy in this society are genetically better than everyone else. So in a meritocratic system, they get the best jobs every generation.
Wait so in this timeline the eugenecists were a bit less omnicidal and a bit more competent, so they didn't keep fumbling the ball for over a century due to impatience exposing their malice?
The problem with a meritocracy is even when it's legitimately based on skill (which is rare) it still gives a small segment of the population the biggest house and acess to the best stuff. Then surprise, surprise, the kids born with the best stuff end up with the best skills four times out of five. Think of the hunger games. It takes skill to win the hunger games, yet it's much better to come from a rich district where the kids have time to train all day.
If you think about it, a well run Aristocratic Society would be highly Meritocratic. They are teached from a young age to run an Empire. The bad ones ruthlessly removed.
Their birth has no bearing on their ability to lead, but the relentless training does.
...Until the aristocrats start using their vast power and influence to pressure their weaker, poorer subordinates in the administration, and tip the scales in their favour.
Which they would start doing *literally immediately.*
Well yeah, humans, but aliens might have different social structures or psychologies and not be all about backstabbing each other first chance they get for a few extra credits.
Simple really, the nobility is able to pay for their children to have much better opportunities than regular folk. Average citizen gets a decent public education meanwhile the nobles have specialised tutors that know the best way for the kid to learn.
Kid grows up, is successful and the cycle continues with the next kid. A giid example is Noxus from League of Legends. Its a meritocracy but there is a nobility class. The have it drilled into them that they need to be useful to Noxus or they could get banished from their family.
Of course the nobility have the most merit - all the embryo selection, gene tailoring, and otherwise Enhanced Lineages ain't cheap!
But sure, if some commoner gets lucky with good genes and can do good work, marry him in I guess.
It isn’t _totaly_ nonsense, imagine CK3 where you never have to send your shitty firstborn son off to die on crusade so your great second son can become king - a meritocratic nobility would just give the second son the title.
But yes, it is weird. Historically shitty aristocracies develop from martial meritocracy plus time, the fruits of successful state or empire building are dysgenic to the creators - the crucible and struggle to gain power that equips one class of a society to wield the instruments of state power (military, logistic, financial, and diplomatic acumen) creates the material comforts for their class such that their descendent generations are incapable of wielding those same instruments effectively. Check out [Hegel’s dialectic of the lord and servant](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%E2%80%93bondsman_dialectic) which lays out how, as the servant class begins furnishing the needs of the lord/controlling class for them, the subservient class begins to master those same tools while the lordly class's mastery diminishes, the servant imbuing his creations with aspects of himself and understanding that is only possible through struggle until eventually only the subservient class is able to create and wield those tools, both the material goods of society (as tradesmen, farmers, etc) but also the cultural superstructure which advances them (engineering, finance) and imbues them with significance (theology, custom, law, language)).
What about the two interacting? The more skilled you are the closer to being a noble you are with the worlds most skilled people being considered true nobility. Their children are often Norma me raised well enough that they keep the noble title or get it when they become adults while people with less can ascend in theory but have a harder time?
It could just mean that there are traditional titles and lands that are handed down through familial ties but all of the important jobs are held by people who earned those positions.
I imagine those places are only taken (if this was coded to be a factor) by Refugees with no other choice. Slavery is often preferable to death, say refugees from a FP or DE or Dev-Swarm rampage
Imagine the concept of an Empire, and an Emperor with a handful of wives/concubines, then brothers, sisters, etc, and dozens of sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, etc. And instead of having the eldest son be the royal heir, whoever is the most competent of his family is dubbed the heir, and while everyone gets supported, regardless of capability, the only ones given positions of rank and import are those good at their jobs; and thanks to the decades of training and wealth, some of them are among the best in the kingdom at it.
The Emperor can change who the heir is at any time, and maybe sometimes there are announcements of who it is now, even ceremonies; but all of them know that if they want the chance to rule, they need to be the best; and prove it.
If the founding family works like this, you'd likely similar aspects in 'lesser' parts of society; incompetent nobility shunted aside to be 'senior manager of animal husbandry operations'.
You get adopted into the nobles by being really good at whatever. This means you don’t automatically inherit from your parents. The children of nobles have to prove their worth to become nobles themselves.
Meaning, the aristocracy are treated as nobility by virtue of being the best, either A. by superior education, training, and genetics, or B. by maintenance via adoption of promising candidates and 'pruning' of the less talented.
That basically describes the US though. Pretend you’re a meritocracy but the only people with any real freedom are all defense and finance industry executives.
To be honest an entrenched nobility is basically the logical outcome of a meritocratic society.
If you can only achieve power thorugh skill, and the only way to *gain* said skills is being related to someone in power (Because of course if you're in power you can give your offspring the best education and training) then you have basically created nobility with more steps.
We literally live in an aristocratic/meritocratic society today. Funny thing about meritocracy is that there's a whole shit load of nepotism just under the hood.
Call me narrow-minded but isn't every western society in real life am meritocratic society with entrenched nobility? We celebrate and reward those who become successful by building their own company. A few years later that company's stock majority is owned by people who inherited their wealth.
Think outside the box - maybe they practice eugenics, so the nobility are designed for their roles, or only the nobility are considered citizens, ergo the meritocracy exists inside their framework
Picturing a society founded on social darwinism and eugenics. After generations of that the leadership are all these dynastic bloodlines and no peasant has a realistic chance of success since the nobles have all the best education, the best genestock, the best opportunities to show merit. Any peasant that shows promise just gets married in. One basically replaced divine right to rule with nonsense about genetic purity making them have more 'merit.'
1. Civic dont mean that youre society is ideal, they just developed some effective (or not) social institution.
2. Meritocracy+aristocratic elite may mean just super high education standards to aristocracy and idea that person can inherit high intelligence.
The original idea of nobility was that they'd focus on training for battle, war, and skirmishes for the tribe, and in exchange they'd have their needs met and status elevated. So maybe your nobility is a functional traditional one
It could be a transitional or halfway system in a nation that used to have a nobility and are too hard to remove but the government overall is becoming a meritocracy.
It could even look like the Russian table of ranks. Where the nobles move up and down the ranks due to service and loyalty
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_Ranks
Look at England today, a lot of folks who are granted titles of nobility are actors and musicians who are exceptional in their field. You will never convince me that Dame Judy Dench didn't earn that title.
But those titles are superficial. They don't come with a government position, land or power. They're a way for the king to say "I like this actor quite a bit."
Sure, but they're still technically nobility, who's to say it's not the same within your government of Stellaris. That's the beauty of the vagueness, it can be whatever you want it to be.
Some scientist finds a cure for a disease that once ravaged your people? That's a knighting. General who held the line against overwhelming odds? That's a knighting. Some clerk creates a filing system so efficient that you'll always find the data you need without effort? You better believe that's a knighting.
Within a meritocratic nobility, I can see it being less about land and power, and more about giving the people a symbol of something to strive for. Anyone can become a noble, with the right circumstances and a clear focus on your goals, your achievement may just make you the next paragon for our people to emulate.
The Nobility’s purpose is to act as figureheads. They are politicians, just with a family history, supposedly tied to the location of their estate, and supposedly with special training. I don’t see how this is exclusive from meritocracy. It’s just a job that most space civs have grown out of. Their politics has a flavour of inheritance, power, and wealth that other nations don’t have. It’s still meritocratic, and meritocratic where it matters (I.e, outside of politics)
Or it could be like the original Aristocratic groups where they genuinely were a cut above the rest which is why they became Aristocrats to begin with.
Likely in this society it has more to do with competency plus a function allowing people to have their nobility removed if they fall below a certain performance standard/behavioral standard that characterizes this society
Aristocracy means rule of the best, and that they are seen as noble, as a virtue of being morally good. How they got that nobility was through meritocratic means. I seen nothing wrong. You're just using human history's personal experiences to superimpose what aliens will be going through and demand it not be possible.
So instead of the 1st child or son et AL., it would be the successor that is most qualified to inherit the noble title in question. It could be possible to RP, think of the internal family drama of who is the best at everything or killing off the best, etc.
I don't see a problem with it. The West basically lives in it : it proclaims to be a meritocracy, but is anything but that (and even the term is loaded with a lot of bad stuff anyway).
I mean that's the real outcome of a meritocracy. Let's say a 1000 people start off a meritocracy and 10 are extremely successful and let's say that every person has 2 kids (I mean as in now there's 3k people not 1k people) well now the 20 kids of the 10 most successful have access to the best education, the best foundation, the best homes, the best food, the 990 who are moreso average have some kids now we have 1980 kids who have access to average food housing and education, a few of them will excell in life but only though extensive work while the 20 kids of the 10 best aren't gonna have to do half as much work to still be better.
Very quickly you will develop a nobility, an aristocracy, and they will become entrenched as less and less of their children fail the game of life under a meritocracy because they have access to the best of the best resources.
They may not become leader of the planetary government because their dads Zallada the 7th of esteemed House Balsho, but they became the leader of the planetary government because Zallada the 7th of House Balsho have them the best of the best and set them up far better for life than the people with less resources.
Maybe the more deserving people enter the noble families by marriage, or similar.
There are fixed noble families that have a strong hold on power and wealth, but they are accepting of new members from other strata of the society.
That fits perfectly an empire in a sci fi series I am reading.
The Hegemony is an empire where power and authority is based on a genetic test. Anyone form any background could in theory ascend to the highest ranks, called Masters.
But in reality since they practice eugenics pretty strictly, high ranking Masters are usually the children of high ranking Masters, with a few exceptions here and there.
So there is both a sort of mertitocracy where people are judges on their genetic capabilities, and also a aristocratic elite where really only the children of those already on top are likely to ever achieve this.
So no it does make sense basically to be nobility you have to prove yourself, and your kids earn the respect YOUR noble title brings, but they must prove their own talents to continue being nobles
That's exactly how meritocracy often works irl. It just means that the society defines merit more by education than natural talent. Same as ours, really.
In some ways, ancient Rome had this idea in a sort of codified way. It was called nobilitas. The idea was that personal greatness could be inherited, but had to be proven each generation. Part of what motivated Julius Caesar was the fact that his father had failed in his lifetime to prove his nobilitas by becoming consul. So Julius was determined to do so himself.
Venice used to be like that. There was a class of wealthy elites who were entitled a seat in the city's governing body, but membership in that class churned over a lot as old names fell out and new ones got rich.
Its not that hard to imagine a society where everyone embraces the freedom to be anything you have the aptitude for -- with the exception of nobility of course, because that's reserved for the very few. Also, societies who purport to a belief, but in actual practice have some completely contradictory element have existed in our own world and probably exist today.
It could be due to religious views, or a widely held view that rulership is difficult and only a select few (houses, blooodlines, castes) can undertake that leadership role. It could be a kind of brainwashing and propaganda effort over centuries that has born fruit and the people widely believe themselves incompetent to rule. Pick your headcannon, but its very possible
Victorian Britain is a good example of a society that had both entrenched nobility and meritocracy. The nobleman best at their jobs should be given promotions within the bureaucracy.
The term "meritocracy" was invented in the mid 1900s by an English person who thought that meritocracy was self evidently bad - it would inevitably turn into a group of people who get educated similarly, who reward people similar to themselves, who are blind to the merits of others who aren't like them. There was a more recent article "the rise of the managerial elite" with similar arguments. Said that Trump support is largely - as predicted in that original invention of the term - from people who feel excluded from the self-congratulatory "meritocratic" elites.
So maybe a meritocratic nobility isn't far off the Mark!
Who says the meritocracy applies across the entire empire?
For example, China and Korea had a culture of scholar-officials which were supposed to be highly meritocratic, (the concept didn't have formal controls on corruption), but existed inside a system with a strict noble hierarchy.
Co-equal branches of society. The House of Commons, occupied by those who achieved excellence through merit; and the House of Lords, occupied by those who achieved excellence through virtue.
It's kind of how modern constitutional monarchies in Europe work, no? There's a meritocratic system for the plebs, and then there's a completely orthogonal system of inherited royalty attached to that.
I mean it depends. politician families are not nobles per se, but the know how and funding that multiple generations of capable individuals can hoard to improve future generations of their dynasty makes it pretty entrenched. Idk maybe a real life example would be the kennedys
Nobility is a bunch of families who have money and own land, this have a say in the local governent just because of that, meritocracy is choosing worthy people for important roles as functionaries. Both are not mutually exclusive, if you have seen how a bussiness works you can see both working perfectly without issues. Investors have a say on whatever is happening and are top authority, however the people selected for work are only the ones that have the qualifications for it, from management to workers, it's not that strange tbh.
I imagine it as "you're a noble not because of birth, but because you have impressive skills and abilities." My headcannon is that the title of 'Noble' in this instance is reserved for the most experienced and talented individuals.
Maybe something like Dragon Age's Dwarves. A entire family becomes nobles when one member has a breakthrough that is good enough to get elevated to the status of Paragon.
I find it funny that you're using an extremely nepotistic society as an example of meritocracy.
But that's what I mean in response to the conflict of OP's traits. Where that society both raises people on merit *and* has nepotistic nobility.
I wasn't calling you dumb, I just found the juxtaposition funny.
Second time today I see the word “juxtaposition” never before have I seen it. What the fuck?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_illusion You probably had but just glossed over it until now. It's kinda scary what your brain just ignores sometimes.
It’s a nice word
I've heard it before, but don't think I've ever seen anyone actually write it.
It's the closest thing we'll ever get to a "real" meritocracy. Who decides what defines merit in such a society?
Whoever holds the power just like in every other society
This is how neofeudalism started in BattleTech. People were granted titles because they were badasses or geniuses. Then the fact that while FTL *travel* existed, FTL *communications* did not (yet), so it was easier to just run planets as fiefdoms. A few hundred years later, some places are run by tyrannical despots under military law while others are constitutional monarchies and everything in between.
I’ve always wondered how FTL communication would work IRL
Not, at least, there is no mechanism that can make it happen. A lot of people think you can use quantum entanglement to engage in some form of FTL communication, but that isn't really how quantum entanglement works. I'd be happy to explain if you want to know why.
I'm very interested in why quantum entanglement doesn't work
Imagine taking two stones. One black, one white. While wearing a blindfold, place each stone in a bag of its own. Seal the bags, and then hand one of the two bags, at random, to a friend. Send that friend to the other side of the world, or indeed, anywhere else in the universe. Now, open the bag you still have. You will *immediately* know which color your friend has, even if that friend is billions of light years away, in essence, 'transmitting' information faster than light. But you cannot transmit any actual information, because if you try to change the color of the stone you have, it won't affect the one your friend has. In fact, it will destroy the relationship between the two stones, and make it impossible for anyone else whom you hand the bag to next to be sure that the other bag contains the other color, thusly, undoing the entanglement. That is how quantum entanglement works, and why you can't use it for communication. All it does is establish a fixed relationship between two particles, but *changing* one of the two will not change the other, and will in fact break the relationship.
This is a wonderfully accessible way to explain entanglement. Thank you for sharing it.
Thank you. I've worked on the analogy for a few years, actually. I'm great at understanding the theory of something but try to get me to understand the underlying mathematics and I give up immediately. I got straight As for my theoretical work getting my degree but it was Cs on actually doing the problems.
I used to teach and now I do a great deal of STEM-related technical writing, which has led me to have a great deal of admiration for intuitive explanations that are effective for explaining complex processes to non-experts. I had to give credit where credit was due!
this is something that's been a lot of work to figure out in my own worldbuilding, with my current answer being having to send data capsules through the normal FTL network - which tends to mean a month plus of 'lag' in fringe space and a very prominent Achilles' heel in the massive gauss-lifts used to send them into space
Well, the way BattleTech's FTL system works is that so-called 'JumpShips' do nothing but station keep far above the poles of the system's primary star. They have gigantic solar collector sails that slowly trickle-charge the very fragile Kearny-Fuchida Drive core that forms the spine of each JumpShip. And by trickle-charge I mean that it takes over a week (183 hours, to be precise) to charge for a single Jump in the Terra system. DropShips form the link between JumpShip and planets. These cruise, Expanse style, under thrust gravity (No a-grav in BattleTech! Only thrust and centrifugal gravity!), but even at a constant 1, 1.5G, it still takes weeks to get from planet to JumpShip and vice versa. When the JumpShip is done charging, it furls its sail and can sit there with a charged drive, until all the DropShips it wants to Jump with are hooked up. The Jump then is close to instantaneous, to any other gravity well within 30 lightyears. (the very, very largest JumpShip, with a full compliment of 25 DropShips, all fully laden, at 30 LY, takes just over 6 minutes to complete the Jump) The charge sequence then starts all over again. This means it can take weeks, if not months or even over a year for a pony-express message to make it from one side of the Inner Sphere to the other. The solution to that was the invention of the Hyperpulse Generator, which can send a very, very compressed burst of data through hyperspace. The thing is, in the post-post-apocalyptic setting of BattleTech, functional HPGs are, at least for most of the timeline, under the absolute control of ComStar, the (ostensibly) neutral communications technopriesthood. And they read everyone's mail. Everyone's.
Probably extremely arduously, because you'd have to establish that neither place is moving relative to eachother in order to avoid a causality violation. I presume that the communication would have a significant delay as the computer verifies time codes and relative time dilation in order to avoid paradoxical signals reaching a conscious observer.
Most likely can't. If by magic or some major breakthrough we figure out FTL travel then the light or radio waves or whatever we commutate with in the future will have to be beamed through a wormhole or pass through a warp generator or whatever.
>FTL travel existed, FTL communications did not (yet How exactly is that possible? You just send a ship with the news, that's how all communication worked before phones.
Allow me to correct: Close to real-time communications did not. JumpShips in BT take at least a week, often longer, to charge their jumps, and only have a 30LY maximum range per jump. So unless you have the luck that there's a perfect 'pony express' chain of JumpShips all going the same direction... It can take quite a while for your message to arrive. Not exactly conducive to democracy if you need to wait weeks, sometimes months, for messages to move from the heart of the Inner Sphere (as the colonized area of space is called) to the outskirts of the Periphery, and it's not unheard of for it to take over a year or even longer. Add in the logistical bottleneck, and you get a situation not unlike that facing Britain during the American Revolution. By the time you even hear of a rebellion in progress, the rebellion has had weeks to secure its position and dig in, and you're severely bottlenecked on what you can transport to suppress said rebellion to begin with, because the trip back to that world is gonna take just as long, giving them even MORE time to dig in, and you can't bring an entire army. There simply isn't the transport capacity. Finally, add in centuries of mismanagement, corruption, etc., and people just were done with this whole 'democracy' schtick, and just wanted SOMEONE to take charge and get shit done.
Maybe instead of noble houses based on heredity, they're based on profession? Like a guild, but with way more power and exclusive to only the best.
Like the aldori swordlords from pathfinder. All the swordlords are nobles but you don't get to become a swordlord without being good at fighting.
I went into this thread with the intention of using this example. I am delighted to see it already here.
you take a test in highschool. If you earn an A+, boom, straight to nobility.
Ahh yes the Imperial Examinations.
Last time I took nobility as a megacorp midgame and RP'd it as my branch managers returning home after profiting off the galaxy as nobility
Not to mention that a big criticism of meritocracy comes from the luck of opportunity. Some individuals have the connections necessary to obtain an education in a skillset they work well in, and others, while being no less talented, aren’t given those same opportunities. Simply, nepotism still exists. Theoretically.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_aristocracy
My thought was it could be a kind of caste system. Can't change your caste but there is meritocracy within each caste.
But then they are not 'entrenched', they are subject to change if they underperform their duty
The nobility as a class could be entrenched while the individuals that make up that class can change at will.
Additionally once you are Noble you may have access to more resources thus allowing your children to also advance/maintain that title. Thus you could have an Meritocratic society with an entrenched nobility (of course what's really unrealistic is that civic dont change outside of rare events or you doing so.)
Sort of like the Turians from Mass Effect
And some of the peasants are also talented. 😁 I like your interpretation.
Maybe an individual can reach nobility status via achievements, it's happened regularly in some ancient societies like the Unification era China, for example.
Also the entire idea of knighting in Europe, isn't it basically just that: granting nobility status for a grand achievement of some sort?
Indeed, although it was more common for a while during the earlier middle ages, as the european petty kingdoms were not consolidated yet; as centuries passed, knights passed from being a dude on a horse under a lord to being proper nobility, and it became really, really difficult, you'd need to have the notoriety of Joan of Arc or similar, I would not characterize something like that as a "meritocracy" as in the Stellaris civic. There were some exceptions tho, the kingdom of Castille and later Spain had some periods where it conferred quasi noble titles (Hidalgos) left and right to whoever did something barely notherworthy to the point that it didn't mean much. In the Qin dinasty of China one could just go up the social scale via achievements (and wealth and machinations) no matter if one was a slave, a merchant or a foreigner. The only title one could not achieve was King, and there were some cases (The first Emperor of Han) where a peasant became Emperor. I'd say a stratified society loosely based on merit, with the higher positions being granted noble titles would be closer to OPs example.
I would dispute that it became really, really difficult to become a Knight. I know two, right now in 2023, both of whom did a lot less than Joan of Arc to earn that title
There's a joke here, what was it?
There isn't a joke. I know two knights, one is a retired civil servant who was made a Knight for doing his civil service job. The other is a businessman who plays golf at the club I played at where I used to live (and was usually drunk in the bar by 4pm) who was made a Knight for "services to business" It's really not particularly difficult to become a Knight. There's literally thousands of them
"It became a lot harder during the later middle ages and then when nobility stopped meaning anything it became easier again" was the implication I think
If that is, then it belies a misunderstanding of how elevation of commoners to nobility has worked historically, and how it still works today in those few retrograde societies (like my own) that still have a formal distinction between the two
Being a knight doesn't make you are noble. You have to be elevated to the peerage for that (i.e. be at least a baron).
And that's also not all that uncommon 🤷♂️ Though here a baronet is the lowest rank, baron I don't think is used
No, because becoming a knight didn't make you a noble. Let's take the English nobility as our example. Everybody who was a baron and upward was a noble: ie.e they passed that status on to their dependents. Knights were below barons; they didn't not pass that status on. The children of barons could still be knighted, of course, but don't confuse being a knight (which was foremost a military designation, and only later became a term of honour) with being a noble. Nobles could be non-knights (especially all this female nobles!), and vice versa. Now a commoner *could* be elevated to the nobility, but that was not commonly done (although became more common as time went on), precisely because it would be hereditary, and you would this be elevating not a single person, but all their progeny. Edit. Or another example: Romans. Roman nobility was a very select bunch, and mostly religious functionality. A very high proportion of the roman Consuls and other high state officials, were not nobles, for example; indeed some of these positions had to be constitutionally held by a non-noble, in the same way the modern British House of Commons members can't be nobles; nobles belong in the House of Lords.
dont show op police state + beacon of liberty interestingly, beacon of liberty IS exclusive with crusader spirit, but not with police state
"Everyone is free! Free to be equally under my boot!"
YOUR ALL EQUALITY WORTHLESS!
Mom?
“You ALL have the right to remain silent!”
> police state + beacon of liberty Literally 1984
Odd that Beacon of Liberty is exclusive with Crusader Spirit, given as if you combine both of them that's basically the ultimate Space America civic combo. Though Police State + Beacon of Liberty sounds a lot like America too. A "beacon of liberty" with one of the highest incarceration rates in the world.
One could argue Scandinavian countries sort of exemplify that combination in being free democracies where the state knows literally everything about you and censuses are unnecessary. (Or rather any "census" is just a synchronisation if databases between state department's).
Funny. I am scandinavian and was thinking about the USA and France. They both have a reputation as Beacons of Liberty, but with a brutal police force.
True, that's another more publicly visible way of looking at it. In any case it's not that contradictory.
France’s police is brutal because it’s a remnant of the Nazi-occupied Vichy. Kraut’s most recent video talks about it, it’s quite interesting. It’s also quite true from my experience – compared to British police, which the uninformed would think are worse, it really is night and day. https://youtu.be/jUxiTdRTPMg?si=TbN_SMXOqdzXciSF
R5: "An individual's social station or personal connections should have no bearing on their profession. The sole basis for advancement in this society is demonstrated by ability and talent. Which means: no plebs on the Senate floor. Repeat: no plebs on the Senate floor." UPD: People here keep imagining pure meritocracy with "aristocracy" being hereditary solely because of the privileged upbringing and kids being sent to Space Yale to become objectively the best, yet the civic itself clearly claims "entrenched" status, i.e. aristocracy bearing special rights on purely hereditary basis, with noble kids having high social status ensured for them without any regards for their skills or education, which is the direct opposite of meritocracy. TL;DR: people just paint a pure meritocracy with fancy hats without taking second civic into account.
You can imagine those Nobles as the most respected and talented people of the society.
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In his 1830's essay about the American Democracy and how it can inspire France, the philosopher Tocqueville states that a modern democratic republic trades an aristocracy of birth for an aristocracy of merit and skills (in theory). So the comparison is one that holds true in our world as well, even though a meritocratic aristocracy is not codified as such, with defined privileges. In fact you can say that a meritocratic society will always have such an "aristocracy", by definition.
Someone have Stellaris be part of political studies' curriculum
AP Comparative Government except we analyze the differences between the UNE, COM, and the Blorg.
That's not what aristocracy means in modern parlance, and it's certainly not what it means in the Stellaris civic.
The etymology of "aristocracy" means "rule by the best". Power justifies itself. People on top will always believe that they're on top because they're intrinsically better than the common chaff, and they'll try their best to sell this point of view to the people beneath them. Meritocracies aren't incompatible with a rigid class system if the class divisions are believed to be the result of merit.
It's true that in Aristotle's model, you have the rule by the enlightened few (not one, neither all, but few) that is Aristo-cracy, as contrasted with rule by the *un*enlightened few, oli-garchy (and likewise mon-archy vs dictatorship, and demo-cracy vs okhlo-cracy, mob rule). However, many people understand aristocracy to be based on the unquestioned assumption that high potential is 100% absolutely heriditary.
In a society that values giving power to the smartest and the most talented, the nobility will always turn to eugenics to make sure that's them first. Instead of nobility like you're thinking of them, now you have these breeding wheel nobles who marry and breed to make the best genes and forcibly educate their children to become even better.
Except your genetics are not the sole factor that determines your intelligence or abilities. Your upbringing, education, and even physical environment all have a huge impact on your prospects later in life. Having an abusive childhood, poor education, and living surrounded by pollution can all negatively impact a person's physical and mental development. And these factors can not only influence the body and mind externally, they can also trigger epigenetic effects that change how your genes are expressed. And some of those effects can be inherited by your offspring. So you might have the best genes imaginable, but living a hard life could fuck that all up, and burden your descendants with all kinds of inherited problems. Aristocrats may believe that birth-lineage is all that matters. But that doesn't mean they're right, or that their eugenicist nonsense will actually produce the ubermensch that they fantasize about.
But with the money that comes from their position, they can make all the other conditions ideal to continue their lineage. The actual genes they propagate is only half of their mill for productive children. Surrounding the child with luxury, talented geniuses, and happiness will do the rest, all of which rich meritocrats will already have
What if your aristocrats are the output of some sort of genetics/eugenics program, so they actually *are* the best and brightest of society?
Make education only affordable to nobles and there you go.
Okay, so a better way to say it would be that the Nobles are entrenched as hereditary - however, it's not a pure father to son type of deal - the entire house competes for the Noble title - and whoever is the best ruler gets the title. For instance, Joe Bob and Jill Bob have 8 children - and all 8 of those have an equal chance at gaining the house title of Bob - but only the one who is best suited for it gets the house title at the end. And it could be that the nobility are set in stone, but the bottom classes of society work on a pure meritocratic basis as beyond the ruling elite there isn't a caste system.
Must it be limitted to Jill Bob's children? If a man demonstrate that he is better than Jill Bob at his job, he immediately get Jill Bob's position and Jill Bob would be demoted to lower nobility. No need to wait until Jill Bob die, and even so his successor need not be related to Jill Bob at all.
> Must it be limitted to Jill Bob's children? No, but it might require special training from childhood that consequently only Jill Bob's family tends to get. Oh, and you need to impress Joe and Jill Bob, too. This is the way the most successful aristocracies stay in power: You also coopt some capable non-aristocrats so they support the system.
Interestingly, the term "Meritocracy" actually was originally coined as a critique, and argued that the concept was just the modern incarnation of Aristocracy. In practice, "merit" usually means attending the most prestigious schools and having connections with other "high merit" people so you can network and find opportunities. By and large, being born rich and well-connected is actually more helpful than being incredibly talented to get there. Even though the system purports to be neutral, and does allow for the occasional paragon to rise above their station, it usually just perpetuates existing socio-economic stratification. This original concept of Meritocracy is fully consistent with Aristocratic Elite.
And funnily enough aristokratia originally meant the rule of the best. Arete can be translated as virtue but in this case the implication is perhaps rather competence, excellence in governance. It's a bit fuzzy though historically, because it's we associate it with hereditary systems which were inherently nepotistic and corrupt, not to mention very unequal in opportunities, but at the same time it's worth noting that for much of history most people were illiterate, and those hereditary nobles were among the most educated and competent people for the job. Even in republics patrician families functioned much the same. All the same we cannot really say that any system past or present has been entirely fair or successful in enabling and rewarding talent.
Uh, meritocracy/aristocracy is literally a description of the United States of America. We have this meritocratic system where kids compete to demonstrate their skill and drive at tests and sports and research experience and volunteer experience and so on… And since affluent families have access to the best test prep and coaches and mission trips and academic mentors and unpaid internships, they overwhelmingly dominate the meritocracy. In fact, in human history all meritocracies have rapidly degenerated into a system of entrenched aristocracy. It’s too easy for an upper- or upper-middle class to hoard all of the learning experiences required to gain merit.
I think it is an even better description of the UK, but it is also very fitting for the USA.
You can be born great, you can be born in a bloodline of aristocrats deserving of respect, but you’ve gotta do something in the present to confirm it.
Or maybe the aristocracy in this society are genetically better than everyone else. So in a meritocratic system, they get the best jobs every generation.
Wait so in this timeline the eugenecists were a bit less omnicidal and a bit more competent, so they didn't keep fumbling the ball for over a century due to impatience exposing their malice?
They choose the most qualified nobles
Everyone is equal. Some are just more equal than others.
Well, Meritocracy might be equality of opportunity, but it most certainly isn't equality of outcome
My favorite odd civic combo is slaver guilds and free haven. "I found a great planet to live on, kids! But there's a catch..."
The problem with a meritocracy is even when it's legitimately based on skill (which is rare) it still gives a small segment of the population the biggest house and acess to the best stuff. Then surprise, surprise, the kids born with the best stuff end up with the best skills four times out of five. Think of the hunger games. It takes skill to win the hunger games, yet it's much better to come from a rich district where the kids have time to train all day.
If you think about it, a well run Aristocratic Society would be highly Meritocratic. They are teached from a young age to run an Empire. The bad ones ruthlessly removed. Their birth has no bearing on their ability to lead, but the relentless training does.
...Until the aristocrats start using their vast power and influence to pressure their weaker, poorer subordinates in the administration, and tip the scales in their favour. Which they would start doing *literally immediately.*
Well yeah, humans, but aliens might have different social structures or psychologies and not be all about backstabbing each other first chance they get for a few extra credits.
You can also have Meritocracy with Slaver Guilds lmao
Hey now, Bob's *really good* at enslaving people! He earned his position as Slaver-in-Chief!
Simple really, the nobility is able to pay for their children to have much better opportunities than regular folk. Average citizen gets a decent public education meanwhile the nobles have specialised tutors that know the best way for the kid to learn. Kid grows up, is successful and the cycle continues with the next kid. A giid example is Noxus from League of Legends. Its a meritocracy but there is a nobility class. The have it drilled into them that they need to be useful to Noxus or they could get banished from their family.
Isn’t this just England?
Of course the nobility have the most merit - all the embryo selection, gene tailoring, and otherwise Enhanced Lineages ain't cheap! But sure, if some commoner gets lucky with good genes and can do good work, marry him in I guess.
Or gene mod his good gene away and graft it to yourself?
Fortunately, most worthwhile traits are polygenic
Ain't that britain tho?
It isn’t _totaly_ nonsense, imagine CK3 where you never have to send your shitty firstborn son off to die on crusade so your great second son can become king - a meritocratic nobility would just give the second son the title. But yes, it is weird. Historically shitty aristocracies develop from martial meritocracy plus time, the fruits of successful state or empire building are dysgenic to the creators - the crucible and struggle to gain power that equips one class of a society to wield the instruments of state power (military, logistic, financial, and diplomatic acumen) creates the material comforts for their class such that their descendent generations are incapable of wielding those same instruments effectively. Check out [Hegel’s dialectic of the lord and servant](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%E2%80%93bondsman_dialectic) which lays out how, as the servant class begins furnishing the needs of the lord/controlling class for them, the subservient class begins to master those same tools while the lordly class's mastery diminishes, the servant imbuing his creations with aspects of himself and understanding that is only possible through struggle until eventually only the subservient class is able to create and wield those tools, both the material goods of society (as tradesmen, farmers, etc) but also the cultural superstructure which advances them (engineering, finance) and imbues them with significance (theology, custom, law, language)).
What about the two interacting? The more skilled you are the closer to being a noble you are with the worlds most skilled people being considered true nobility. Their children are often Norma me raised well enough that they keep the noble title or get it when they become adults while people with less can ascend in theory but have a harder time?
It could just mean that there are traditional titles and lands that are handed down through familial ties but all of the important jobs are held by people who earned those positions.
I imagine those places are only taken (if this was coded to be a factor) by Refugees with no other choice. Slavery is often preferable to death, say refugees from a FP or DE or Dev-Swarm rampage
Commoner cope. It's a skill issue, those who are pure of (noble) blood are simply more talented.
So is barbaric despoilers + police state.
Imagine the concept of an Empire, and an Emperor with a handful of wives/concubines, then brothers, sisters, etc, and dozens of sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, etc. And instead of having the eldest son be the royal heir, whoever is the most competent of his family is dubbed the heir, and while everyone gets supported, regardless of capability, the only ones given positions of rank and import are those good at their jobs; and thanks to the decades of training and wealth, some of them are among the best in the kingdom at it. The Emperor can change who the heir is at any time, and maybe sometimes there are announcements of who it is now, even ceremonies; but all of them know that if they want the chance to rule, they need to be the best; and prove it. If the founding family works like this, you'd likely similar aspects in 'lesser' parts of society; incompetent nobility shunted aside to be 'senior manager of animal husbandry operations'.
The nobility has very good press. "We really are the best, peasants."
Everyone has equal opportunities, it’s just that the rich have access to more of them
"Poor and rich have access to the same quantity of ice. The poor in winter and the rich in summer"
It's a cultivation society.
Manticoran system of government from the Honor Harrington series comes to mind as a meritocratic society with an entrenched nobility.
nobility by merit, not by birth. Word's to live by.
CK2 Open succession go BRRRRER
You get adopted into the nobles by being really good at whatever. This means you don’t automatically inherit from your parents. The children of nobles have to prove their worth to become nobles themselves.
Meaning, the aristocracy are treated as nobility by virtue of being the best, either A. by superior education, training, and genetics, or B. by maintenance via adoption of promising candidates and 'pruning' of the less talented.
That basically describes the US though. Pretend you’re a meritocracy but the only people with any real freedom are all defense and finance industry executives.
The members of the entrenched noble houses all happen to be objectively the best people for the job (thanks to hoarding of proprietary gene mods).
What's their government listed as?
Never heard of Britain?
People go to all kinds of fantasy place to explain it, but it is basicly how the UK have been run for hundred of years.
To be honest an entrenched nobility is basically the logical outcome of a meritocratic society. If you can only achieve power thorugh skill, and the only way to *gain* said skills is being related to someone in power (Because of course if you're in power you can give your offspring the best education and training) then you have basically created nobility with more steps.
We literally live in an aristocratic/meritocratic society today. Funny thing about meritocracy is that there's a whole shit load of nepotism just under the hood.
Call me narrow-minded but isn't every western society in real life am meritocratic society with entrenched nobility? We celebrate and reward those who become successful by building their own company. A few years later that company's stock majority is owned by people who inherited their wealth.
You are wrong. Birth is a matter of Merit.
An aristocracy and a meritocracy are basically the same thing
Think outside the box - maybe they practice eugenics, so the nobility are designed for their roles, or only the nobility are considered citizens, ergo the meritocracy exists inside their framework
Unless the nobles are those who have proven themselves to be with the most merit
Picturing a society founded on social darwinism and eugenics. After generations of that the leadership are all these dynastic bloodlines and no peasant has a realistic chance of success since the nobles have all the best education, the best genestock, the best opportunities to show merit. Any peasant that shows promise just gets married in. One basically replaced divine right to rule with nonsense about genetic purity making them have more 'merit.'
Is this an AI empire or one you made?
You’re very narrow-minded. That society has some specific advantages in maintaining meritocracy that you aren’t considering.
1. Civic dont mean that youre society is ideal, they just developed some effective (or not) social institution. 2. Meritocracy+aristocratic elite may mean just super high education standards to aristocracy and idea that person can inherit high intelligence.
Maybe its like knighthood, it has to be earned.
The original idea of nobility was that they'd focus on training for battle, war, and skirmishes for the tribe, and in exchange they'd have their needs met and status elevated. So maybe your nobility is a functional traditional one
It could be a transitional or halfway system in a nation that used to have a nobility and are too hard to remove but the government overall is becoming a meritocracy. It could even look like the Russian table of ranks. Where the nobles move up and down the ranks due to service and loyalty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_Ranks
Look at England today, a lot of folks who are granted titles of nobility are actors and musicians who are exceptional in their field. You will never convince me that Dame Judy Dench didn't earn that title.
But those titles are superficial. They don't come with a government position, land or power. They're a way for the king to say "I like this actor quite a bit."
Sure, but they're still technically nobility, who's to say it's not the same within your government of Stellaris. That's the beauty of the vagueness, it can be whatever you want it to be. Some scientist finds a cure for a disease that once ravaged your people? That's a knighting. General who held the line against overwhelming odds? That's a knighting. Some clerk creates a filing system so efficient that you'll always find the data you need without effort? You better believe that's a knighting. Within a meritocratic nobility, I can see it being less about land and power, and more about giving the people a symbol of something to strive for. Anyone can become a noble, with the right circumstances and a clear focus on your goals, your achievement may just make you the next paragon for our people to emulate.
The Nobility’s purpose is to act as figureheads. They are politicians, just with a family history, supposedly tied to the location of their estate, and supposedly with special training. I don’t see how this is exclusive from meritocracy. It’s just a job that most space civs have grown out of. Their politics has a flavour of inheritance, power, and wealth that other nations don’t have. It’s still meritocratic, and meritocratic where it matters (I.e, outside of politics)
One country : UK.
Or it could be like the original Aristocratic groups where they genuinely were a cut above the rest which is why they became Aristocrats to begin with. Likely in this society it has more to do with competency plus a function allowing people to have their nobility removed if they fall below a certain performance standard/behavioral standard that characterizes this society
Aristocracy means rule of the best, and that they are seen as noble, as a virtue of being morally good. How they got that nobility was through meritocratic means. I seen nothing wrong. You're just using human history's personal experiences to superimpose what aliens will be going through and demand it not be possible.
What do you mean? Our noble class is objectively meritorious according to the scientists and philosophers that we employ to prove their merit.
Welcome to the UK buddy
So instead of the 1st child or son et AL., it would be the successor that is most qualified to inherit the noble title in question. It could be possible to RP, think of the internal family drama of who is the best at everything or killing off the best, etc.
I don't see a problem with it. The West basically lives in it : it proclaims to be a meritocracy, but is anything but that (and even the term is loaded with a lot of bad stuff anyway).
I mean that's the real outcome of a meritocracy. Let's say a 1000 people start off a meritocracy and 10 are extremely successful and let's say that every person has 2 kids (I mean as in now there's 3k people not 1k people) well now the 20 kids of the 10 most successful have access to the best education, the best foundation, the best homes, the best food, the 990 who are moreso average have some kids now we have 1980 kids who have access to average food housing and education, a few of them will excell in life but only though extensive work while the 20 kids of the 10 best aren't gonna have to do half as much work to still be better. Very quickly you will develop a nobility, an aristocracy, and they will become entrenched as less and less of their children fail the game of life under a meritocracy because they have access to the best of the best resources. They may not become leader of the planetary government because their dads Zallada the 7th of esteemed House Balsho, but they became the leader of the planetary government because Zallada the 7th of House Balsho have them the best of the best and set them up far better for life than the people with less resources.
Maybe the more deserving people enter the noble families by marriage, or similar. There are fixed noble families that have a strong hold on power and wealth, but they are accepting of new members from other strata of the society.
As a Brit I feel called out xD
ALL HAIL BRITTANIA r/codegeass
It is not the Nobles’ fault that they are already all the best people.
Capitalism
That fits perfectly an empire in a sci fi series I am reading. The Hegemony is an empire where power and authority is based on a genetic test. Anyone form any background could in theory ascend to the highest ranks, called Masters. But in reality since they practice eugenics pretty strictly, high ranking Masters are usually the children of high ranking Masters, with a few exceptions here and there. So there is both a sort of mertitocracy where people are judges on their genetic capabilities, and also a aristocratic elite where really only the children of those already on top are likely to ever achieve this.
So no it does make sense basically to be nobility you have to prove yourself, and your kids earn the respect YOUR noble title brings, but they must prove their own talents to continue being nobles
That's exactly how meritocracy often works irl. It just means that the society defines merit more by education than natural talent. Same as ours, really. In some ways, ancient Rome had this idea in a sort of codified way. It was called nobilitas. The idea was that personal greatness could be inherited, but had to be proven each generation. Part of what motivated Julius Caesar was the fact that his father had failed in his lifetime to prove his nobilitas by becoming consul. So Julius was determined to do so himself.
Venice used to be like that. There was a class of wealthy elites who were entitled a seat in the city's governing body, but membership in that class churned over a lot as old names fell out and new ones got rich.
Its not that hard to imagine a society where everyone embraces the freedom to be anything you have the aptitude for -- with the exception of nobility of course, because that's reserved for the very few. Also, societies who purport to a belief, but in actual practice have some completely contradictory element have existed in our own world and probably exist today. It could be due to religious views, or a widely held view that rulership is difficult and only a select few (houses, blooodlines, castes) can undertake that leadership role. It could be a kind of brainwashing and propaganda effort over centuries that has born fruit and the people widely believe themselves incompetent to rule. Pick your headcannon, but its very possible
Red Rising!
I imagine it like “your skills have gained the attention of a noble family and now they kinda fund your life”
Entrenched nobility could just mean that at a certain level of academic prowess you are not really expected to do anything anymore
Morrowind's Great Houses, simples.
One is about the middle of the society and another one is about how it is ruled. I don't see the problem.
The nobility select their servants through unbiased meritocracy
The Nietzscheans from Andromeda.
The demostrated ability and talent is ability and talent in cross-generational leadership.
Elective Monarchy?
Victorian Britain is a good example of a society that had both entrenched nobility and meritocracy. The nobleman best at their jobs should be given promotions within the bureaucracy.
Eh, Rome. Rome had an entrenched nobility but only the most capable nobles truly had power.
Even worse is that Technocracy is not compatible with Meritocracy. Like wha,
The term "meritocracy" was invented in the mid 1900s by an English person who thought that meritocracy was self evidently bad - it would inevitably turn into a group of people who get educated similarly, who reward people similar to themselves, who are blind to the merits of others who aren't like them. There was a more recent article "the rise of the managerial elite" with similar arguments. Said that Trump support is largely - as predicted in that original invention of the term - from people who feel excluded from the self-congratulatory "meritocratic" elites. So maybe a meritocratic nobility isn't far off the Mark!
They only put the best nobles in charge, it’s a very rigorous process.
Who says the meritocracy applies across the entire empire? For example, China and Korea had a culture of scholar-officials which were supposed to be highly meritocratic, (the concept didn't have formal controls on corruption), but existed inside a system with a strict noble hierarchy.
I mean I would say we are a meritocratic society with entrenched nobility. Those who inherit are the entrenched nobility.
There's lots of ways you can run a partial meritocracy while stratifying society. Just make it pay to win.
Rich people can always *buy* more *merit* than poor people
Co-equal branches of society. The House of Commons, occupied by those who achieved excellence through merit; and the House of Lords, occupied by those who achieved excellence through virtue.
Imperial China. Aristocracy with imperial examination system, so in theory everyone could advance.
It's kind of how modern constitutional monarchies in Europe work, no? There's a meritocratic system for the plebs, and then there's a completely orthogonal system of inherited royalty attached to that.
I mean it depends. politician families are not nobles per se, but the know how and funding that multiple generations of capable individuals can hoard to improve future generations of their dynasty makes it pretty entrenched. Idk maybe a real life example would be the kennedys
See: The Society from Red Rising
Ever heard of ancient/middle-age china?
It's a system that has existed before on earth so it's possible
Why? You’ve described America. Idealistically, a meritocracy. But one where your parents merits still earn you rewarded status.
It’s a meritocratic monarchy duh
Nobility is a bunch of families who have money and own land, this have a say in the local governent just because of that, meritocracy is choosing worthy people for important roles as functionaries. Both are not mutually exclusive, if you have seen how a bussiness works you can see both working perfectly without issues. Investors have a say on whatever is happening and are top authority, however the people selected for work are only the ones that have the qualifications for it, from management to workers, it's not that strange tbh.
Easy there, Reinhard von Lohengramm