This blog has been pretty much dead since I entered full production on my thesis. Key takeaway? Blogging drops WAY down on the priority list when thesis writing kicks in, and while this space was really helpful for me early on (for testing out ideas, for reviewing the literature, and for just getting some writing done), it's felt like a distraction during recent months. If I'm going to be writing, shouldn't I be writing for my thesis?
Anyway, that's how it has played out, and how it will remain for at least a few more weeks, but here's a very quick post that I wanted to get written down, since it won't make it into my thesis.
Johan Soderburg, in Hacking Capitalism, drawing from Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, says that "higher education sanctions the liberal myth of a meritocracy where class inequalities are coded as differences in intelligence between individuals."
This isn't a particularly bold statement in its own right - everybody knows that Western society is caught in a neurotic contradiction between its talk ("you can accomplish anything!") and its walk ("but most people end up in the same place as their parents"). However, the phrasing jumped out at me in this case because I am so accustomed to seeing the word "meritocracy" associated only with Free and Open Source Software (FOSS)
When FOSS talks about meritocracy (or do-ocracy, in some cases, to emphasize productive output over ability), the idea is that the best code will be recognized, the best coders will be recognized, and life will be grand. N00bs who challenge the "inner circle" of a FOSS community are told to just write the code they want to see... much in the same way that marginalized people in a democracy are told to "go do something about it" when they complain about their social status. And, in both cases, doing something about it - for reasons not entirely clear - does not include thoughtful, informed discussion. Talk equals whining, in other words.
My point? Don't exactly have one, yet -- just wanted to get these thoughts down so I can get back to my thesis. But I think that, just as democratic societies ought to be more reflective about power and access to power, and own up to their "myth of a meritocracy", so should FOSS communities at least consider, seriously, whether they are really as true to their ideals as they believe they are. Some things to watch out for: cronyism, elitism, technocentrism, and bad attitudes.
More in May.
