Meritocracy, Deservingness, and Inequality

Over the last few decades, meritocracy has become one of the most powerful ways of making sense of social inequalities. Success and failure are frequently interpreted as the outcome of individual effort, talent, and achievement, shaping how people understand their own life chances as well as the opportunities and disadvantages experienced by others. In this context, meritocratic beliefs serve as a guiding principle for determining who deserves certain benefits and who does not. Yet growing social and economic inequalities have renewed questions about the moral and political foundations of meritocratic societies.

This session explores how ideas of merit and deservingness are constructed, contested, and institutionalized across different social contexts. We are interested in research examining how people evaluate who deserves resources, recognition, rights, or opportunities, and how these judgments are connected to broader structures of inequality. Particular attention will be given to the relationship between individual beliefs and institutional arrangements in fields such as education, labor markets, welfare states, migration regimes, and digital platforms.

We welcome empirical and theoretical contributions that investigate the consequences of meritocratic beliefs, the production of deservingness boundaries, and the ways in which social actors challenge or reproduce these moral frameworks. Comparative, historical, qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods approaches are all encouraged.