What if there were no prestige?

 

1. Introduction

1.1 The question

Some people enjoy prestige. They may be given titles which carry a certain cachet. Their holding such titles may lead others to think highly of them, and that may in turn induce positive self-perception on the part of the holders. Even if no titles are involved, records of achievements may be read in ways that lead others to think highly of the achievers, and that may in turn induce positive self-perception on the part of the achievers. In either case, prestige takes us beyond what would be implied by the mere noting of facts and the detached evaluation of those facts as, for example, indicators of likely performance in future tasks. Prestige involves a bit of magic, albeit magic that is explicable entirely in natural psychological and social terms.

We shall speak of people being accorded prestige, meaning that they are widely thought of as being special. The according of prestige will often not be a conscious act. It will usually be just how people tend to think of a person, given that person's titles or achievements. Anthropologists sometimes speak of a prestige economy, alongside any monetary economy. Prestige is accorded in line with the norms of the relevant society, and it is found to be a valuable reward and motivator. 

We shall also speak of people having titles, awards or positions bestowed on them. Bestowal will be of interest to us when the titles, awards or positions are ones that on the whole lead recipients to be accorded prestige. Bestowal will be a conscious act on the part of those who have the power to bestow. It may or may not lead to the beneficiary being accorded prestige. It would be perfectly possible for the wider population to think nothing of the title, award or position. And someone could be accorded prestige without any title, award or position ever being bestowed, simply because the population admired some achievement.

If prestige is not accorded, it will vanish. It exists only in the minds of the beholders. Our question is as follows. What would be the consequences of this magic which we have called prestige vanishing in relation to everybody, so that there was never any sense that a title, award or position was anything more than a label with descriptive content and nobody took records of achievements to be of any significance other than to the extent that they were useful indicators of likely future performance?

1.2 Our scope

Our topic is prestige that is noticed in society generally or at least across a large class of people, rather than prestige that only arises in narrow settings such as a family or a small institution, the inner workings of which do not attract public attention.

Prestige marks out a proportion of a particular group of people, which must amount to a modest proportion of the (perhaps larger) group of people who accord the prestige.

If the two groups are the same, as for example with the prestige of some engineers among engineers generally, the proportion of that group must be modest. If most members of the group were accorded the prestige, it would not be valued.

If however the two groups are different, that restriction need not apply. For example, doctors might enjoy a certain prestige among the population as a whole simply by virtue of their profession. Merely being a doctor would not give rise to prestige among doctors, but it might do so among people in general.

Prestige may arise formally, out of the receipt of specific honours (prizes bestowed by institutes, election to national learned academies with restricted membership, honours bestowed by the state, and so on) or out of the holding of specific positions. Prestige may also arise informally out of achievements that are recognised to be difficult, either naturally difficult such as climbing high mountains or artificially difficult such as publication in certain journals where competition for space in them is fierce. And there are other things in between the formal and the informal, such as invitations to chair or speak at important conferences and distinguished roles in professional bodies. Indeed, some academics now include in their CVs not only lists of their publications but also sections headed "Indicators of esteem", where esteem may be seen as a step on the way to prestige.

We shall be concerned with prestige that attaches to distinctions, the achievement of which is easily identified and the quantity of which is tightly limited, whether by explicit or informal quota (as with state honours and membership of some learned academies), by the nature of the position (as when a council only needs one person to chair it), or by human nature (which renders it so difficult to climb high mountains or to make significant scientific discoveries that few people manage such things).

Identifiability of achievement excludes from our scope general recognition by colleagues. And tight limits on quantity exclude mere membership of an esteemed profession. Tight limits also allow us to distinguish prestige from mere esteem, which may be accorded by members of a group to a large proportion of that group.

One significant consequence of our choice of scope will be that the prestige which interests us is something that someone might well pursue by following a plan to obtain it.

We shall now explore our question as to the consequences of prestige's vanishing. We shall do so largely by going through the effects that the possibility of being accorded prestige may have.

2. Achievement

2.1 Motivation

To the extent that people like to be accorded prestige, its availability may drive them to work hard. It may also drive them to get a move on, given that we have limited lifespans and even more limited spans of time during which we are at the height of our powers.

So if prestige were to vanish, less might get done. This could be to the detriment both of the individual, who might fall short of fulfilment of their potential, and of society. But it is also possible for the pursuit of prestige to lead people astray, so its disappearance might not be wholly disadvantageous either to the individual or to society.

2.2 The distortion of choices

If someone's desire for prestige encourages him or her to work hard at tasks, success in which increases the probability that prestige will be accorded, that is likely to be beneficial. And it may be so even if the individual is motivated by the prospect of prestige rather than by any feeling that one should do the best job one can.

If however prestige is of great importance to the individual, he or she may be greatly concerned to do what other people will admire.

In some areas, the effect will still be very likely to be beneficial. What people admire will be aligned with what any rational agent would pursue. In athletics, what is admired by members of society is the same as what should matter to the individual: faster, higher, stronger. In those academic disciplines in which it is appropriate to think in terms of answers the correctness of which cannot sensibly be doubted until new evidence comes along, we see the same alignment. Getting those answers is admired and should also be the individual's aim. This can be said of mathematics, a large majority of work in the natural sciences, and a smaller but still substantial proportion of work in the social sciences and the humanities.

In other areas, the alignment between what people admire and what any rational agent would pursue will be far from guaranteed. Artistic achievement is the obvious example. Indeed, some now admired artistic movements were at first scorned. Impressionism suffered from that treatment. But the same misalignment could arise in politics, with some campaigns against injustice being more deplored than admired, or in business, where someone who sacrifices profit to what is perceived as socially responsible consideration for those known as stakeholders may be admired and someone who has a single-minded focus on profit deplored, even though the profit-seeker may not only obtain higher rewards but also have a better prospect of serving the customer well and keeping the business's employees in their jobs.

There are two potential disadvantages when someone is intent on prestige but there is no guaranteed alignment between what people admire and what any rational agent would pursue.

The first disadvantage is that effort may be wrongly directed. A new artistic movement which would in fact be of value may go undeveloped. An important political campaign may not be pursued. Or a business may not be run to best advantage, whether of the owner or of the customers or employees.

The second disadvantage is that the agent may fail to be true to himself or herself. Whether one sees this as a serious disadvantage will depend on how much one admires the person who insists on living on his or her own terms, and who refuses to conform merely for the sake of conforming. Some of us do see it as a great virtue to live in that way. For a powerful case in favour, and against the conformist pursuit of compliance with social expectations for the sake of prestige, see Ayn Rand's novel The Fountainhead.

Both of these disadvantages would be removed if prestige disappeared.

2.3 Manipulating the system

There would be other things to do in the pursuit of prestige which would not be directly detrimental to the quality of work. They would primarily be to the detriment of any relevant system of bestowal, bringing it into contempt.

These would include both the outright fabrication of achievements, and practices which were less obviously unacceptable. Someone might ask friends who were also friends of bestowers of titles, awards or positions to put in a good word for them. Another approach would be to put great effort into presenting a case for recognition, putting everything in the best possible light without exactly lying.

Moreover, it would often not be difficult to sway the judgement of bestowers. The criteria for bestowal are generally not wholly objective, other than in special cases such as awards for triumph in sports where there is a wholly objective measure of achievement (such as time or height, rather than style) or awards for being the first to solve mathematical or technical problems which have been defined in advance.

2.4 When prestige is incidental

People may act in ways that lead to their being accorded prestige, but without having prestige as a goal.

This may be the ideal, so long as prestige exists. If they have sufficient motivation, the lack of motivation from prestige will be no handicap. And they should neither be tempted to manipulate the bestowers of titles, awards or positions, nor be led astray by social conditions on the according of prestige.

One might indeed see lack of interest in prestige as a virtue in itself. Lack of interest would allow people to do things because they were seen as worthy things to do, rather than for any ulterior motive. And the vanishing of prestige would not matter to people with such an attitude.

3. Personal satisfaction

Prestige may give rise to personal satisfaction. It feels good to have one's achievements admired by others. And such admiration confirms that the worth of one's achievement is not a figment of one's own imagination. It may indeed be anticipation of such satisfaction that motivates the pursuit of prestige.

The perception of validation is however not always justified. We noted above that there are areas of work in which what people admire will be aligned with what any rational agent would pursue, and areas in which such alignment is far from guaranteed.

Someone who was accorded prestige for achievements in areas of the first kind could have considerable confidence in the judgement of his or her admirers, except when prestige was accorded only by a few eccentrics and the one who basked in the prestige refused to acknowledge this fact.

Someone who was accorded prestige in areas of the second kind might legitimately have confidence in the judgement of his or her admirers, whether the judgement of those who bestowed awards which were widely regarded as prestigious or the judgement of people generally who thought well of the specific bestowal of an award on that person or thought well of that person's achievements.

Someone who was accorded prestige in such areas might however have doubts. What if the standards of his or her admirers were inappropriate? What if prestige was in fact accorded largely on the basis of conformity to current norms as to what kind of work should be produced, so that mediocre but conformist work could earn it while excellent but nonconformist work would not?

What would be the effects of prestige's vanishing? Individuals could still be satisfied with their achievements, but they would lose one source of validation of their satisfaction. Among some people, this might reduce motivation to achieve. As for society, any loss of motivation might be unfortunate. But at least there would be a reduction in motivation to conform to inappropriate standards.

4. The allocation of resources

Institutions have to decide how to allocate scarce resources. Who will make the best use of them? The question can arise both in relation to resources for specific projects, and in relation to the allocation of longer-term jobs. Prestige can be used as a guide, on the basis that past performance is at least an indicator of having the talents needed for good future performance. We may ask whether it would be easier or harder to allocate resources appropriately in the absence of prestige.

If prestige were accorded on a basis which ensured that there was a high positive rank correlation with level of achievement, it would be sensible to use prestige as at least a rough guide to the allocation of resources. But if prestige were accorded on other grounds, for example on the basis of conformity to expectations which in fact deserved to be challenged, its use could easily lead to an inappropriate allocation of resources.

Even if prestige were accorded on the basis of level of achievement, there would be a difficulty. Unproven talent might be shut out. It is not that all new entrants into a field should get resources. Some would actually lack talent. But prestige would not be enough to ensure the best allocation of resources. There should also be an enquiry into work done by at least some new people. Sadly, that might be obstructed by a desire among those who currently enjoyed high prestige and control over resources to exclude challengers.

Overall, the disappearance of prestige might well reduce the misallocation of resources where prestige was not accorded on a basis which ensured a high positive rank correlation with level of achievement.

Where prestige was accorded on a basis which ensured a high positive rank correlation, its disappearance would remove a useful rule of thumb in the initial selection of potential recipients of resources. But that could be replaced by a cursory examination of the achievements of potential recipients.

A more detailed examination of their achievements and talents would in any case be needed to whittle down a shortlist to the list of actual recipients, if there was to be much prospect of the whittling down's leading to an allocation of resources which was not manifestly inferior to one or more alternative allocations. (We speak in these terms because it would be very unlikely that anyone could identify an optimal allocation, even supposing that an optimum would exist.) 

5. Power

Our discussion of the allocation of resources brings us on to the topic of power.

Having prestige can in itself give power, and the appropriateness of such power may be questioned. In particular, if the distribution of prestige reflects any considerations other than real talent and achievement, the influence on the distribution of power is quite likely to be inappropriate.

(We deliberately speak of appropriate and inappropriate distributions of power, not legitimate and illegitimate distributions. Our concern is with whether it would be sensible for certain people to have power in order that good results be achieved, not with whether it would be just for them to have power.)

We can see what might go right, or wrong, by considering different types of power that might be involved.

5.1 The power to influence other people's views

Having prestige may make it is more likely than otherwise that one's views on contentious topics will be accepted. If the distribution of prestige tracks real expertise, that may be beneficial. And a failure to have some way or other to indicate who had expertise and who did not would be unfortunate - although prestige might be too broad-brush an indicator to be ideal for this purpose. But if the distribution of prestige does not track real expertise, or does so only poorly, the result may be unhelpful. Views of people whose expertise is modest may be given more weight than views of others whose expertise is greater. The problem would disappear if prestige vanished. It would however be useful to have some alternative rule of thumb to identify those whose views were likely to be worth serious consideration.

Prestige may also make it easier than it would otherwise be to get one's views disseminated, for example by getting one's own works published or by having others report one's views. Here there is a serious potential disadvantage, even if prestige is well correlated with expertise. The question of whether views are worth considering can only be answered by those who have become aware of the views. It is reasonable to direct one's attention to those who have expertise, and to ignore people who manifestly do not, but within the range of experts one should at least cursorily survey all views, not just those from prestigious people. Otherwise one could very well miss valid challenges to established orthodoxy. Again, this problem would disappear if prestige were to vanish.

5.2 The power to influence selectors for positions

Having prestige may make it more likely than otherwise that one will be promoted to positions of leadership. The case here is slightly different from that with expertise, because effectiveness in leadership requires abilities that are less well defined than those which expertise requires but are more easily recognised by non-experts. So even if prestige is not ideally allocated, it may play a useful and relatively harmless role in getting candidates who enjoy prestige onto a shortlist.

Having said that, the final choice of candidate should be made without regard to prestige and should depend on actual possession of the required talents. The main area in which prestige can lead selectors badly astray is when someone comes from outside a given area of work, lacking a relevant track record but in possession of considerable prestige from some other area of work. For example, someone with great political or civil service prestige but little business sense might seek an appointment to run a business, and the selectors might be influenced by the prestige. If prestige were to vanish, this danger would go away. On the other hand, where this danger did not arise, a useful rule of thumb in the compiling of shortlists would be lost.

5.3 The power to allocate resources and positions

Prestige may make one more likely to have powers of allocation of resources and positions.

This gives rise to a serious concern. If resources and positions are allocated by people with high prestige, the result may be a self-perpetuating oligarchy. The resources may well, and the positions are very likely to, enhance the prestige of the recipients after a little while. Then they may inherit power to allocate resources and positions.

This concern would arise whether or not prestige was accorded in line with actual talent. A self-perpetuating oligarchy would be likely to slow down the progress of those who, while they would do perfectly good work, had faces which did not fit. It would also tend to perpetuate established views on how people in the relevant area should think and work.