The principle of meritocracy in education and its current status in the age of neoliberalism: a theoretical and empirical study

本研究的任务是：（一）从社会学理论的角度重新审视教育中的“英才教育”，（二）运用社会学研究的方法，把握英才教育原则在当前教育中的体现。这是对任务（一）有关的精英教育的现状，显示。本研究于2007年6月至9月进行，以全日制高中二年级学生为研究对象，旨在从实证的角度阐明教育内外的英才教育对儿童和青少年的意识和行为的影响本研究从全国范围内随机抽取了34所学校，并同意合作进行调查，有效问卷2，475份。例如，i）“肯定精英”的意识在属于“等级”较高的班级的学生中更强烈，ii）但同时，无论班级的“等级”如何，这种意识在高中生的研究样本中普遍存在，iii）另一方面，高中生中普遍存在“肯定平等原则”的意识，其程度不亚于“肯定任人唯贤”的意识;（4）高中生的“肯定平等原则”意识与“肯定任人唯贤”意识之间是否存在正相关或负相关关系，而存在负相关关系。

The task of this study is (I) to consider anew what is "meritocracy" in the education fundamentally in the light of social theory, and (II) to grasp how the principle of the meritocracy appears in the current status of education according to the method of the social research.In the report of this study, the result of the research by questionnaires, which is on the task (I) concerned with current status of meritocracy in education, is showed. The research was conducted from June to September in 2007 for the purpose of clarifying empirically how the consciousness and the action of children and the youth was regulated by the meritocracy within education as well as outside of it, targeted at the second grade full-time senior high school students (2,475 with valid responses) of 34 schools, which were extracted at random from the whole country, and were consent of cooperating to the researchThe findings provided from the research are wide-ranging; for example, i) a consciousness with "affirmation of meritocracy" is found more strongly among students belonging to classes higher in "rank", ii) but at the same time, such a consciousness is found generally among research samples of high school students regardless of the difference of "rank" of their classes, iii) on the other side, the consciousness with "affirmation of the principle of equality" is seen widely among high school students none less than that consciousness with "affirmation of meritocracy", iv) in addition, between these two consciousnesses is there not a positive or negative correlation but a decorrelation.