Fudan-LSE Lecture Series No.29

THE SPEAKER

Daniel A. Bellis Dean of the School of Political Science and Public Administration at Shandong University (Qingdao). His latest book (co-authored with Wang Pei) Just Hierarchy: Why Social Hierarchies Matter in China and the Rest of the World was published by Princeton University Press in March 2020. He is founding editor of the Princeton-China series. In 2018, he was awarded the Huilin Prize and was honored as a 'Cultural Leader' by the World Economic Forum. In 2019 he was awarded the Special Book Award of China. 

ABSTRACT

In a large modern community, there will always be political hierarchies between rulers and citizens. When are political hierarchies morally justified? We will argue that they are justified when the rulers serve the ruled and when the ruled trust the rulers and we argue that political meritocracy is a form of this ideal. We then argue that political meritocracy is an appropriate standard for assessing political change in China and we ask if political meritocracy is compatible with democracy.

ORGANIZER

Institute for Global Public Policy