Discrimination of excellence is the unjust treatment of outperformers and overachievers.[1] Discrimination against outperformers[2] includes the critique of unfair treatment in non-merit-based admissions practices, degree conferral or promotion standards.[3] Unfair treatment of outperformers occurs when focusing away from merit or biases lead to economic inefficiency or suboptimal choice in the wake of intransparent, arbitrary or nepotistic decision-making. Discrimination against excellent students during admissions is thematized in Ivy League admission debates[4] and legally scrutinized in the context of individuals outperforming on standardized college admission tests but not being admitted. Discrimination of excellence evidence is found in most outstanding students failing a PhD degree conferral[5][user-generated source] and intransparent promotion criteria systemically biasing against outperformers and overachievers.

Foundation

Discrimination is unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things.[6] Attempts exist to legally abolish, economically counter-weight and societally alleviate the negative consequences of discrimination around the world.[7] The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution ban the federal and state governments from discriminating. The United States Employment Discrimination laws seek to prevent discrimination based on race, sex, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, physical disability, and age by employers. The United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lists as especially sensitive areas of discrimination attention age, disability, equal pay and compensation, genetic information, harassment, national origin, pregnancy, race and color, religion, retaliation, sex and sexual harassment.[8] The European Union introduced an Anti-Discrimination Directive[9] to ban discrimination on the grounds of age, disability, religion or belief and sexual orientation. The Lisbon Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union serves as legal protection against discrimination acknowledging equal rights for all human to be treated unbiased and with equal fairness and dignity.[10]

Higher education discrimination

Discrimination of excellence includes the 2019 college admission fraud scandals, standardized admission test outperformers suing a U.S. higher education institution and the United States Department of Justice scrutinizing higher education over potential systemic biases in college admission standards that would underweight transparent standardized testing criteria.[4]

University and college admission and promotion criteria are critical career gatekeeping events, in which unexpectedly overweighting intransparent, non-merit based criteria can result in merit-based outperformers underperforming in admissions. Discrimination bias can occur in merit-based up-or-out placement and promotion criteria in hierarchical rank orders, when performance is partially measured on intangible or intransparent performance criteria implying potential economic inefficiency.[1]

Economic foundations

Outperformance[11] is the foundation of excellence. Overachievement is related to investments. Outperformance and overachievement are bases of the intellectual elites[clarification needed] and related to luxury consumption.[12]

Overachievement may instigate economic growth. John Maynard Keynes' multiplier effect attributes investments of overachievers as some of the drivers of economic growth. Investments of the striving elite multiply in economic spending in the overall economy.[13][circular reference]

Consumption of the elite is an economic growth factor. Thorstein Veblen's trickling down of excellence emphasizes that luxury consumption is a driver of economic growth and accelerator of social enhancement and cultural advancement.[14][circular reference]

The American Dream ideals of striving to outperform are foundations of economic productivity.[15]

Historical foundations

Slowing down overachievers and abolishing intellectual outperformance has occurred throughout history. Various regimes attempted to eradicate, cut down or slow performance and discourage individual striving.[16]

Societal structure

Discrimination of excellence theory[1] integrates the 'übergroup'[17] in the social psychology social identity theory categorization of society into so-called 'ingroups' and 'outgroups.'[18]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c Puaschunder, Julia (August 2019). "Discrimination of Excellence: A Research Agenda" (PDF). Proceedings of the 14th International Research Association for Interdisciplinary Studies (RAIS) Conference at the Erdman Center of Princeton University. 14 (1): 54–58. doi:10.2139/ssrn.3459603. S2CID 219357207.
  2. ^ "Kearney, Kathi, Discrimination against Excellence, Understanding Our Gifted, November/December 1993". 1993.
  3. ^ Bazerman, M. H.; Tenbrunsel, A. E. (2011). Blind Spots: Why we fail to do what's right and what to do about it. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
  4. ^ a b Hartocollis, Anemona (August 13, 2020). "Justice Dept. Accuses Yale of Discrimination in Application Process". New York Times.
  5. ^ Krotov, Vlad (July 10, 2020). "If I fail a Ph.D. program, what can I do?". Quora.
  6. ^ "Transcript of Civil Rights Act (1964)". Retrieved July 28, 2012.
  7. ^ "Non-discrimination". European Commission. August 19, 2020.
  8. ^ "Equal Employment Opportunity Commission". Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
  9. ^ "European Union Anti-Discrimination Directive". European Union.
  10. ^ "Treaty of Lisbon". European Union.
  11. ^ "Outperformance". Cambridge Dictionary.
  12. ^ Serdari, Thomaï (2016). "Experiments in Suchness: Hiroshi Sugimoto's Silk Shiki for Hermès". In Armitage, J.; Roberts, J. (eds.). Critical Luxury Studies: Art, Design, Media. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. pp. 130–50.
  13. ^ "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money". John Maynard Keynes.
  14. ^ "The Theory of Leisure Class". Thorstein Veblen.
  15. ^ "How Does the American Dream Influence the US Economy?". Investopedia.
  16. ^ Radeska, Tijana (August 25, 2016). "People were killed for being academics during the 1970's in Cambodia". The Vintage News.
  17. ^ Puaschunder, Julia (October 2019), Discrimination of Excellence, Copyright TXu002167333 / 2019-10-08
  18. ^ Tajfel, H.; Turner, J. C. (1979). "An integrative theory of intergroup conflict". In W. G. Austin; S. Worchel (eds.). The social psychology of intergroup relations. Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole. pp. 33–47.
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