Non-Meritocrats or Choice-Reluctant Meritocrats? A Redistribution Experiment in China and France

Recent experimental evidence suggests that meritocratic ideals are mainly a Western phenomenon. Intriguingly, the Chinese public does not appear to differentiate between merit- and luck-based inequalities, despite China’s historical emphasis on meritocratic institutions. We propose that this phenomenon could be due to the Chinese public’s greater reluctance to make an active choice in real-stake redistribution decisions. We run an incentivized redistribution experiment with elite university students in China and France where we vary the initial split of payoffs between two real-life workers to redistribute from. We show that Chinese respondents consistently and significantly choose more non-redistribution across different status quo scenarios. Additionally, if we exclude the individuals who engage in non-redistribution choices, Chinese respondents do differentiate between merit- and luck-based inequalities, and do not redistribute less than the French. Chinese respondents are as reactive as the French towards scenarios with noisy signals of merit, such as inequalities of opportunities. We argue that the reluctance to make an active choice signals diminished political agency to act upon redistribution decisions with real-life stakes, rather than apathy, inattention, having benefited from the status quo in Chinese society, or libertarian preferences among the Chinese. Notably, our findings show that the reluctance to make a choice is particularly pronounced among respondents of working-class or farming backgrounds, while it is absent among individuals whose families have closer ties to the private sector.

Link: Non-Meritocrats or Choice-Reluctant Meritocrats? A Redistribution Experiment in China and France