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In the Name of Merit: Ethical Violence and Inequality at a Business School

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Abstract

This study examines how meritocracy as a collective social imaginary promoting social justice and fairness reproduces class and caste inequalities and fosters ethical violence. We interrogate discourse of merit in the narratives of the professional–managerial class-in-making at an Indian business school. Empirically, we draw on interviews, full-text responses to a qualitative questionnaire, and a student’s poem. We describe how business school students articulate merit as a neoliberal ethic, emphasizing prudential, enterprising attitudes, and responsibility. However, this positive, aspirational façade of merit masks practices of ethical violence, wherein individuals invoke an ethical principle as grounds for moral condemnation and linguistic injuries. These practices of ethical violence desubjectify disadvantaged students and result in silence as a form of inequality. We contribute to organizational research on inequalities by foregrounding ethical violence and desubjectification. We detail the possibilities of discursive agency in contesting and interrupting ethical violence.

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Notes

  1. Our data collection had largely concluded by 2019 when IIMs implemented the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) reservation (10%). Thus, this study does not include EWS students. EWS inclusion complicates the binary of upper caste as general (merit) and oppressed castes as reserved (non-merit) and warrants further research.

  2. IIM entrance exams introduced Third Gender as a category in 2019. Prior to this, candidates identified as male or female.

  3. In some regions in India, some OBC groups compete with upper castes for economic and political dominance. Nevertheless, in the context of higher education, the general category’s claim on merit is entrenched. Dominant discourses relegate a student claiming a reservation to the shadow of ‘non-merit’ (Deshpande, 2013).

  4. Beedis are South Asian cigarettes made of tobacco wrapped in tendu leaves.

  5. State universities give domicile preferences; central institutions like IIMs, IITs and NITs do not.

  6. Lakh is a unit in the Indian numbering system, equalling 100,000.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Editor Sara Louise Muhr and the anonymous reviewers for the highly insightful and constructive comments. We are grateful to Rohit Varman for his generosity and the incisive, detailed comments at various stages. We are thankful to Dheeraj Singh for the multiple conversations and to Divya S. for sharing her poetry.

Funding

We have not received any funding for this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, K-408, New Academic Block, D.H. Road, Joka, Kolkata, West Bengal, 700104, India

    Devi Vijay

  2. Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, D.H. Road, Joka, Kolkata, West Bengal, 700104, India

    Vivek G. Nair

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  1. Devi Vijay
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Correspondence to Devi Vijay.

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Ethical Approval

We have complied with Journal of Business Ethics’ ethical standards. This work has not been published before and is not under consideration for publication anywhere else. The paper has not been previously rejected or withdrawn after review by the Journal of Business Ethics and its submission has been approved by all co-authors.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants in the study. All participants except Divya S. and Dheeraj Singh have been anonymized and there is no identifying information. We use Dheeraj’s and Divya’s names with permission. Additional informed consent was obtained from the participant, Divya S., whose poem is one of the data sources in this article.

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Appendices

Appendix 1: Questionnaire

Sl. No.

Question

1

When you consider someone as meritorious (either yourself, your batchmates, or seniors), what aspects/ qualities/ characteristics are you referring to?

2

When you consider someone as not meritorious (either yourself, your batchmates, or seniors), what aspects/ qualities/ characteristics are you referring to?

3

What do you consider as essential to making this institution a more meritocratic place? (Assuming merit is a desirable quality. If you disagree, please explain)

4

Any other views you wish to share

Appendix 2: A Scheduled Caste Girl, By Divya. S.

I conquered the world

With broken English

With a half working left brain, but

With an empowered right brain.

I pushed away lakhs of aspirers

Who were better than me!

With a single paper,

A caste certificate.

I barred the gates of [ABC]

For a student with 99 percentile,

But doomed to be born in upper-caste.

What do I do?

Is it my privilege to be born in a Scheduled Caste family?

Is it his/her fault to be born in an upper-caste family?

Is it the government's mandate to place the reservation system?

What is it?

But apparently, I failed at [ABC]

With lesser self-esteem

With lesser exposure.

Miles between their

Family background and mine.

Square miles between their

Pockets and mine.

I looked upon their wardrobe, I awed.

I looked upon their make-up, I awed.

I looked upon their accessories, I awed.

But when I went back home,

My naïve mother told everyone,

“My daughter is studying in [ABC].”

My pain withered away

My self-esteem blossomed again.

I'm the conqueror,

At least in my own world.

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Vijay, D., Nair, V.G. In the Name of Merit: Ethical Violence and Inequality at a Business School. J Bus Ethics 179, 315–337 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-021-04824-1

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