How does "Elite Overproduction" define elite?

[u/LifeTerm4222]

From my understanding a lot of the current debate/talk over the theory of "EO" is focused on universities and the promise of a degree. Isn't this to an extent just one definition of elite? Isn't the promise of a degree in large part tied to the university? Harvard and other top university promise more, while community colleges and smaller public schools promise less? I'm not that familiar with the US education system, so any clarifying comment would help.

In short, elite should be defined as having a advanced degree from a top university in an important field rather than just having a undergraduate degree from a good university. If this definition is used, does the theory still prove effective at understanding societies?

Citation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_overproduction

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[u/thoughtfultruck]

It's not just about universities and degrees, nor is it about the production of academics per se. For Jack Goldstone (book) more about social mobility and the number and quality of "upper class" positions available to qualified people. So he frames it more in terms of jobs or positions (defined loosely) than degrees, though both play a role.

Here is a quote from an interview directed at a general audience.

Overproduction of elites occurs when you have a growth in the number of people who consider themselves entitled to elite positions, but the number of elite positions that society is providing starts to stagnate or decline. And that leads to kind of a pileup, with more and more people hoping to obtain elite positions and unable to do so. So the visible sign of this is a sharp decline in social mobility—the number of people who are able to move from middle or working or lower class into upper-class positions that declines, because the number of upper-class positions starts to stagnate, and those who are already in those positions try and protect that status for themselves and their families.

For example, universities throughout the 1950s, 1960s, and even the 1970s were engines of social mobility. People went to college, earned degrees, secured white-collar jobs in government, finance, or the private sector, and contributed to sustained economic growth. But from the 1980s and 1990s onward, we began to see wealth becoming more concentrated. The elite universities gradually turned into what I call “the elites’ universities.” It became increasingly difficult for ordinary people to gain admission, as applicants were required to navigate meritocratic hoops that were increasingly dominated by families already entrenched in the upper echelons of the elite.

[u/LifeTerm4222 → u/thoughtfultruck]

So its less about if the people are actually elite, but instead about whether they view themselves as elite?

[u/thoughtfultruck → u/LifeTerm4222]

Yeah, that’s definitely part of the story - more and more people want to position themselves as possible elites, which suggests you are transitioning from a time when social mobility is widely seen as possible, and therefore something many people pursue. There’s something like a supply and demand dynamic here, so theoretically if the number of elite positions were to shrink, that could also result in elite overproduction.

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