DAVID RIESMAN
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become fascist. And my attitude was that America was too unruly for
that
to happen. I resisted theories about the authoritarian personality and
thought it was a misreading of the antinomian American even before the
war, but my attitude was strengthened by the war.
DB:
Does America's peculiar brand of anti-elitist, anti-intellectual and
anti-authoritarian character - or tendency - bear any relation to the de–
velopment of cultural conformity in this country?
DR:
In the book,
Education and Politics at Harvard,
I described two kinds
of meritocracy. One I called "aristocratic meritocracy," and I attributed
that to Harvard President A. Lawrence Lowell, who looked forward to
training the leaders of America but did not expect them all to come from
the patrician class. Yet he and his sort of people would judge who was fit
to be trained. And I compared that with what then (at the time of the
book's publication) prevailed, which was "democratic meritocracy," in
which any number could play and there were formal tests of merit.
"Democratic meritocracy" came after the war.
DB:
Is there a trade- off between egalitarianism and freedom - or liberty?
You write a little about that in your work. Often, it seems, the movement
toward egalitarianism makes for a desire among people to want fewer
distinctions.
DR:
Yes. I illustrate that in the book about Harvard by describing a pro–
posal in connection with the first freshman dormitory that had been built
there in decades. The dormitory was to have its own program for the
student residents, which would be very demanding, intellectually outward
bound. And students would have to know that it was very tough and se–
rious. But some objected on the ground that it was elitist. I noted in my
discussion that these objections, among people who actually were
all
part
of an elite by virtue of the fact that they were Harvard students, were
preposterous. I got nowhere. This anti-elitist bent was powerful. And of
course, if anything, it is even more powerful today in terms of victim
groups and excluded groups.
DB:
Do you contend that you can have both egalitarianism and liberty?
DR:
Yes, but there is a trade-off. If egalitarianism is pushed too far you
lose liberty. You lose everything in the things you can't do. I have had an
interest for some time in boarding schools for black boys. Some in the
women's movements resist giving advantages of any sort to certain groups
