> As if seniority is, by some strange logical gymnastics, less
> arbitrary and autocratic?
The nice thing about it, surely, is that it *is* arbitrary? No connection with "merit" or "worthiness" at all.
To be sure, some people are more skilled and conscientious than others. But forty years' experience in the corporate workplace has convinced me that meritocratic regimes aren't any good at all at preferring the one to the other. They're fairly good at rewarding the compliant and the obsequious and the devious, but that's another matter.
Arbitrary selection -- seniority, or drawing lots, or whatever -- would just have to be better than the selection mechanisms I've seen operating in my working life.
--
Michael Smith mjs at smithbowen.net http://stopmebeforeivoteagain.org http://fakesprogress.blogspot.com
"I am in favor of leaving people alone, no matter how imperfect their polity may seem." -- Stephen Maturin, MD