Meritocratic fundamentals of personnel policy in the public governance system

Abstract

The approaches to understanding the essence of meritocracy in the system of forming the administrative elite have been analyzed in the article. It has been found out that the meritocratic principle is to choose intelligent, talented, charismatic, communicative persons, endowed with managerial abilities, as well as responsibility, impartiality, honesty, own personal core. It is found that the term has a number of meanings, in particular, the principle of political governance, the mechanism of selection and appointment of the administrative and political elite. Meritocracy is based on free competition, impartiality and objectivity as opposed to power inheritance, social and cultural preferences, personal acquaintances and more. It is the equality of opportunity for citizens that underlies the social lift. It is revealed that the basic elements of the meritocratic principle of the implementation of personnel policy are the competitive principles of entry into public service; personal abilities, knowledge, ability are the criteria for evaluation of applicants; non-discrimination against all public servants; equal pay for equal work; encouragement for effective performance; the search for talent, care and creation of favorable conditions for the people selected for power. The world and Ukrainian experience of formation of managerial personnel on the principles of meritocracy was investigated, its advantages and disadvantages were revealed. Positives include the possibility of a fair distribution of political values beyond heredity, ties, social status; any competent and highly conscious person can claim a politically important position; hierarchy of career ladder promotion; the disjointed rulers contribute to the prosperity of the country and civilization. Criticism of meritocracy is based on the inability to apply universal means of determining merit to society and measures of human capacity; priority of intelligence and secondary values of human values (kindness, compassion, etc.). In our opinion, the meritocratic principle must be fundamental in the formation of the national management elite through the system of examinations formed, testing on the basis of impartial, objective, comprehensive evaluation. It is proved that an integral part of the general problem of overcoming corruption, creation of the Ukrainian democratic statehood, based on effective and authoritative public authority in the society, is the identification of sources of formation of public service personnel according to the principles of meritocracy.