Education and Social Stratification in South Korea

East Asia is a hot spot where people’s educational enthusiasm is realized in rigorous competition for academic credentials; an outcome of which is students’ higher academic performances in international comparisons. South Korea is a country with a well-known intensive academic meritocracy. Does the academic meritocracy, however, accurately reflect the reality of the society? How is an ‘objective’ condition of the effect of academic credentials on one’s socioeconomic status converted into a ‘subjective’ condition of the effect of one’s academic credentials? Shin Arita, a comparative sociologist, renders cogent answers to these questions though his comprehensive quantitative analyses, which uncover accurate figures of Korean meritocracy. Readers can learn from Arita’s thorough investigations what roles education plays in shaping social stratification in a rapidly modernized society. This is a must-read book for those who are interested in the evolution of meritocracy. -- Takehiko Kariya, University of Oxford, author of Education Reform and Social Class in Japan