Expertise, a Framework for our Most Characteristic Asset and Most Basic Inequality

Abstract

This essay provides a framework of concepts and principles suitable for systematic discussion of issues surrounding expertise. Expertise creates inequality. Its multiple benefits and the creativity of technology lead to a society replete with expertises. The basic binds of expertise derive from the desire of non-experts to be able to both enjoy what expertise offers and insure that it is exercised in the social interest. This involves trusting the exercise of expertise, involuntarily or voluntarily. A healthy society provides various means to move trust from involuntary to voluntary. The social means for achieving this are laid out. The purpose of this short essay is to briefly lay out a conceptual framework within which to construct, clarify, evaluate and apply expertises. It is not to promote some particular notion of expertise over others, or to review the vast literatures, such as that on trust in science, that make up the domain. A few notes on one work towards this essay’s close may indicate what a major, and expert, process this would be.