Experts and Elites Play Fundamentally Different Games

Understanding the expert-elite divide

Experts and elites play fundamentally different games. Misunderstanding this distinction warps how we judge institutions—and who we choose to trust.

A few days ago, The Free Press published my Letter to the Editor discussing the difference between experts and elites—an insightful distinction I first encountered on Robin Hanson’s Substack.

Here I elaborate on this framework. I’ll be speaking with a certain amount of looseness and generalization. Any time you speak about social patterns there will be exceptions. Boundaries can be fuzzy. Still, this is a useful framework.

Defining Experts and Elites

In most societies, people fall into one of three roles: the masses, the experts, and the elites.

Experts are people who know things. They’re judged by other experts—people who speak the same language, use the same methods, and know the same details. You can spot experts by their credentials, their technical precision, or just the way they argue. They care about being right. They’re evaluated on whether their work holds up—whether it can be tested, measured, replicated, or defended under scrutiny. They debate each other, go deep into the weeds, and let the details decide who’s correct.

Elites are different. They’re not judged on technical knowledge but on being impressive across a broader range: wealth, looks, taste, social fluency, connections, charisma, and cultural feel. Elite institutions tend to screen for such qualities, which is why educational pedigree is also often important. This is why you can major in anything at Harvard and still get an elite job. No need for narrow expertise in, say, engineering or mathematics.

It’s common to see someone from an elite college with a degree in English or political science go on to work at a top consulting firm even though their degree had nothing to do with their job. Many elite organizations don’t filter for narrow technical expertise but rather roundedness and the qualities that make for an elite rather than an expert.

They talk to other elites—not necessarily in the same field, but from the same orbit. Their speech is less about precision and more about mood, values, and gestures. Social grooming and chimp politics. Instead of drilling down, they smooth over. Instead of proving their point, they bring people along to crystallize a consensus. They win arguments through allegiance rather than getting closer to the actual objective truth.

Recall season 6 of the television series Mad Men. Dr. Arnold Rosen, a relatively plain man, tells the tall and handsome protagonist, Don Draper, “If I looked like you and talked like that, I wouldn’t have had to go to medical school.” Don, who didn’t graduate from college, responds with a restrained smile.

The Expert–Elite Spectrum

You can think of experts and elites as ends of a spectrum.

At one end: the pure expert—say, a mathematician—does proofs all day and needs zero social skills. At the other: the pure elite—a politician, a CEO—who might not have much technical knowledge, but knows how to talk, how to read a room, how to get people on board.

Elites like to say they’re just following the experts. “We believe the science,” they’ll insist. But elites can overrule expert opinion—especially on issues charged with moral or emotional weight. They pretend their views came from neutral experts, when they often don’t.

A lot of elites, though, were experts first. Managers climb the ladder from technical roles. Thought leaders often start out as academics or journalists. Eventually they shift focus. From depth to breadth. From precision to persuasion. Many still call themselves “experts.” Elites understand audiences, coalitions, and cultural sensitivities. They know how to frame things. That’s what qualifies them, supposedly, to lead the conversation rather than merely contribute to it.

Academics tend to stay in their lane. “Here’s what I know about my field.” But they’ll stop short of broader recommendations. They’re cautious, disciplined, trained to qualify their claims. Their audience is other experts. The job is to be precise, not persuasive.

Public intellectuals play a different game. They range wider, speak more freely, and they’re more comfortable telling people what should be done. They aren’t just sharing knowledge. They’re trying to build coalitions, shape opinion, steer the ship. Which means their language shifts. Less jargon, less hedging.

And they’re judged differently, too. Academics get evaluated by other specialists: Does this person know what they’re talking about? Are they following the rules of the field? Public intellectuals, by contrast, have to impress a broader audience. They’re expected to have taste, poise, connections—celebrity-adjacent traits. It’s not enough to be right; you also have to be compelling.

Experts talk in a particular way. It’s precise, analytical, often skeptical. They’re comfortable pointing out flaws, raising objections, disagreeing in public. That’s part of the job—scrutinize the details, say what’s wrong, argue your case. Elite talk is different. It’s smoother. More flattery. More vagueness. More emphasis on values and shared goals.

Here I can’t help but recall a quote from Thomas Sowell: "For university presidents, as for politicians at all levels, one of the most valuable talents for the success of their careers is the ability to say things that make no sense, with a straight face and a lofty tone."

Elite talk is less about getting things exactly right and more about keeping people on board. Building consensus, projecting optimism, saying the kind of thing that motivates rather than scrutinizes. It’s not that one is better than the other—they serve different functions. Expert talk is for getting to the truth. Elite talk is for getting things to move. And in most real-world settings—institutions, media, politics—it’s elite talk that sets the tone.

At a conference, the person giving a talk is often more of an expert. The panel discussion afterward is more elite territory, where people will opine on topics they have no special expertise in. Academics tend to cluster toward the expert side. Public intellectuals drift elite. A frontline worker might know every detail of how a system works; their manager probably couldn’t do the job, but knows how to talk about it in a meeting. As people move up a hierarchy, they frequently try to move from expert to elite.

There are plenty of other examples of this expert–elite divide.

Take journalism. A beat reporter is closer to an expert—they’re supposed to gather facts, stick to the evidence, and get the details right. An opinion columnist, on the other hand, plays the elite role. They make broader claims, shape narratives, signal values. Their job isn’t just to report what’s true—it’s to tell you what it means and why it matters.

Same thing with boards. Advisors are the experts. They know a specific thing, and they’re brought in for that knowledge. Directors are elites. They’re there for judgment, influence, connections, and status.

Even Nobel Prize winners—arguably the peak of expert success—often try to make the leap. Once they win, many of them start writing op-eds, weighing in on topics far outside their field. The underlying assumption is: now that I’ve proven myself as an expert, I’ve earned the right to speak like an elite. Robin Hanson points out that even for Nobel Prize winners, it's really hard after a lifetime of the expert strategy to suddenly switch to trying to be the elite. Most of these Nobel Prize winners do not become accepted as elites.

And it goes both ways. High-status people often try to drape themselves in expertise. They want the authority of the expert label without the years of narrow focus. So there’s mutual envy: experts want reach, elites want credibility. You don’t need to become an expert first to become an elite. But that’s the usual direction within these two categories. Elites seldom strive to become experts; plenty of experts attempt to become elites.

Experts can be broke—or at least live in a zone of genteel poverty. Elites are usually better off financially as it’s easier for them to exchange status for money.

A lot of people who do public-facing work toggle between the two. Sometimes you demonstrate mastery of a subject. Other times you zoom out, gesture toward big themes, build alliances.

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In most organizations, the people at the bottom are the experts. They’re the ones who actually know how things work. How to run the numbers, fix the systems, navigate the day-to-day operations. As you move up the chain, you get less technical expertise and more authority. The manager at the top usually can’t do any one job better than the people under them. But they make the big decisions.

Managers will often say, “I just listen to my team—they’re the real experts.”

We’re told that promotions reward competence—that people rise because they’re the best at what they do in terms of technical ability on the job. But in addition to expertise, promotions also reward eliteness: broad social fluency, political instincts, chimp politics. Promotions go to people who would make good leadership material. People who talk the right way, signal good judgment, and don’t ruffle the wrong feathers.

This performance shows up in media and government too. Journalists say they “talk to the experts.” Agencies claim to “follow the science.” And often they do—to a point. But they’re still elites. They curate which experts get airtime, which findings get amplified, which stories get framed a certain way. They don’t just transmit expert knowledge—they manage it, shape it, and decide how it gets used.

When Elites Override Experts

When elites don’t care about a topic, experts are in charge. They set the norms, make the decisions, and everyone defers to their judgment. But the moment elites start paying attention—once they form a consensus—they take over.

You saw this during the Covid pandemic. Early on, many physicians and health experts were skeptical about lockdowns, travel bans, and masks. Then global elites started talking—governments, media, institutional heads—and settled on a different line. Almost overnight, the official expert view flipped to match the elite view. The messaging changed, and everyone followed.

Pandemic experts had access to decades, even centuries, of historical precedent and protocol. But as soon as elites aligned on what they wanted, the experts fell in line. It was instant. The kind of abrupt reversal that feels like something out of 1984. One day it’s “We never said that.” The next, it’s “We’ve always said that.”

When elites change their minds, the institutions and the experts within them usually follow.

I remember listening to a podcast in 2020 where two physicians discussed how strange it was to isolate healthy people during a pandemic, whereas in every other pandemic in history only the sick were quarantined. Elites called the shots and most experts went along with it.

You can see the elite/expert split in other arenas. Criminologists who track victimization surveys and randomized patrol experiments have long found that visible, data-driven policing deters violent crime. Yet elite commentators often champion “defund” slogans or broad-brush bans on proactive policing because those positions resonate with their social peers and align with their political commitments. The pattern is consistent: experts uncover important details, while elites curate narratives that feel morally and socially acceptable—often steering policy away from what the evidence actually supports.

We like to pretend that anyone can speak up, offer ideas, or take action. But in practice, we tend to accept important moves only when they come from elites. And even then, only when they’re delivered in the “correct” elite style.

Proposals for reforms, innovations, or new lines of research are rarely taken seriously unless they come from high-status people. Even when someone is clearly mistreated, we’re uncomfortable if they speak out too directly, especially if they don’t have status. The proper channel is to quietly bring it to the attention of someone higher up, and then wait to see if they choose to act.

This deference extends to almost everything sensitive. Cynicism, flirtation, taboo subjects, and uncomfortable truths are all tolerated more easily when they come from elites. Particularly if the delivery is polished. The same behavior that would get a lower-status person punished is often excused, or even admired, when it comes from higher up.

“Nobody gets fired for buying IBM.”

A lot of corporate innovation depends on borrowed prestige.

If an idea comes out of Harvard or from a high-status professor, companies are eager to cite it. They’ll say, “We’re working with someone from Harvard, and he recommends we do X”—and that alone gives them cover to proceed. But if the same idea comes from someone at a lower-status institution, they’ll usually ignore it. Not because the idea is worse, but because the association doesn’t offer enough protection. Recall the old adage “Nobody gets fired for buying IBM.”

Most people pushing new ideas need the support of someone with visible prestige. That’s what gives their proposal a chance.

This is also how management consulting works. A firm sends in recent graduates from elite schools—people with almost no domain knowledge—but they carry institutional prestige. If someone inside the company has an idea but lacks clout, they can bring in a consulting firm to repackage the same idea and give it the legitimacy it needs. It’s a status transfer. You buy the credibility you don’t have.

Experts alone often aren’t enough. They have to convince elites to endorse their ideas—whether it’s policy, behavior, or some emerging trend. Without that elite validation, it’s harder to get things moving.

Beauty, Brains, and the Nobel Prize Puzzle

Becoming a qualified elite means accumulating the right mix of traits: charisma, charm, social fluency, connections, and the ability to project status. Physical attractiveness also helps.

One interesting example here is the speaking market for scientists. A 2020 study found that social scientists earn more when they’re attractive, while natural scientists earn more when they’re unattractive.

The logic is intuitive. People mentally seem to categorize social scientists into the elite category, and natural scientists go into the expert category.

In both cases, what’s rewarded isn’t necessarily pure expertise—it’s alignment with the right image. Social scientists are paid for looking elite. Natural scientists are paid for looking like experts.

In most domains, being attractive helps. All else being equal, good-looking people get better jobs, make more money, and are seen as more competent. But a study found that among top-tier scientists, being attractive actually reduces the likelihood of receiving a Nobel Prize.

Scientists with average looks have the highest odds of winning. Very unattractive scientists are less likely to win, which is consistent with other research on how very plain individuals tend to be penalized in the job market.

Interestingly, the researchers of this paper suggest that one reason attractive scientists are less likely to win the Nobel is that they have more outside options. Physical attractiveness tends to boost career prospects—it opens doors to leadership roles, administrative posts, and public-facing opportunities that come with higher pay but also more meetings and less time for deep, focused research. Good looks help to move from expert to elite.

In academia, department chairs, deans, committee heads, journal editors, directors of funding agencies—these are the elites of the academic world. They’re not just researchers. They’re positioned to enter broader elite circles. If someone wanted to run for Congress, for instance, it would make more sense to come from a university presidency than a tenured professorship.

Elites Hide Their Ambition, Experts Don’t Have To

In some ways, the pursuit of expertise is a more recent development. Eliteness, by contrast, taps into something older and more instinctive.

The drive to become elite isn’t new. It’s an ancient human behavior, with deep roots in our psychology. We don’t need to be taught how to seek prestige—it comes naturally. The specifics vary by culture, but the basic impulse is universal.

This helps explain why eliteness isn’t about technical skill. It’s about general prestige—about seeming broadly impressive. One of the primary social functions of elites is to make it feel legitimate for others to defer to them. That deference is made possible by prestige. So elites need to project not just competence, but a package: grace, attractiveness, articulateness, generosity, and public-spiritedness.

They have to talk like they care about the greater good. About the country, the community, the big picture. Experts don’t have to do that. They’re allowed to seem narrowly focused, even self-interested. Elites, though, have to appear selfless—even when they’re not.

The elite persona is defined by a studied obliviousness to status-seeking. You’re not supposed to act like you’re chasing influence. You’re supposed to act like you just happened to end up there while pursuing truth or service.

It’s a double standard. Experts are allowed to be openly ambitious. Elites are supposed to act like they aren’t.

If you meet a 22 year old physics student who says “I want to win the Nobel prize some day,” you’ll hold him in higher regard than a 22 year old political science student who says “I want to be the president some day.”

Presidential candidates are a clear example. Everyone knows they want power—but they’re expected to pretend they’re just stepping up out of duty and concern for the nation.

Even celebrities follow this rule. Take athletes. Some qualify as elites simply by being exceptionally good at what they do. But to move fully into elite circles, raw talent isn’t enough. They still have to pass the other tests: Can they speak smoothly? Do they come off as gracious, thoughtful, socially fluent? If not, they get treated as narrow experts—people with skill, but not prestige.

I recently watched The Last Dance, about the golden age of the Chicago Bulls. The documentary pointed out that not only was Michael Jordan a superstar on the court, he was also handsome and clearly at ease speaking in front of a camera. That gave him crossover appeal such that people were willing to listen to him opine about topics outside of professional basketball.

The Battle for Elite Legitimacy

Knowing a lot about a specific subject makes you an expert. It qualifies you to make technical judgments in that domain. But that doesn’t automatically make you an elite. Elites aren’t defined by deep knowledge of one area—they’re defined by general social impressiveness. They move easily in leadership roles. People listen to them, not because of what they know, but because of who they are and how they carry themselves.

Some people try to climb into elite circles by becoming experts first. But they often underestimate how much else is involved—pedigree, polish, family background, institutional signals. It’s not just about intelligence or competence. If you’re missing those other signals, you’re unlikely to be accepted as one of them.

Another strategy is to find elites who are curious about experts. Some elites go “slumming”—they get it into their heads that they want to learn something technical, so they find an expert to talk to. That might be you. But even then, they don’t always hear what you’re actually saying. They often reinterpret it in ways that align with their own preferences or narratives.

This disconnect is part of why so many so-called populist movements frame themselves as revolts against elites. But in reality, most of these movements are just one elite faction fighting another. It’s an internal power struggle, with each side trying to claim a more authentic connection to “the people.”

One group of elites will go to the public and say, “Those other elites—you shouldn't trust them. We’re the real elites. They’re fake.” It’s a fight over legitimacy—who gets to count as a true elite, who gets excluded, and which coalition controls the story. These aren’t revolutions from below. They’re battles at the top.