"supremacy or power of bookish theorists," 1842, from pedant + -cracy "rule or government by," with connecting vowel. Coined (in French) by Mill in a letter to Comte.
Entries linking to pedantocracy
pedant n.
1580s, "schoolmaster," from French pédant (1560s) or directly from Italian pedante, literally "teacher, schoolmaster," a word of uncertain origin, apparently an alteration of Late Latin paedagogantem (nominative paedagogans), present participle of paedagogare (see pedagogue). Meaning "person who trumpets minor points of learning, one who overrates learning or lays undue stress on exact knowledge of details or trifles as compared with large matters or general principles" is recorded by 1590s.
-cracy
word-forming element forming nouns meaning "rule or government by," from French -cratie or directly from Medieval Latin -cratia, from Greek -kratia "power, might; rule, sway; power over; a power, authority," from kratos "strength," from PIE *kre-tes- "power, strength," suffixed form of root *kar- "hard." The connective -o- has come to be viewed as part of it. Productive in English from c. 1800.