“An interminable making of interpretations is the duty of the teacher; in this duty of mindfulness, never fully to be discharged, he is freer than most citizens. That unique condition can only exist if academics do not try to destroy it by a frequent taking of sides, as auxiliaries in the ever-changing struggle for power. If we teachers understood those struggles, we would stay out of them; battle lines are not to be trusted.” –Philip Rieff<\/strong>, Fellow Teachers<\/em>, 1972.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A\u00a0recent\u00a0post<\/a>\u00a0by Megan McArdle about liberal bias in academia has been getting some attention<\/a>\u00a0in the blogosphere, so I think it’s appropriate to discuss the issue, something I personally relish a bit more than discussing abortion with strangers and a bit less than declawing a feral cat without the use of\u00a0anaesthetic.<\/p>\n

McArdle’s basic thesis is that there is a widespread, underlying\u00a0liberal bias in academia that fuels discrimination in the profession\u00a0against conservative academics and ideas; and that this systemic discrimination explains the relatively low percentage of conservative academics. This doesn’t strike me as a\u00a0terribly new or\u00a0surprising argument, but numerous writers have taken offense to what they see as MaArdle’s jihad against universities. She tends to grate on some people’s nerves anyway\u00a0due to her style of argumentation, which strikes me as being a bit like:<\/p>\n

McArdle:<\/strong> What a beautiful, sunny day this is!<\/p>\n

Non-McArdle:<\/strong> Wait, no, it’s raining and overcast- look.<\/p>\n

McArdle<\/strong>: Well, I suppose a liberal might raise that objection, but I see no reason that it disproves my original thesis.<\/p>\n

I understand why her critics are skeptical. Moreover, Tom Levinson points out in some detail<\/a> that she cites the following essay<\/a> in a way that misrepresents what it actually says. Finally, I find it striking that she lists off\u00a0alternate theories<\/a>\u00a0proposed\u00a0to her original thesis\u00a0about the lack of conservative academics without mentioning the most obvious one: American conservatives, in general, have a\u00a0really\u00a0low opinion<\/em> of professors, and it’s therefore about as hard to imagine them actually wanting<\/em> to become professors as it is to imagine a bleeding heart liberal joining the police force.*<\/p>\n

But, to be honest, I’m not terribly interested in discussing\u00a0McArdle’s post. Absent McArdle, David Horowitz, and\u00a0any other conservative\u00a0writer who\u00a0one may or may\u00a0not consider ideal,\u00a0this critique of academia is not going away. There are five reasons to address it head on: 1. Republicans are often in power and will often have a say in education funding, 2.\u00a0 Addressing the criticism could lead to a much more vibrant academic community and improve town-gown relations, 3. More conservatives in\u00a0academia could encourage the growth of a more intellectually-vibrant conservative movement, which would be good\u00a0for\u00a0political life as a whole,\u00a04. The critique might well have some weight to it, and 5. Circling the wagons is\u00a0seldom preferable to self-criticism and soul searching. So, let’s dive into this cactus together, shall we?<\/p>\n

It seems to me that there are two\u00a0claims that conservatives make about academic liberal bias: I’ll call them the hard argument and the soft argument. The hard argument, which McArdle doesn’t make but plenty of her commenters do, is that academia is simply a harsh environment for conservatives: if students express conservative opinions the professors attack those opinions and give them failing grades, their ideas are openly ridiculed in classrooms, and the actual instruction amounts to interminable lectures on the evils of America and the glories of Marxist socialism; ultimately, this climate drives out conservatives and makes academics progressively more liberal- the Indoctrination model, basically.<\/p>\n

The soft argument is that liberal academics probably don’t openly discriminate, except in rare cases, but their underlying biases make it hard for them to see the merits of intelligent conservative arguments, associating them with other, less intelligent conservative arguments, and perhaps they suspect that conservatism is just not a marker of intellectual seriousness; finally, that over time, this subtle, nearly unconscious bias will have the effect of weeding out conservatism in academia. After all, our job is, basically, to judge the quality of each other’s thought. And, if you think that conservatism is lower on the intellectual scale than liberalism, it could be hard to judge conservatives\u00a0fairly.<\/p>\n

What conservatives have to understand is that, for many of us in the profession, the hard argument simply\u00a0doesn’t square with our experiences. I’ve got twelve years in higher ed under my belt, four universities attended, and numerous “conservative” opinions that have been fairly well received by my peers. I’ve never heard the anti-American jeremiads or the encomiums on the virtues of Communism in lecture halls; I’ve never been ridiculed for my illiberal opinions; I’ve yet to meet any of the raging ideologues I’ve heard about; finally, I suspect that my own grading is a bit inflated for the conservative students due to concerns about my own biases and the biases of my profession.**\u00a0Simply put, academics are opinionated, like most people,\u00a0but my experience is that they’re also professional in their work. In fact, many of the behaviors that conservatives\u00a0claim are widespread and\u00a0commonplace are incredibly unprofessional and widely recognized as such by people who actually do this work.<\/p>\n

It’s not to say that they never happen- every profession has\u00a0some unprofessional people- but that there’s a tricky bit of math being used to claim that they’re widespread: you take a handful of anecdotes about shitty professors and conflate this with the percentage of academics who are registered Democrats and you can claim abuse is commonplace. And, indeed, I have to wonder if bright conservative students don’t enter\u00a0academia now with the expectation<\/em> that they won’t get a fair shot. We can call this the ‘dark legend’ of academics.<\/p>\n

But what about the soft argument? Academics find it easy to discount the hard argument because it’s so exaggerated, but at the expense of asking whether or not one’s political convictions really do<\/em> shape their view of\u00a0individuals with different convictions. After three decades of Foucault’s stock being\u00a0somewhat\u00a0overinflated in the profession, we\u00a0should have some<\/em> awareness of how the creation of knowledge intersects with the production of power. Why aren’t there more conservatives in academia? And why, aside from self-interest, shouldn’t we poke this particular hornet’s nest? Instead, the discussion usually begins in a dead-end, with conservatives making increasingly exaggerated claims about academics\u00a0and both liberals and academics discounting anything<\/em> conservatives have to say about the profession; this in turn validates the belief of conservatives that academia is a closed shop.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I don’t think anyone should see academia as a closed shop. The specific problem I want to address is evoked\u00a0by a recent letter in our university newspaper\u00a0from an undergraduate asking the\u00a0provocative question: “Why do most professors support the\u00a0creation of a socialist dictatorship?”<\/em> \u00a0It’s a\u00a0bit\u00a0ridiculous, of course. But it’s the latest in a stack of evidence that suggests to me that we’ve reached a point in which many academics\u00a0expect their ideas\u00a0to be denigrated by a large percentage of the general population and a good number of students believe that their ideas will be denigrated by a large percentage of their instructors!\u00a0<\/p>\n

So, I want to consider how we could get to a point in which all scholars, junior and senior, trust that their ideas will be judged fairly by each other, but also by the public.\u00a0I do think we can work out a hypothetical solution that would enrich academia, liberalism, conservatism, and the culture at large; I believe a healthy, democratic\u00a0society needs all of these things to survive.\u00a0But, as it would likely require a\u00a0fair bit of detente and effort from\u00a0conservatives, liberals, and academics, I also realize that there’s no chance of it ever being carried out.\u00a0We can\u00a0call it an academic exercise.<\/p>\n

*\u00a0And, no,\u00a0I don’t think she actually addressed that with, “Conservatives don’t want to be professors because they’re anti-intellectual”. Maybe nobody raised the point, but it seems like a pretty obvious one.<\/p>\n

** The obvious rejoinder here is that my experiences would likely be different if I was\u00a0a conservative Republican. I plan to address that point\u00a0in the next part.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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