Academic Bias

Stanley Kurtz over at NRO reprints a letter he got from one of his readers reporting on a recent symposium held at the American Enterprise Institute. I'm reproducing his post here because I don't know how else to present it. I could link to "The Corner" but Kurtz's post will soon be buried in the voluminous output of other contributors. So here goes:

"On February 14, the American Enterprise Institute hosted a session on liberal bias in higher education. Daniel Klein went first and recounted the findings of his study of voter registration. The tally ranged from department to department (economics: Dems 3-1; anthro: Dems 30-1), but overall the discrepancy was more than 8-1 Democat to Repub. And the problem is worsening: the younger the faculty members are, the more Leftist they are. One interesting thing was that when Klein asked faculty about their attitudes toward different policies (such as tariffs on imports), the Republicans showed far greater viewpoint diversity than did the Democrats. Republicans were all over the board, while Democrats clustered at one end. So, within the Republican professorate one finds much wider latitude on political issues.

Then, Anne Neal of ACTA spoke. She presented strong findings from the student survey showing that 29 percent believe that if they don't toe the prof's political line it will cost them in the grade. 49 percent stated that profs bring politics into the class even though it is unrelated to the material.

Then, Roger Bowen of the AAUP spoke. It was amazing. Here were his rejoinders:

1. It is no surprise that most faculty in social sciences are liberals, since those fields
traditionally have been about questioning identity, writing "progressive" history, and other causes.

2. Among liberals, there is a tremendous range of opinion, and critics such as Klein are simplifying their ranks.

3. Outsiders haven't the "expertise" to police the faculty. Professors have undergone rigorous training that makes us trust their judgment more than that of journalists and the public.

4. Folks such as David Horowitz are mounting an intimidation campaign. (Bowen recalled his own experience having his class visited in the early 80s by rabble-rousers at Accuracy in Academia).

5. Conservatives prefer going into business, while liberals have a stronger social bent.

6. Most students come into college with too many conservative prejudices and they need to be shaken up.

7. He has never heard of a hiring committee that asked a candidate about political affiliation.

8. Finally, he said, "So the faculty is Democrat. So what?"

"Yes, he actually argued these points. David French, of FIRE, took him to task for many of them. French said, " So what? Here's what: diversity orientation seminars that are manipulative and coercive; speech codes; star chambers; religious organizations asked to strip themselves of their religion; etc." He noted that if a discipline comes to define itself by an agenda (such as questioning the government), it's no longer a discipline.. Or rather, it's an agenda passing itself off as a discipline. This is why they don't have to ask about political affiliation. All they need do is examine the work to see if it meets "disciplinary criteria," which are already politically-coded. At that point, a political judgment may be expressed in disciplinary terms, appearing entirely within the protocols of peer review. French also agreed that many students enter college with prejudices, but why is it that the prejudices of
Red-state, rural, evangelicals are the only ones challenged, and not the prejudices of upper-west-side cosmopolitan students that are challenged?

"Unfortunately, though, Bowen was able to drone on and on, making one spurious justification after another, changing the subject when it suited him, avoiding the problem, and slipping into simple denial mode. It was frustrating.

"One response must be made, though, to the line, “Republicans are greedy, and so avoid academia, while Democrats care about social justice, and so they flock to academia.” Anybody who thinks that higher education is a place to improve social justice hasn’t been there for very long. Egalitarian? Selfless? Duty-based? In truth, academic departments are some of the most hierarchical places in the nation, and professors are quick as lightning to insist on their prerogatives. They want small classes, light administrative loads, and long vacations­and they get them. It’s an elitist enclave, where accountability is low and ego is high."

I would have loved to have been at that conference. The exchange would have been, to say the least, interesting, even if frustrating. There really is something deeply wrong in academia as it currently is constituted and pressure for change is building. The Churchill affair is a shot across the bow that academic institutions ignore at their own peril. If our educational institutions do not reform themselves they will be reformed from the outside, and that would be the worst of all possible outcomes.

Several of Roger Bowen's points are just plain wrong, but the one that really got my back up is number 3, the idea that professors' rigorous training grants them superior judgment. Some of the most foolish thing's I've ever heard have come out of the mouths of participants in Ivy League seminars. Academicians may have a very narrow range of specialized knowledge and technical competencies but that in no way grants them superior judgment. And, there are lots and lots of outsiders who have both the specialized knowledge and the technical expertise to evaluate academicians. I suspect several such individuals were in attendance at the symposium.