Rethinking Diversity
Is Our Concept of Diversity Sufficiently Diverse?
Jeffrey Borrowdale
When most people think about diversity, they think about race, cultural
heritage, language, gender or sexual orientation. Although some people
regard these attributes as an important part of who they are, they
rarely encompass or describe the whole individual, and focusing on them
may predispose us to engage in easy labeling or stereotyping. Moreover,
an inordinate focus on these differences, many of which are superficial
in nature, may draw attention away from our common humanity and the
values we share as rational and caring beings. This article is a
critique of the concept of diversity as currently understood in higher
education and suggests an alternative model more in keeping with the
goals of the academy.
The concept of diversity brings together several pre-existing
educational and public policy trends, including Affirmative Action,
Multiculturalism, Cultural Competency and Social Justice. Diversity is
presented first and foremost as the goal of having a racially and
culturally, mixed and gender balanced group of faculty, staff,
administration and students. Sometimes this is presented as a
self-evident intrinsic good; at other times it is presented as a means
to some other good, for example, giving students a broader educational
experience, fostering tolerance for those of other races or cultures or
furthering social justice. Once diversity is established as a goal, it
is used to justify preferential treatment and special programs for
members of historically disadvantaged groups, because, it is argued,
without these programs members of such groups would not exist in
sufficient numbers in the institution. It is even suggested that there
is a "critical mass" necessary for diversity to have its full social
and educational impact on the institution, requiring extra effort to
attain a "threshold level" of minority representation. It should be
noted that offices, programs and initiatives created to achieve
diversity are separate from those created to meet pre-existing federal
mandates for Affirmative Action or legal requirements set down by the
Equal Opportunity Employment Commission.
Secondly, diversity is a concept which is applied to college programs,
especially academic curricula, and extra-curricular student activities.
Before the late sixties, there was little attempt in academia to either
understand other cultures on their own terms or include non-Western
ideas or the contributions of women and minorities in any significant
way in academic curricula. Clearly, this was wrong, not only from a
moral point of view, but from the standpoint of scholarship and
pedagogy. Efforts at multicultural inclusion and infusion ought long
ago to have been the natural outgrowth of academic disciplines such as
Anthropology and Sociology, which show us that there are many different
ways of being human, and that a variety of social arrangements abound,
different from, though not necessarily worse (or better) than our own.
Academia was slow to recognize and abandon its ethnocentric biases in
favor of a broader view of the world.
Unfortunately, whereas before the academy viewed the world through
rose-colored glasses of a Western tint, today it views everything
through the myopic prism of race, class and gender. Race, class and
gender, not as aspects of the human experience to be explored, but as
part of a neo-Marxist interpretive framework permeate every aspect of
academic life, from curriculum, to professional development, to
academic conferences, to scholarly work, to library acquisitions to
hiring. Life is portrayed as a vast struggle revolving around issues of
"privilege, power and difference"1 and students are called upon to be
activists in bringing about "social justice", typically cashed out in
terms of special group rights, economic redistribution and pacifism.
What began as an inclusive attempt to broaden discourse was transformed
into a new dogma, mandating the vilification of Western culture and
irrelevant "dead white males" and replacing them with more politically
fashionable material. Now certainly there is nothing wrong with
exploring the dark side of Western Civilization, with all wars of
conquest and empire building, stratified class structures, religious
persecution, subjugation of women, and so on. And students ought to be
aware of the fact that the Founding Fathers and those who followed in
their footsteps often did not live up to the ideals they set forth in
the Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal and
endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights". Genocidal
campaigns against Native American tribes and the practice of chattel
slavery, though obviously shameful episodes in our nation's history,
deserve study. However, if we fixate solely on the shortcomings of our
nation's founders, we lose sight the ideals of equality and freedom to
which, however imperfectly, they aspired.2 It is one thing to show the
face of Western civilization, warts and all; it is another to excise
the warts and begin examining them under a microscope, forgetting the
face from which they were cut.
In practice, "diversity" seems to mean celebrating every other culture
and heritage except distinctively American traditions, and every
heritage except that of Western Europe. Those who point out this
hostility towards Western culture or the lopsided view presented to
students are, in keeping with the neo-Marxist framework, labeled as
"reactionary" and as merely attempting to protect the status quo
because they have a vested interest in perpetuating it and in keeping
alive fields such as Philosophy or the Western Humanities. Of course
this an example of what is known of as the ad hominem fallacy, a
classification first published by Aristotle, who probably wrote the
first systematic treatise on logic, and who is an excellent example of
what dead white males have to offer us.
Diversity is the second of six core values of Lane Community College's
Strategic Plan and our Five-Year Diversity Plan calls for funding of
over 1.2 million dollars. This is money which will not be spent on
keeping tuition low, meeting student demands for classes in academic or
professional-technical areas, or providing more much-needed classroom
space. However, any reasoned opposition to the continued growth and
expansion of diversity programs, even during times of budget crises, is
typically viewed as intolerant, narrow-minded or bigoted. Office Space
is dedicated and staff hired for Diversity Offices, Multicultural
Centers, Women's Centers, and centers for Gay, Lesbian Bisexual and
Transgendered students, often while traditional academic programs are
scaled back. The function of these offices is often as much ideological
and political as educational, but given the documented leftward
leanings of college faculty1, few complain. Administrators look for any
opportunity to leap on the diversity bandwagon, because such
opportunities represent sterling resume enhancement, offering a boost
up to the next rung of the managerial ladder. Once diversity gets
written into the college's mission statement, core values or targeted
goals, it becomes a measure of the worthiness and success of new
programs becomes totally infused into the life of the college,
including all-important funding mechanisms.
Diversity interview questions function as a troubling political litmus
test for new hires. New employees must either give the expected answer
or not only possibly suffer the loss of enough points to sink their
candidacy, but ensure a hostile treatment of their application in
deliberations in case of a tie. Expected answers include the legitimacy
of preferential treatment on the basis of race, the concept that there
are deep and enduring differences between people of different racial
and ethnic backgrounds and the belief that teaching methods must be
tailored to these differences. Typical answers simply describe
experiences working with diverse populations and gush over how much the
candidate loves diversity, eliciting information of questionable
relevance or value to teaching. One also wonders about the degree to
which faculty can or should tailor their curriculum to diverse
audiences. Examples of this kind of tailoring are rare in interviews
and those in the diversity literature seem trite and condescending.
Might not time spent looking for ways to serve diverse groups be better
spent focusing on general pedagogical techniques, particularly those
based on sound psychological research, on scholarship in one's field of
expertise, or on finding ways to meet individual student needs?
Textbooks now strain to include the most minor contributions of women
and minorities for the sake of "balance" in a bean-counter, quota
mentality. I remember reviewing an introductory Philosophy textbook,
which, in order to include the contributions of African Americans,
tacked on a chapter featuring African proverbs, as if the authors of
those proverbs were doing the same thing as Plato or David Hume or
Nietzsche. It was more of a question of commensurability than merit;
the proverbs of Solomon would have been equally out of place.
Such editorial and curricular decisions seem to stem from a need to
atone for past sins by looking diverse, to overemphasize contributions
which were underemphasized or ignored in the past. But the past cannot
be changed, and individuals cannot atone for what other individuals
have done, nor do any of us bear the blame for what our ancestors may
or may not have done. Seen in this light, diversity appears to be a
kind of super-Affirmative Action, for both personnel and programs. But
does diversity, in this sense, serve the academy?
Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Paul Greenberg perceptively comments,
"By capital-D Diversity, of course, I don't mean a diversity of ideas,
talents, aptitudes or experiences, but only a cosmetic, quota-derived
Diversity. The kind that has succeeded Marxism on American campuses as
the ideology du jour… The capital-D variety is a caricature of any real
diversity, for its only diversity is one of appearance. Its object is
to fashion an American elite that looks different but thinks alike. All
these offensive (and officious) quotas, preferences and Affirmative
Actions are designed to produce an America that may look like the
rainbow but thinks like NPR.4"
As Greenberg notes, the model of diversity most appropriate to an
educational institution is that of intellectual diversity, that is,
diversity of beliefs, values, opinions, theoretical approaches,
talents, abilities, backgrounds, and so on. The educational experience
depends upon students being exposed to a variety of viewpoints.
However, diversity in its current incarnation gives us the same point
of view, particularly on pressing moral, social, cultural and political
issues, albeit from a rainbow of representatives.
Crucial to the educational experience is fostering a climate where
students may engage in open dialogue, and where the negative effects of
ego-involvement (fear of judgment, self-consciousness, hostile
confrontations, defensiveness, rationalization) are minimized. But the
current racial-ethnic-gender identity model of diversity encourages
this very sort of thing, leading individuals to closely identify with
their race, culture or gender, along with an associated orthodoxy
of historical, social and political beliefs, which they are taught to
see as a fundamental part of who they are. Consequently, students are
likely to view any challenge to their beliefs to be a form of
persecution--the attacks of victimizers or haters.
It is as if no one thought to ask whether a race-conscious approach
which highlights past and present discrimination would actually produce
tolerance and understanding or whether it would promote division and
alienation. The present sad state of race relations and my own
experience lead me to believe that emphasis on group identity, coupled
with a focus on past and present injustices against these groups
creates hostility, resentment, alienation and a "victim mentality"
which serves neither the "victim" nor the group identified as
"victimizer." It is this balkanizing influence which is one of the
present diversity models' most destructive influences, its separating
people into competing interest groups vying for special entitlements
and status. Minority groups are told over and over again that their
"people" were victimized in the past and that even today they will be
the perpetual targets of racists and bigots. It would be surprising if
many didn't develop paranoia, hopelessness, lack of ambition,
anxiety and hostility towards the white majority. And is it so
surprising that the white majority, who are told over and over again
that they are "privileged" and the recipients of unfair advantages
often feel resentment at being held liable for the sins of their
ancestors, knowing that they, themselves, worked hard to be where they
are? Those from modest backgrounds may bristle at the suggestion that
they benefit from any privilege from being white, especially when they
see so many programs geared towards helping minority students which
exclude them. And of course the notion of labeling anyone with a light
complexion as "white" is itself a form of stereotyping, ignoring the
diversity of cultures from which they may come. Light-skinned
immigrants of Italian, Polish, Irish and Jewish decent all faced
rampant discrimination themselves at the hands of the English
immigrants who preceded them, when they first hit American shores.
Some California Colleges have even taken the step of having separate
graduation ceremonies for Hispanic students. This again shows the
balkanizing influence of diversity. When you encourage people to think
in terms of group identity and group interests, people will gravitate
towards the groups with which they most identify and seek their
company, to the exclusion of others. Before we had segregation by law,
through the force of government. Today we have segregation by choice,
in special "spaces" and programs designed for women and minorities. But
these are "choices" borne of social conditioning which say you are
Black or Hispanic or a woman first, a human being second. Ought not we
to be encouraging integration and breaking down racial and gender
barriers which separate us?
This is the real damage that the diversity ideology does. It emphasizes
surface characteristics, such as the color of one's skin, while
insisting on ideological orthodoxy amongst faculty and students on
important social, economic, political and religious issues. It treats
people as the passive recipients of genetics and cultural heritage as
opposed to rational beings with the powers of reason and choice, who
bear personal responsibility for their actions. Diversity asks us to
focus on group identity instead of individual merit. It celebrates
victimhood and encourages class envy, rather than celebrating personal
virtue and achievement. It recognizes disparate cultural forms, while
failing to see something called "the human condition" which underlies
them all. Great works of art and literature can speak to us about the
human condition equally. A Socrates can speak to an African-American
female student just as surely as a Gandhi or an Ayn Rand can speak to a
white male student.
Martin Luther King once said he looked forward to a day when human
beings were judged by the content of their character, not the color of
their skin. The Buddha voiced a similar sentiment when he said, "No one
is a member of the priestly caste by birth; no one is a member of the
servant caste by birth. A priest is such by his deeds; a servant is
such by his deeds." I think both would have been gratified to see the
American Anthropological Association's Statement on Race, which says
that race does not exist, except in our minds, being the product of a
small group of genes controlling a few overly noticeable surface
characteristics, having very little to do with who we truly are as
human beings. Until and unless we stop making judgments based on such
characteristics, King's dream of a colorblind society will never be
realized.
Endnotes
1. Allan G. Johnson, Privilege, Power and Difference (New York:
McGraw-Hill, 2001). Dr. Johnson was the keynote speaker of our 2004
Spring Conference and his book was featured in the Reading Together
program and adopted by instructors as a secondary text as a part of
that program. In his book, Johnson credits capitalism with playing a
major role in the creation of white racism as well as producing a
system of static, stratified economic classes in America forming a
"matrix of domination". He attacks with gusto the concept of
individualism, calling it "the myth that everything is somebody's
fault".
2 In a recent case that garnered some national media attention, Ahmad
Al-Qloushi, an International student from Kuwait, received the
following essay topic in a Fall 2004 course at Foothill College (a
Community College in California) from Professor Joseph Woolcock: "Dye
and Zeigler contend that the constitution of the United States was not
“ordained and established” by “the people” as we have so often been led
to believe. They contend instead that it was written by a small
educated and wealthy elite in America who representative of powerful
economic and political interests. Analyze the US constitution (original
document), and show how its formulation excluded majority of the people
living in America at that time, and how it was dominated by America’s
elite interest." Ahmed argued that, contrary to Dye and Zeigler, the
Constitution "was a progressive document for its time" and "symbolizes
and embodies what America is today, a just and democratic society where
all men and women are created equal and…free to pursue their own
happiness and fulfillment." Professor Woolcock not only refused to
grade his paper, he lectured Ahmed on his misguided political views,
insisted he seek psychotherapy and threatened his visa status if he did
not do so. (http://www.studentsforacademicfreedom.org/archive/2005/January2005/AhmadFoothillarticle010605.htm)
3 There are have several recent studies on the ideological and
political leanings of college faculty, all showing similar results. In
November 2004 Klein & Stern released a nation-wide study of college
professors, finding that in the Social Sciences and Humanities
Democrats outnumbered Republicans by a ratio of at least 7 to 1, with
disparities as high as 28 to 1 and 30 to 1 in the fields of Sociology
and Anthropology, respectively (http://swopec.hhs.se/ratioi/abs/ratioi0053.htm).
A paper based on their research "How Politically Diverse Are the Social
Sciences and Humanities? Survey Evidence from Six Fields" is
forthcoming in Academic Questions. In a separate survey based on voter
registration, a public and objective indicator of ideological leaning,
Klein & Western ascertained that across 23 major academic
departments, including mathematics, business and the hard sciences,
which tend to lean less to the left, Democrats outnumbered Republicans
at Stanford by a ratio of 7 to 1 and at Berkeley by a ratio of 10 to 1 (http://swopec.hhs.se/ratioi/abs/ratioi0054.htm).
4 Paul Greenburg, How Diversity Became Orwellian, July 18, 2003
(Tribune Media Services).
(http://www.townhall.com/columnists/paulgreenberg/pg20030718.shtml)
© 2005 Jeffrey Borrowdale. This paper was originally published in
The Community College Moment, Vol. 5, pp. 50-55
Is The Curriculum Biased?
A Statement Of The National Association Of Scholars
http://nas.org/statements/biased.htm
American higher education is facing widespread demands to eliminate the
allegedly "Eurocentric" and "patriarchal" bias of the curriculum. While
the details vary from campus to campus, these demands tend to focus on
four objectives:
* that the "canon" be revised to include more works
by blacks, other ethnic minorities, and women
* that the "issues of race, gender, and class" be
introduced into a greater variety of courses
* that more courses in women's studies and minority
studies be developed
* that courses in women's studies and/or minority
studies be required of all undergraduates.
Various justifications are commonly proffered for making these changes.
It is alleged that:
* works by minorities, women, and Third World
authors have been excluded from the curriculum
* minority and female students feel alienated and
their educational progress is retarded by being asked to study works
primarily by white males
* in order to overcome their own prejudices, white
males must become acquainted with the cultures and problems of
minorities and with the perspectives and problems of women
* the traditional curriculum represents the hegemony
of Western culture, covertly supports a status quo inherently
oppressive of women and minorities, and is unfairly imposed on students
from different cultures
* the traditional desiderata of truth, objectivity,
and critical intelligence can be met only by adding the perspectives of
women and minorities and by facing up to the new questions they raise
* an increasingly diverse society and interdependent
world require that our citizens gain greater understanding of different
cultures.
The National Association of Scholars disputes the first five of these
arguments and believes that the last entails something other than the
changes being proposed.
First, any work, whether formerly neglected or widely known, should be
added, retained, or removed from the curriculum on the basis of its
conformance to generally applicable intellectual and aesthetic
standards. A sound curriculum cannot be built by replacing those
standards with the principle of proportional representation of authors,
classified ethnically, biologically, or geographically.
Second, the idea that students will be discouraged by not encountering
more works by members of their own race, sex, or ethnic group, even
were it substantiated, would not justify adding inferior works. Such
paternalism conveys a message opposite to the one desired.
Third, other cultures, minority subcultures, and social problems have
long been studied in the liberal arts curriculum in such established
disciplines as history, literature, comparative religion, economics,
political science, anthropology, and sociology. But more important,
mere acquaintance with differences does not guarantee tolerance, an
ideal Western in origin and fostered by knowledge of what is common to
us all.
Fourth, the idea that the traditional curriculum "excludes" the
contributions of all but males of European descent is patently false.
From their beginnings, Western art and science have drawn upon the
achievements of non-Western societies and since have been absorbed and
further enriched by peoples around the globe. That the liberal arts
oppress minorities and women is yet more ludicrous. Even if the
curriculum were confined to thought strictly European in origin, it
would still present a rich variety of conflicting ideas, including the
very concepts of equality and freedom from oppression invoked by those
who would reorient the curriculum.
Fifth, while diversity of background is valuable to the discussion of
issues to which those differences are germane, objectivity is in
general not enhanced but subverted by the idea that people of different
sexes, races, or ethnic backgrounds necessarily see things differently.
The assertion that cognition is determined by membership is itself an
example of stereotypic thinking which undermines the possibility of a
true community of discourse.
Sixth, the study of the traditions and achievements of other nations
and of ethnic subcultures is important and should be encouraged. But
this must proceed in a manner that is intellectually honest and does
not serve as a pretext for inserting polemics into the curriculum.
Furthermore, "multicultural education" should not take place at the
expense of studies that transcend cultural differences: the truths of
mathematics, the sciences, history, and so on, are not different for
people of different races, sexes, or cultures, and for that reason
alone their study is liberating. Nor should we further attenuate the
study of the traditions of the West. Not only is knowledge of those
traditions essential for any evaluation of our own institutions, it is
increasingly relevant to our understanding of other nations, which, in
striking testament to the universality of the values they embody, are
rapidly adapting Western practices to their own situations.
The National Association of Scholars is in favor of ethnic studies, the
study of non-Western cultures, and the study of the special problems of
women and minorities in our society, but it opposes subordinating
entire humanities and social science curricula to such studies and it
views with alarm their growing politicization. Efforts purportedly made
to introduce "other points of view" and "pluralism" often seem in fact
designed to restrict attention to a narrow set of issues, tendentiously
defined. An examination of many women's studies and minority studies
courses and programs discloses little study of other cultures and much
excoriation of our society for its alleged oppression of women, blacks,
and others. The banner of "cultural diversity" is apparently being
raised by some whose paramount interest actually lies in attacking the
West and its institutions.
We urge our colleagues to demand clear explanations and cogent
arguments in support of the proposals being so rapidly brought before
them, and to reject any that cannot be justified. The curriculum is and
should be open to change, but we must rebut the false charges being
made against existing disciplines. We must also reject the allegations
of "racism" and "sexism" that are frequently leveled against honest
critics of the new proposals, and which only have the effect of
stifling much-needed debate.
"For Reasoned Scholarship in a Free Society"
Missing Diversity On America's Campuses
By David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com | September 3, 2002
http://www.studentsforacademicfreedom.org/essays/missing_diversity.html
IN THE FALL OF 2001, I spoke at a large public university in the
eastern United States, which will remain nameless to protect the
innocent. It was one of more than 30 colleges I had visited during the
school year and, as usual, my invitation had come from a small group of
campus conservatives who also put together a small dinner for me at a
local restaurant. Our conclave reflected the current state of
conservatism in the American university. Not only were our numbers
small, but there were no deans or university administrators present,
and only one professor. Open conservatives are an isolated and harassed
minority on today’s college campuses, where they enjoy little respect
and almost no support from institutional powers.
Although I am a nationally known public figure—author of books that
have been best-sellers and nominated for a national book award, a Fox
News contributor and one of America’s 100 leading "public
intellectuals" according to a recent study of the subject, at these
dinners, which normally precede my campus speeches, the absence of
administration representatives is wholly predictable. (In nearly 200
campus appearances, I can think of only two exceptions.) When I spoke
at the University of Michigan to 1,000 students, there were three
university vice presidents in the balcony, but none thought to
introduce himself to me. Occasionally a professor will attend these
dinners, but rarely more than one. My experience as a conservative is
not unique. By contrast, if I were an anti-American, radical like
Angela Davis, deans of the college would wait on me and professors
would confer academic credits on students for attending my appearances.
On many occasions my speech would be an official campus event.
Angela Davis—a lifelong Communist zealot with no noticeable scholarly
achievement—is a celebrated campus figure (there is even an "Angela
Davis Lounge" at the University of Michigan) and thus can be expected
to attract the attention of like-minded peers now entrenched in
university administrations. But the same disparity would be discernible
between a less well-known leftist and almost any comparable
conservative. It reflects the fact that while conservatives often make
up a large proportion of the student body on American campuses—and in
some cases even a plurality—conservative professors and administrators
are notably hard to find. Not only are the overwhelming majority of
college professors fashionably "liberal," most faculties have a strong
contingent of hard leftists whose views are extreme, and whose
concentrated numbers make it possible for them to dominate (and even
define) entire academic fields. These faculty activists are also
available to be sponsors of an impressive array of radical campus
political groups, which—if the university is large enough—may receive
hundreds of thousands of dollars from general student funds.
Among those invited to the dinner was a silver-haired history
professor, who served as the faculty sponsor of the club inviting me.
This man represented a dying breed of faculty conservatives who had
become tenured in an era when hiring committees were not yet applying a
litmus to exclude those whose political views were not suitably left.
The transformation that followed was succinctly described by the
distinguished intellectual historian, John P. Diggins, at an annual
meeting of the American Studies Association in Costa Mesa, Calif., a
decade ago. Diggins told the assembled academics: "When my generation
of liberals was in control of university faculties in the Sixties, we
opened the doors to the hiring of radicals in the name of diversity. We
thought you would do the same. But you didn’t. You closed the doors
behind you."
Diggins’ observation provides the template for what has happened to
American universities in the last thirty years. The liberal academy of
the 1950s and 1960s, whose ideals were shaped by Charles Eliot and
Matthew Arnold and whose mission was "the disinterested pursuit of
knowledge" is no more. Leftists tenured after the 1960s first
transformed these institutions into political battlegrounds and then
redefined them as "agencies of social change." In the process, they
first defeated and then excluded peers whom they perceived as obstacles
to their politicized academic agendas.
Some years ago a distinguished member of this radical generation,
Richard Rorty, summarized its achievement in the following words: "The
power base of the left in America is now in the universities, since the
trade unions have largely been killed off. The universities have done a
lot of good work by setting up, for example, African-American studies
programs, Women’s Studies programs, Gay and Lesbian Studies programs.
They have created power bases for these movements." Rorty is a
professor of philosophy at the University of Virginia and one of the
nation’s most honored intellectual figures. He is also an editor of the
democratic socialist magazine Dissent and a moderate in the ranks of
the left. That such an intellectual should celebrate the conversion of
academic institutions into political "power bases" speaks volumes about
the tragedy that has befallen the university.
On the occasions of my campus visits, I am always curious to discover
the local circumstances that conspire to create a situation so
otherwise inexplicable in an open society. How, in particular, does an
institution that publicly promotes itself as "liberal" and "inclusive,"
as dedicated to "diversity" and the "free exchange of ideas," devolve
into such a political monolith? The conservative history professor who
had come to dinner was obviously a senior member of his academic
department, which was really the only status a conservative faculty
member could have, since the hiring doors had been closed nearly a
quarter of a century earlier. So I asked how conservatives like him
were treated by faculty colleagues.
Catching my drift he replied, "Well, they haven’t allowed me to sit on
a search committee since 1985." He was referring to the committees that
interview prospective candidates to fill faculty openings. "In 1985, he
continued, "I was the chair of the search committee and of course we
hired a Marxist." "Of course," I said, knowing that for conservatives
who believed in the traditional mission of academic inquiry, diversity
of viewpoints would make perfect sense. Others might be guided by
different imperatives. Their very dedication to "social change" would
commit them to an agenda, which is about power, and which inspires them
to clear rivals from their path.
The professor went on: "This year we had an opening for a scholar of
Asian history. We had several candidates but obviously the most
qualified one was from Stanford. Yet he didn’t get the job. So I went
to the chair of the search committee and asked him what had happened.
‘Oh,’ he said, ‘you’re absolutely right. He was far and away the most
qualified candidate and we had a terrific interview. But then we went
to lunch and he let out that he was for school vouchers."
In other words, if one has a politically incorrect view on K-12 school
vouchers, one must be politically incorrect on the Ming Dynasty too.
This is almost a dictionary description of the totalitarian mentality.
But there is more than dogmatism at work in the calculation. The
attitude also reflects the priorities of an entrenched oligarchy, which
fears to include those it cannot count on to maintain its control.
A certain focus on control is normal for bureaucrats in any
institution. But in an institution like the university, whose very
structures are elitist, there are few natural limits to such political
agendas. Outside the hard sciences and the practical professions, what
is the penalty for bad ideas? There is none. Once a discredited dogma
like Marxism is legitimated through the hiring process, there is no
institutional obstacle to its expansion and entrenchment as a
"scholarly" discipline.
The structural support for ideological conformity is intensified by the
introduction of overt political agendas. These agendas were originally
imported into the university by radicals acting as the self-conscious
disciples of an Italian Marxist named Antonio Gramsci. As an innovative
Stalinist in the 1930s, Gramsci pondered the historic inability of
Communist parties to mobilize workers to seize the means of production
and overthrow the capitalist ruling class. Gramsci’s new idea was to
focus radicals’ attention on the means of intellectual production as a
new lever of social change. He urged radicals to acquire "cultural
hegemony," by which he meant to capture the institutions that produced
society’s governing ideas. This would be the key to controlling and
transforming the society itself.
To illustrate how ingrained this attitude has become and how casually
it is deployed to justify the suppression of conservative ideas, let me
cite an e-mail I received from a professor at Emory University. The
professor was responding to an article I had written about the abuse of
conservative students by administrators at Vanderbilt and the exclusion
of conservatives from the Vanderbilt faculty. He was not especially
radical, yet he did not have so much as a twinge of conscience at the
picture I drew of a faculty cleansed of conservative opinions. "Why do
I and other academics have little shame here?" he asked rhetorically,
then answered the question: "We are not the only game in the
marketplace of ideas. We are competing with journalism, entertainment,
churches, political lobbyists, and well-funded conservative think
tanks."
In other words, contemporary academics see themselves not primarily as
educators, but as agents of an "adversary culture" at war with the
world outside the university. But the university was not created—and is
not funded—to compete with other institutions. It is designed to train
employees, citizens and leaders of those institutions, and to endow
them with appropriate knowledge and skills. Because of its strategic
function as an educator of elites however, it can be effectively used
in the way Gramsci proposed to subvert other institutions too.
There is an organic connection, for example, between the political bias
of the university and the political bias of the press. It was not until
journalists became routinely trained in university schools of
journalism that mainstream media began to mirror the perspectives of
the adversary culture. Universities have become a power base of the
political left, and the Emory professor’s argument only makes sense,
really, from the vantage of someone so alienated from his own society
as to want to subvert it. His suggestion that universities somehow
"balance" conservative think tanks of the wealthy is patently absurd.
"Well-funded" conservative think tanks may stand in intellectual
opposition to subversive agendas, but what wealthy think tank can
compete with Harvard, its centuries of tradition, its hundreds of
faculty members, its government subsides and its $18 billion, tax-free
endowment?
Academics who are not self-conscious radicals may also harbor
resentments against the larger culture and be inspired to seek
like-minded colleagues. When they are imbued with a sense of social
mission that requires ideological cohesion, the result is an
intellectual monolith. How monolithic? Last spring I organized college
students to investigate the voting registrations of university
professors at more than a dozen institutions of higher learning. The
students used primary registrations to determine party affiliation.
Here is a representative sample:
• At the University of Colorado—a public university in a Republican
state—94% of the liberal arts faculty whose party registrations could
be established were Democrats and only 4% percent Republicans. Out of
85 professors of English who registered to vote, zero were Republicans.
Out of 39 professors of history—one. Out of 28 political scientists—two.
How Republican is Colorado? Its governor, two Senators and four out of
six congressmen are Republican. There are 200,000 more registered
Republicans in Colorado than there are Democrats. But at the
state-funded, University of Colorado, Republicans are a fringe group.
• At Brown University, 94.7% of the professors whose political
affiliations showed up in primary registrations last year were
Democrats, only 5.3% were Republicans. Only three Republicans could be
found on the Brown liberal arts faculty. Zero in the English
Department, zero in the History Department, zero in the Political
Science Department, zero in the Africana Studies Department, and zero
in the Sociology Department.
• At the University of New Mexico, 89% of the professors were
Democrats, 7% Republicans and 4% Greens. Of 200 professors, ten were
Republicans, but zero in the Political Science Department, zero in the
History Department, zero in the Journalism Department and only one each
in the Sociology, English, Women’s Studies and African American Studies
Departments.
• At the University of California, Santa Barbara, 97% of the professors
were Democrats. 1.5% Greens and an equal 1.5% Republicans. Only one
Republican professor could be found.
• At the University of California, Berkeley, of the 195 professors
whose affiliations showed up, 85% were Democrats, 8% Republicans, 4%
Greens and 3% American Independent Party, Peace and Freedom Party and
Reform Party voters. Out of 54 professors in the History Department,
only one Republican could be found, out of 28 Sociology professors
zero, out of 57 English professors zero, out of 16 Women’s Studies
professors zero, out of nine African American Studies professors zero,
out of six Journalism professors zero.
• At the University of California, Los Angeles, of the 157 professors
whose political affiliations showed up 93% were Democrats, only 6.5%
were Republicans.
• At the University of North Carolina, the Daily Tar Heel conducted its
own survey of eight departments and found that, of the professors
registered with a major political party, 91% were Democrats while only
9% were Republicans.
In an ideological universe in which university administrators claim
that "diversity" is their priority, these are striking facts. How can
students get a good education, if they’re only being told half the
story? The answer is, they can’t.
The present academic monolith is an offense to the spirit of free
inquiry. The hiring practices that have led to the present situation
are discriminatory and illegal. They violate the Constitution, which
prevents hiring and firing on the basis of political ideas and
patronage laws that bar state institutions from servicing a particular
political party. Yet university administrators have not shown any
inclination to address this problem, or to reform the practices that
perpetuate it. Nor have self-identified "liberal" professors who are
themselves the source of the problem. If there is to be reform, it will
have to come from other quarters.
The Racism of "Diversity"
by Peter Schwartz (January 16, 2003)
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=2392
President Bush faces an ideal opportunity to take a principled position
on the issue of racial "diversity." As his administration ponders
whether to support the legal challenge, now before the Supreme Court,
to the University of Michigan's affirmative action policies, he should
go further and raise a moral challenge to the entire notion of
"diversity." Instead of timidly wavering on this question, in fear of
being smeared by Democrats as racist, President Bush should rise to the
occasion by categorically repudiating racism--and condemning
"diversity" as its crudest manifestation.
It is now widely accepted that "diversity" is an appropriate goal for
society. But what does this dictum actually mean? Racial integration is
a valid objective, but that is something very different from what the
advocates of "diversity" seek. According to its proponents, we need
"diversity" in order to be exposed to new perspectives on life. We
supposedly gain "enrichment from the differences in viewpoint of
minorities," as the MIT Faculty Newsletter puts it. "It is the only way
to prepare students to live and work effectively in our diverse
democracy and in the global economy," says the president of the
University of Michigan. Minorities should be given preferential
treatment, the university's vice president says, because "learning in a
diverse environment benefits all students, minority and majority alike."
These circumlocutions translate simply into this: one's race determines
the content of one's mind. They imply that people have worthwhile views
to express because of their ethnicity, and that "diversity" enables us
to encounter "black ideas," "Hispanic ideas," etc. What could be more
repulsively racist than that? This is exactly the premise held by the
South's slave-owners and by the Nazis' Storm Troopers. They too
believed that an individual's thoughts and actions are determined by
his racial heritage.
Whether a given race receives special rewards or special punishments is
immaterial. The essence of racism is the idea that the individual is
meaningless and that membership in the collective--the race--is the
source of his identity and value. To the racist, the individual's moral
and intellectual character is the product, not of his own choices, but
of the genes he shares with all others of his race. To the racist, the
particular members of a given race are interchangeable.
The advocates of "diversity" similarly believe that colleges must admit
not individuals, but "representatives" of various races. They believe
that those representatives have certain ideas innately imprinted on
their minds, and that giving preferences to minority races creates a
"diversity" of viewpoints on campus. They have the quota-mentality,
which holds that in judging someone, the salient fact is the racial
collective to which he belongs.
This philosophy is why racial division is growing at our colleges. The
segregated dormitories, the segregated cafeterias, the segregated
fraternities--these all exist, not in spite of the commitment to
"diversity," but because of it. The overriding message of "diversity,"
transmitted by the policies of a school's administration and by the
teachings of a school's professors, is that the individual is defined
by his race. What, then, is a more loyal adherence to that message than
the desire to associate with members of one's own race and to regard
others as belonging to an alien tribe?
If racism is to be rejected, it is the premise of individualism,
including individual free will, that must be upheld. There is no way to
bring about racial integration except by completely disregarding color.
There is no benefit in being exposed to the thoughts of a black person
as opposed to a white person; there is a benefit only in interacting
with individuals, of any race, who have rational viewpoints to offer.
"Diversity," in any realm, has no value in and of itself. Investors can
be urged to diversify their holdings--but for the sake of minimizing
their financial risk, not for the sake of "diversity" as such. To
maintain that "diversity" per se is desirable--that "too much" of one
thing is objectionable--is ludicrous. Does unimpaired health need to be
"diversified" with bouts of illness? Or knowledge with ignorance? Or
sanity with lunacy?
The value of a racially integrated student body or work force lies
entirely in the individualism this implies. A racially integrated group
implies that skin color is irrelevant in judging human beings. It
implies that those who chose the students or the workers based their
evaluations only on that which reflects upon the individual: merit. But
that is not what the advocates of "diversity" want. They sneer at the
principle of "color-blindness." Whether the issue is being admitted to
college or getting a job at a corporation or being cast as an actor on
TV shows, the "diversity" supporters want such decisions to be made
exactly the way that the vilest of racists make them: by bloodline.
They insist that whatever is a result of your own choices--your ideas,
your character, your accomplishments--is to be dismissed, while that
which is outside your control--the accident of skin color--is to define
your life. Their fundamental goal is to "diversify"--and thus to
undercut--the standard of individual achievement with the non-standard
of race.
Racial "diversity" is a doctrine that splits people into ethnic tribes,
which then battle one another for special favors. If President Bush is
eager to demonstrate his disagreement with the racist views of a Strom
Thurmond, let him stand up and denounce all forms of
racism--particularly, the one that underlies "diversity."