Democracy and Higher Education: Traditions and Stories of Civic Engagement

by Scott J. Peters, Theodore R. Alter, Neil Schwartzbach

Overview

How are we to understand the nature and value of higher education's public purposes, mission, and work in a democratic society? How do-and how should-academic professionals contribute to and participate in civic life in their practices as scholars, scientists, and educators?
     Democracy and Higher Education addresses these questions by combining an examination of several normative traditions of civic engagement in American higher education with the presentation and interpretation of a dozen oral history profiles of contemporary practitioners. In his analysis of these profiles, Scott Peters reveals and interprets a democratic-minded civic professionalism that includes and interweaves expert, social critic, responsive service, and proactive leadership roles. 
     Democracy and Higher Education contributes to a new line of research on the critically important task of strengthening and defending higher education's positive roles in and for a democratic society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780870139765
Publisher:	Michigan State University Press
Publication date:	09/01/2010
Series:	Transformations in Higher Education
Pages:	396
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.90(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Scott J. Peters is Associate Professor of Education at Cornell University and the lead editor and author of Engaging Campus and Community: The Practice of Public Scholarship in the State and Land-Grant University System.

Theodore R. Alter is Professor of Agriculture, Environmental, and Regional Economics and Co-director of the Center for Economic Community Development at Penn State University.

Before his retirement, Neil Schwartzbach was the senior coordinator of grants and outreach for Cornell University's American Indian Program (AIP).

Read an Excerpt

Democracy and Higher Education

TRADITIONS AND STORIES OF CIVIC ENGAGEMENT

---

By SCOTT J. PETERS THEODORE R. ALTER NEIL SCHWARTZBACH

Michigan State University Press

Copyright © 2010 Scott J. Peters
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-87013-976-5

---

Chapter One

Answering the Public Purposes and Work Question

There are, of course, many different answers to the question of whether academic professionals should be engaged off their campuses in the public work of democracy, and if so, what public purposes they should pursue, what roles they should play, and what contributions they should seek to make. This question is effectively answered every day—even if it is never explicitly posed—as academic professionals make practical judgments in particular situations (either alone or with others) about what they should and should not do to address public issues and problems. The best answer to this question, therefore, is "It depends." It depends on the context—on the specific details, dynamics, and politics of a given time, place, and situation. It depends not only on academic professionals' practical theories, abilities, skills, dispositions, interests, agendas, commitments, values, ideals, and political views and theories, but also on those of their external partners. It depends on institutional, disciplinary, and community missions, cultures, identities, norms, and realities. It depends—in highly complex ways—on the development and exercise of power. It depends on the availability of time, money, and institutional and community support. And more.

Despite the wisdom of the "It depends" response, some people have provided general answers that reflect distinctly different normative positions about the roles, contributions, and ends academic professionals should and should not take up, make, and pursue in their off-campus civic engagement work. In this chapter, we name and explore four such positions that have been staked out in American higher education since the late nineteenth century. We situate each of these positions within a different normative "tradition" in the American academic profession. There are three traditions that represent positive answers to the engagement in public work question: the service intellectual, public intellectual, and action researcher / public scholar / educational organizer traditions. A fourth tradition is what we characterize as the "antitradition" of the detached and disengaged scholar. It is important that we not overlook this tradition, as it has been and still is defended as a valid if not essential means of pursuing and protecting one conception of higher education's core public purposes.

Before we begin, we want to note three things. First, with respect to the way we name and characterize the four positions and traditions we discuss, some or even many of our readers may accuse us of creating so-called straw men. In anticipation of such an accusation, we want to say that what we have constructed are not straw men, but normative types. Just as we should be wary of straw men, we should be wary of normative types. While both can be found in academic (and other) literatures and rhetoric, neither exists in pure form in practice, and neither allows for the contingencies, ambiguities, messiness, surprises, diversity, inconsistencies, and contradictions of "real" life. It was our desire to get beyond the limited and ultimately misleading confines of normative types that led us to invite academic professionals to tell stories of their civic engagement work and experiences.

Second, we want to point out that each of the positions and traditions we identify in this chapter reflects or implies a practical theory about the way things are and the way things should be, and how academic professionals can and should (or should not) help to close the gap between them. If we wish to improve the conversation about higher education's public purposes and work, in and for a democratic society, these practical theories—and the presumptions, assumptions, and bets that are included in them—must be both illuminated and questioned. We will turn to that task in chapter 2. In this chapter, our aim is limited to that of identifying and briefly sketching the positions and traditions mentioned above.

Finally, we use key works from the discipline of sociology to sketch the details of two of the traditions we identify in this chapter: the service intellectual and public intellectual traditions. We want to make it clear that these traditions—and the positions and practical theories on which they are based—are not limited to sociology or the social sciences. On the contrary, in varying degrees and situations they have been and continue to be espoused and embraced by academic professionals from every discipline and field, including the arts and humanities, engineering, law, and the social, natural, and biological sciences.

Professionalizing the Academic Calling in American Higher Education

The idea—and reality—of scholars as active participants in and contributors to the public work of democracy was a key component of the "academic revolution" of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. According to Richard Hofstadter, at the start of the twentieth century, "the academic man was beginning to overcome his traditional civic passivity and take an active part in the shaping of political events." Armed with "empirical specialized skills," Hofstadter writes, "academic men had not only prestige but some real marketable advice to bring to public life." For the first time, "the profession developed the capacity both for large-scale innovative work in scholarship and for social criticism and practical contribution to the political dialogue of American society."

Also for the first time, the academic profession developed a quasi-official normative statement of scholars' main roles in and contributions to civic life, and the protections scholars needed in order to pursue them. This statement was the "Report of the Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure," published in 1915 by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). Because this statement provided the first authoritative and influential articulation of professional scholars' civic roles and contributions, it is worth examining in detail.

During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a number of corporate and industrial leaders, most of whom served on university boards of trustees, successfully pressured colleges and universities to terminate the employment of several accomplished scholars who had become vocal in expressing their (relatively) radical political views. The publication in 1915 of the AAUP's report on the topic of academic freedom was prompted in large part by a desire to protect against such meddling. As historian Thomas Haskell interprets it, the report was the "capstone" of reformers' attempts to professionalize the academic calling. Its central aim in this regard was to justify the granting to scholars of collegial autonomy and self-governance, two of the most basic components of professionalism. Importantly, the report grounded the justification of these professional privileges in a particular view of the nature and value of the civic roles and contributions of scholars and their institutions.

Two accomplished scholars drafted the AAUP's 1915 report: E.R.A. Seligman, an economist from Columbia University, and Arthur Lovejoy, a philosopher from Johns Hopkins University. The report includes sections on the "basis of academic authority," the "nature of the academic calling," and the "function of the academic institutions." In the section on authority, the authors made a distinction between "proprietary" and "ordinary" institutions of learning. The former were to be understood as constituting a "private trust," while the latter constituted a "public trust." Proprietary institutions are established on behalf of religious institutions or wealthy individuals in order to further certain predetermined doctrines and opinions, while "ordinary" institutions are established on behalf of the public in order to "advance knowledge by the unrestricted research and unfettered discussion of impartial investigators." The authors argued that a clear understanding among boards of trustees of the distinction between proprietary and "ordinary" institutions is a crucial "prerequisite" to the realization of academic freedom as a means for upholding the public trust.

In the section on the nature of the academic calling, the authors argued that the mistaken view of the university as "an ordinary business venture" and of teaching as "a purely private employment" manifested a "radical failure to apprehend the nature of the social function discharged by the professional scholar." This failure, the authors wrote, required a restatement of the reasons why it is in the public interest that the "professional office" of the scholar be one of "both dignity and of independence." Noting that the academic profession offers no promise of great financial rewards, the authors argued that its rewards must lie elsewhere: namely, in achieving an honorable and secure position that offers scholars the "freedom to perform honestly and according to their own consciences the distinctive and important function which the nature of the profession lays upon them." This function, the authors went on to spell out,

is to deal at first hand, after prolonged and specialized technical training, with the sources of knowledge; and to impart the results of their own and of their fellow-specialists' investigations and reflection, both to students and to the general public, without fear or favor. The proper discharge of this function requires (among other things) that the university teacher shall be exempt from any pecuniary motive or inducement to hold, or express, any conclusion which is not the genuine and uncolored product of his own study or that of fellow-specialists. Indeed, the proper fulfillment of the work of the professorate requires that our universities shall be so free that no fair-minded person shall find any excuse for even a suspicion that the utterances of university teachers are shaped or restricted by the judgment, not of professional scholars, but of inexpert and possibly not wholly disinterested persons outside their ranks.

In continuing their statement of the function of the academic profession, the authors were careful to point out that the "lay public is under no compulsion to accept or act upon the opinions of the scientific experts whom, through the universities, it employs." In other words, the proper public function of scholars is not to control or dominate the public but to serve and inform it. The value of scholars' service to the public is bound up in the trustworthiness of their opinions and knowledge. For such a function to be successfully carried out in a manner that gains (and deserves) the public trust, the authors wrote,

it is highly needful, in the interest of society at large, that what purport to be the conclusions of men trained for, and dedicated to, the quest for truth, shall in fact be the conclusions of such men, and not echoes of the opinions of the lay public, or of the individuals who endow or manage universities. To the degree that professional scholars, in the formation and promulgation of their opinions, are, or by the character of their tenure appear to be, subject to any motive other than their own scientific conscience and a desire for the respect of their fellow-experts, to that degree the university teaching profession is corrupted; its proper influence upon public opinion is diminished and vitiated; and society at large fails to get from its scholars, in an unadulterated form, the peculiar and necessary service which it is the office of the professional scholar to furnish.

Following their discussion of the academic calling, the authors turned their attention to what they took to be the three main functions of academic institutions: to promote inquiry that advances knowledge, to provide instruction, and to develop experts for various branches of public service. The latter of these the authors tied to one of the "recent developments of democracy," which in their view was "the recognition by legislators of the inherent complexities of economic, social, and political life, and the difficulty of solving problems of technical adjustment without technical knowledge." The authors noted that professors—many of whom were technical experts with something to contribute to "solving problems of technical adjustment"—were being "drafted to an increasing extent into more or less unofficial participation in the public service." In performing this service, they wrote, "the scholar must be absolutely free not only to pursue his investigations but to declare the results of his researches, no matter where they may lead him or to what extent they may come into conflict with accepted opinion. To be of use to the legislator or the administrator, he must enjoy their complete confidence in the disinterestedness of his conclusions."

Infringements on and threats to academic freedom in the contemporary university, the authors argued, were being caused not so much by religious institutions as by three other sources: business interests, governments and politicians, and the "tyranny of public opinion." The latter of these fostered a tendency for people to think, feel, and speak alike, threatening the liberty of individuals to dissent from conventional views and opinions. To protect against this threat to academic freedom, the authors declared, the university must be seen as an "inviolable refuge from such tyranny." It must serve as an "intellectual experiment station" where new ideas can germinate, ripen, and bear fruit. But the university must also exercise a conservative influence, both by protecting past thought that is "not in the fashion of the moment" and by checking the "hasty and unconsidered impulses of popular feeling." By its very nature, the authors wrote, the university

is committed to the principle that knowledge should precede action, to the caution (by no means synonymous with intellectual timidity) which is an essential part of the scientific method, to a sense of the complexity of social problems, to the practice of taking long views into the future, and to a reasonable regard for the teachings of experience. One of its most characteristic functions in a democratic society is to help make public opinion more self-critical and more circumspect, to check the more hasty and unconsidered impulses of popular feeling, to train the democracy to the habit of looking before and after. It is precisely this function of the university which is most injured by any restriction upon academic freedom; and it is precisely those who most value this aspect of the university's work who should most earnestly protest against such restriction. For the public may respect, and be influenced by, the counsels of prudence and of moderation which are given by men of science, if it believes those counsels to be the disinterested expression of the scientific temper and of unbiased inquiry.

It is important not to miss the fact that the authors of the AAUP's statement on academic freedom made a distinction between scholars' public functions as professional "men of science" and their "extra-mural" public functions as citizens. While functioning as professionals, scholars were expected to limit their public functions to the provision of "counsels of prudence and moderation," the "disinterested expression of the scientific temper and of unbiased inquiry." While functioning as citizens, however, scholars could enjoy the full freedom other citizens enjoyed of joining or supporting movements or causes of their choice, and of stating their opinions and judgments on matters outside their specialties. By way of reinforcing the distinction between professional and "extramural" conduct, the authors took pains to point out that it is "not the absolute freedom of utterance of the individual scholar, but the absolute freedom of thought, of inquiry, of discussion and of teaching, of the academic profession, that is asserted by this declaration of principles."

In summary, according to the authors of the AAUP's 1915 report on academic freedom, professional scholars have two main functions in civic life:

• to provide the public with trustworthy knowledge, judgment, and opinion, based on objective, disinterested, and unbiased inquiry and scientific study; • to make public opinion more self-critical by checking the "more hasty and unconsidered impulses of popular feeling" and training in the "habit of looking before and after."

(Continues...)

---

Excerpted from Democracy and Higher Education by SCOTT J. PETERS THEODORE R. ALTER NEIL SCHWARTZBACH Copyright © 2010 by Scott J. Peters. Excerpted by permission of Michigan State University Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments xi

Foreword Harry C. Boyte xv

Introduction and Overview 1

Part 1 The Public Purposes and Work Question in American Higher Education

Chapter 1 Answering the Public Purposes and Work Question 19

Chapter 2 Questioning the Answers 51

Chapter 3 Developing and Using Practitioner Profiles 63

Part 2 Practitioner Profiles

Chapter 4 Reaching Outside the Compartmentalized Structure: A Profile of Molly Jahn 75

Chapter 5 It isn't Rocket Science: A Profile of Ken Reardon 99

Chapter 6 The Making is the Learning: A Profile of Paula Horrigan 119

Chapter 7 Every Interaction is an Educational Opportunity: A Profile of Daniel J. Decker 137

Chapter 8 To be in There, in the Thick of it: A Profile of Marcia Eames-Sheavly 151

Chapter 9 I Never Set Myself up as Somebody Special: A Profile of Antonio DiTommaso 165

Chapter 10 Is it your Problem, or is it a Social Problem? A Profile of Tom Lyson 181

Chapter 11 My Path has Been Different from my Predecessors': A Profile of Marvin Pritts 195

Chapter 12 The Expert in the Middle: A Profile of Frank Rossi 213

Chapter 13 Leapfrogging Back and Forth: A Profile of John Sipple 231

Chapter 14 I Feel Like a Missionary: A Profile of Tom Maloney 263

Chapter 15 A Sense of Communion: A Profile of Anu Rangarajan 291

Part 3 Learning from Profiles and Practice Stories

Chapter 16 Lessons 315

Conclusion 349

Notes 357

Bibliography 373

Index 383

What People are Saying About This

David Matthews

"From the perspective of a half-century’s observations, I see a new stirring in the academic ranks coming from faculty members who are determined to integrate their scholarly efforts with their democratic convictions. Their 'public work' has the potential to strengthen the ability of citizens to influence their destiny at a time when global forces and domestic uncertainties threaten to deny them that influence. If you are concerned about our democracy and the role of higher education in it—and you are looking for more than a theoretical discussion—I heartily recommend this book." --(David Mathews, President of the Kettering Foundation and author of Politics for People)

David Mathews

"From the perspective of a half-century’s observations, I see a new stirring in the academic ranks coming from faculty members who are determined to integrate their scholarly efforts with their democratic convictions. Their 'public work' has the potential to strengthen the ability of citizens to influence their destiny at a time when global forces and domestic uncertainties threaten to deny them that influence. If you are concerned about our democracy and the role of higher education in it—and you are looking for more than a theoretical discussion—I heartily recommend this book."--(David Mathews, President of the Kettering Foundation and author of Politics for People)