The Colorado Question
There’s a heated debate going on in Colorado right now, over something called the ‘Academic Bill of Rights,’ planned legislation that would enforce or promote or encourage universities to adhere to or comply with said Bill of Rights, David Horowitz, the imbalance between registered Democrats and registered Republicans in the political science departments of Colorado universities, and whether and how something should be done about said imbalance. The Academic Bill of Rights itself sounds pretty unexceptionable, declaring for instance that scholars should be hired on the basis of their competence and appropriate knowledge, not their political beliefs. That provision, for instance, is simply another version of B&W’s mission statement. So far so good. But it is difficult to help being suspicious. It is a Republican governor and legislature that has landed on the idea like a duck on a June bug, and I don’t share Republicans’ assumption that it is only the left that has an axe to grind. I wonder, for example, what these surveys that tell us how many Democrats and Republicans are in the political science department, have to say about how many of each are in the business school – which is, if Colorado universities are typical, much, much larger than the poli sci department. My innocent guess is that Republicans are well represented in business schools. Perhaps over-represented. Does this worry the Republican governor and legislature? If not, why not?
And then there is the question of why there are more Democrats than Republicans in the political science department. It’s not automatically or self-evidently the case that that could only happen if the people doing the hiring were applying political criteria. That’s one possible explanation, but surely it is not very difficult to think of others. Self-selection, for instance. Perhaps the kind of people who prefer teaching political science to, say, selling real estate or bonds, are also the kind of people who prefer to be Democrats. Now, how would the governor and legislature go about fixing that, if it turned out to be the explanation? People’s free choices about how to live their lives, what kind of work they do, what they think and believe, what parties they do or don’t belong to, are supposed to be the kind of thing Republicans are keen to protect. Aren’t they? Am I wrong? Wouldn’t they think it was what they like to call ‘social engineering’ to start fretting about the fact that there are ‘too many’ of one kind of people in universities and ‘too many’ of another kind in real estate, and start issuing instructions and laws and regulations designed to ‘fix’ the ‘problem’?
I don’t know. It seems likely to me that there is a lot of the second kind of reason involved along with (perhaps) some of the first, but I don’t know. Meanwhile at least there is an array of opinion represented in reply to this article at History News Network. And the article makes some good points, too.
Ophelia,
(I hope I may address you thusly – it sounds so much nicer than OB)
I think your point about the number of Republicans in the Business School is wrong. According to this study (by David Horowitz at this site http://studentsforacademicfreedom.org/articles/lackdiversity.htm) some Ivy League schools have NO registered Republicans in any school.
However, if B&W agree with the “Academic Bill of Rights” then what is undesirable with enacting it as legislation ? Is there a “hidden agenda” or a “slippery slope” ?
Is a good concept only good when brandished by those we approve of ?
I have no doubt that the Governor is seeking political advantage – but that’s why he exists. It is his (possibly sole) area of expertise. If he runs with a good idea, then let him run.
I think most of the ABofR would be a great idea here in Australia (except point 8 – Horowitz is obviously trying to sneak some arcane US point under the radar here).
If it is useful in a totally foriegn setting, divorced from all the factional bother Stateside then it likely is what it purports to be – an objective, reasonable, enactable Academic Bill of Rights.
“However, if B&W agree with the “Academic Bill of Rights” then what is undesirable with enacting it as legislation?”
Quite a lot, really. The content of the ABR seems, as I said, unexceptionable, but surely there are plenty of ideas that are unexceptionable that one would nevertheless hesitate to enact into law. A formal Bill of Rights is not the same thing as a statement of principle. It’s legally binding and enforceable. What the governor and legislature in Colorado are talking about is not just a statement of principle, it is legislation to enforce the principle. Well, how would that work, exactly? There aren’t ‘enough’ Republicans or Democrats in a given school. So – what? What follows from that? Who decides what follows? On the basis of what? And then who decides what is to be done about it? And what is, in fact, to be done about it? Surely, Mr. Blair, you can see the potential for problems in this scenario. They seem blindingly obvious to me.
By the way, on the subject of ‘rights’, have a look at Julian’s latest Bad Moves, it’s excellent.
Julian Baggini’s ‘Rights’ article is rather relevant, and contra-indicative of a move to enshrine the ABofR in legislation.
“More would I concede: though that I can do is nothing worth …”
‘There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance.’ We’re agreed then. The ideas in the ABR are good ones and should be promulgated by speech and writing, by ‘discourse’ and phallogocentric activities like that. But as for governors and state legislatures micro-managing universities, well, maybe not. Especially not in the US, where we have a bad habit of electing empty-headed movie stars to high office…