June 20, 2014
Harry Targ
The university is a site for
intellectual excitement: debate about new theories and hypotheses; rigorous
examination of competing ideas; and research, teaching and community service.
Most men and women who pursue such a career are inspired by intellectual curiosity,
the prospect of educating and inspiring students, and serving diverse
communities.
Moreover, the Morrill Act passed by
Congress in 1862 committed the United States to construct and support state
universities that would serve the people. Great state-funded public
universities grew over the subsequent 150 years to facilitate the education of
a growing population and helped build a more vibrant democracy.
But there are darker truths about
the growth of the modern university. First, higher education is stimulated by,
and financially beholden to, governments, political processes, corporations and
banks. These institutions affect what research is done and what is taught.
Second, conceptions of disciplines,
bodies of knowledge, appropriate methods, ideas accepted as unchallengeable
truths, and the basic principles of whole universities are shaped by economic
interests and political power.
Third, professional associations,
journals, forms of peer review, and general procedures for validating the
quality of academic research and teaching are also affected by the same
interests.
Serving status quo
Therefore, in the main, the
university as an institution is, and has always been, designed to serve the
status quo, a status quo again that is governed by economic and political
interests.
The following examples are from
Purdue University. Similar examples can be found at virtually every large and
prestigious university in the country. David Smith and Scott Bauer of The
Lafayette Journal and Courier
reported on Purdue President Mitch Daniels’ attendance at a conference of the
conservative think tank, the American Enterprise Institute. Daniels said he
attended to learn and to touch base with one of Purdue’s biggest donors.
The meeting was populated by
presidential candidates and conservative governors from Michigan and Florida.
Other attendees included former Vice President Dick Cheney; former CIA Director
David Petraeus; former Amway President Dick DeVos; and current or former CEOs
from TD Ameritrade, Apple and Google. Republican operative Karl Rove also
attended. Inadvertently highlighting the connection between corporate and
political power and the university, Daniels said: “I considered this a trip of
use to Purdue.”
Academic advocates for large-scale
government and corporate commitments to increased space exploration, such as
Daniels, who served as co-chair of the National Research Council, can be seen
as serving the economic needs of research universities. The NRC issued a
286-page report in May, suggesting that a huge and redefined commitment would
be needed to land on Mars by the 2030s. Despite the document’s skepticism about
the possibilities of achieving new goals in space, Daniels said “human space
exploration remains vital to the national interest for inspirational and
aspirational reasons that appeal to a broad range of U.S. citizens.”
The report outlined a range of steps
that would be needed to achieve long-term goals in space. These multi-billion
dollar research-based programs could occupy the research agendas of academic
departments in universities such as Purdue for decades and enrich the biggest
corporations in America.
Daniels was not the only
university-affiliated spokesperson of note who recently made news. Purdue Board
of Trustees member Don Thompson, president and CEO of the McDonald’s Corporation,
weighed in on the debate about raising the minimum wage for fast-food workers
after a nationwide set of protests against McDonald’s on May 22.
Thompson at a shareholders’ meeting
declared that “McDonald’s is often a first job for many entering the work
force. About one-third of our employees are 16 to 19. We are proud that we open
doors to opportunity,” according to USA
Today. Thompson praised his corporation for being a worker-friendly
employer and added that it was the largest employer of veterans in the nation.
Later he hinted at the possibility of raising the minimum wage at McDonald’s.
Protesters argued that the median age of fast-food workers is 29, most work at
today’s minimum wage, and economic survival on McDonald’s wages is virtually
impossible.
Finally, the Purdue news service has
announced increased collaboration of the university with the notorious Duke
Energy Corp. most recently in the news because of its responsibility for a coal
ash spill in North Carolina that coated 70 miles of the Dan River along the
North Carolina and Virginia border with 60,000 tons of toxic sludge. A North
Carolina judge ordered Duke Energy to immediately eliminate the source of
groundwater pollution from company coal ash dumps. A criminal investigation of
links between the spill and Duke Energy and state government officials in North
Carolina is still under way.
Purdue News
reported that the university would collaborate on the expansion of an education
program to create the Duke Energy Academy at Purdue, a six-day instructional
program to inspire high school students and teachers to work in STEM-related
disciplines related to energy. The article erroneously claimed that “the amount
of students entering the STEM fields is declining.” Other co-sponsors of the
six-day educational experience include Bowen Engineering, General Electric,
Kidwind Project, Siemens Energy and Windstream Technologies Inc.
Which path?
Higher education is at a fork in the
road. One path is to maintain its traditional mission to educate and inspire
students while sharing knowledge with communities at home and abroad. Another
path is to expand the needs of special interests, political and corporate, at
the expense of the traditional role of higher education. Growing social
movements should include demands that universities continue to serve the needs
of the people, rather than politicians and corporations.
Harry
Targ is a political science professor at
Purdue University. He wrote this for The
Journal Gazette, Fort Wayne,
Indiana.
