Profs ponder lack of conservatives on college faculties

The Dartmouth ^ | Wednesday, October 22, 2003 | By Michael Herman

[.cnI redruM]

Common stereotypes portray university faculties as "vast left-wing conspiracies," a sentiment most recently articulated by New York Times columnist David Brooks in an attention-getting op-ed piece last month. Brooks' piece, titled "Lonely Campus Voices," criticized university faculties for having a liberal bias and for making it exceedingly hard for conservatives to receive tenure at top universities.

While there is some agreement with Brooks' view among Dartmouth's faculty, most professors here who spoke to The Dartmouth about this issue felt that Brooks inaccurately presented the political atmosphere at most colleges.

In the article, Brooks writes that "faculties skew overwhelmingly to the left. Students often have no contact with adult conservatives, and many develop cartoonish impressions of how 40 percent of the country thinks." Brooks also claims that conservatives face discrimination and resentment when trying to seek tenure.

Among Dartmouth's faculty, especially in the humanities and social sciences, there are a greater number of politically liberal professors than conservative ones, said Linda Fowler, director of the Nelson E. Rockefeller Center. However, she thought that this disparity is most likely due to self-selection.

Liberals, she argued, are more drawn to study topics like history, religion, philosophy and similar disciplines because "they're predisposed to take relativist views -- that's why they study what they study." On the other hand, conservatives who go to graduate school tend to pursue other career paths in the private sector or in politics instead of in academia, Fowler said.

Jeff Hart, emeritus professor of English, took an opposite view. He said that conservatives choose not to go into academia precisely because they fear not receiving tenure because of their political views. "Conservatives don't think they can get anywhere in the academic profession," he said.

But Hart did allow for some exceptions. "A good conservative will get promoted."

Most professors here disagreed with Brooks' claim that conservatives have a harder time receiving tenure. "Political views play virtually no role in the hiring of faculty," chair of the economics department Doug Irwin said, "I would be very leery in the name of diversity to apply a political litmus test for hiring."

Still, Hart contended that liberal professors are more likely to favor a liberal candidate over a conservative one when deciding tenure because "liberals tend to think that liberalism is common sense, whereas there has to be a good reason to be conservative: it might be a psychological aberration or bad character," said Hart.

"Conservatives like to believe they're fighting the good fight against a deeply entrenched enemy," said Fowler, adopting a different stance. "To blame the academy for a dearth of [conservative] people seeking degrees really isn't useful."

While there are fewer conservatives than liberals among Dartmouth's faculty, said English professor Ivy Schweitzer, "the senior faculty tends to be more conservative in general, and as a group, than the younger faculty, and so fewer wield more power." In that sense, it is hard to say if conservatives are really a minority at Dartmouth, she said.

"I think we have a very open forum for faculty to speak, from all sides of the political spectrum," said Schweitzer. "Is the general atmosphere here 'liberal?' Yes, because we are a liberal arts institution, and liberal arts education is supposed to produce 'liberal' attitudes that encourage forward thinking ideas about inclusion, equality and innovation."

[liberallarry]

That's what he thought. He was not an idiot. He just disagreed with you and your fundamental beliefs. The Muslims of his day were not the murderous, frustrated losers of our day. And it is undeniable that Roman glory in the time of Trajan and and his immediate predecessors and successors was unsurpassed. So analogies made by comparing Caligula to Clinton are not only vastly overblown but utterly worthless.

[TPartyType]

Oh, House Un-American Activities Committee. Right.

[liberallarry]

Burkhardt was not an idiot either and there's something to what he says as well. Rome nearly perished in the third century under the barbarian onslaught and its own internal contradictions (I don't think you can attribute the loss at Adrianople to degeneracy, any more than you can attribute the loss of 3 legions to the Germans 3 centuries earlier to such a cause). Christianity definitely offered hope to many who otherwise had none.

[91B]

Academic definitions: Liberal=Maoist, Conservative=Trotskyite.

[liberallarry]

I agree with you about Horowitz. But I wonder about your characterization of the proper role for conservatives. Weren't the founding fathers - of all political persuasions - active proselytizers, propagandists, and street-fighters?

[Eva]

Yes, because we are a liberal arts institution, and liberal arts education is supposed to produce 'liberal' attitudes that encourage forward thinking ideas about inclusion, equality and innovation."

Oh please, this elitist supercillious attitude is both tiresome and wrong headed. There is no relationship between liberal thought and the leftist politics of the universities. Traditional liberalism is dead, the closest group to the classic liberals are the neo-cons. What we have in the universities are the neo-coms (neo-communists).

[.cnI redruM]

Yes, that person is an elitist pig. Eight buzzwords and zero intelligent ideas per sentence.

[.cnI redruM]

>>>>>"they're predisposed to take relativist views"

That's the elegant way to announce your prostitution to the world.

[vanmorrison]

The era of the Roman Empire was always bloody and vicious. It was so under the Claudians, the Antonines, under Trajan, Diocletian, and even Aurelius. Only Constantine saved it from complete dissolution. Burkhardt recognized this. Gibbon couldn't bring himself to this conclusion. He was enamored of the "Enlightenment", which attempted to discredit any recognition of Christian virtue.

And the Moslems were always murderous, too. These people have been slaughtering Jews and Christians with bloody abandon ever since Mohammed rode his camel out of the desert 1600 years ago and began butchering women and children, young and old alike. You know, just like these creatures continue to do today.

[liberallarry]

The era of the Roman Empire was always bloody and vicious...

...and it remained so until its final demise in 1453.

And the Moslems were always murderous, too. These people have been slaughtering Jews and Christians with bloody abandon ever since Mohammed rode his camel out of the desert

The Jews of medievil Spain and many other places would not agree with you. You have a peculiar view of history which is conveniently blind to all the medievil Christian atrocities. And of course the Jews, when they held power in old Israel, were just as bloody-minded and intolerant.

[JGT]

I tend to agree with your assessment; there is a small but determined number of us Gen Xers who are trying to do our part to reinstate a conservative voice back into academia, especially in the humanities and social sciences. I recently completed a PhD in the social sciences for this very reason. I have a close circle of like-minded friends who all decided to enter graduate school in the mid-1990s to combat the virus of intolerant liberalism that we all encountered as undergraduates. We realize that we have practically no chance of employment in the large public universities, so we have quietly gone about securing positions in small, private liberal arts colleges.
Some of the most rigorous and comprehensive conservative scholarship is being carried out at these small schools that most of you have probably never heard of (with the exception of Hillsdale).
Students in all of my classes will be reading Voegelin, Strauss, Popper, MacIntyre, Hayek, Von Mises,Sowell, etc.--so all is not lost, its just that you have to find the right institution to be in a position to present these ideas.
jgt

[Maelstrom]

Don't take my word for it.

Go forth and verify my statements yourself.

It is that bad.

[Lost Highway]

Thanks for your reply. I posted a little earlier and I will do so again just to clear up any confusion I created. As much as I wish I could claim the words as my own the article is by David Horowitz. I copied it from his site www.frontpagemag.com. I got the link at the top but somehow missed his name. Sorry for any confusion. I will say that there is probably no one in the country more in touch with the issue than Mr. Horowitz.

[liberallarry]

Mr. Horowitz is very, very good. A major leaguer. If you decide to plagiarize you could do much worse. :)

[TPartyType]

Regarding your 45:

I don't think so. Paine was for sure. But Washington was the epitome of decorum. Franklin enforced strict rules of civil discourse in his paper. Madison, Hamilton and Jay aimed at an enlightened, civil audience in the Federalist Papers. I think they were more into reasoned discourse than street fighting. Probably as many exceptions to my rule as those I've enumerated . . . I'm no authority.

FRegards.

[TPartyType]

Go, JGT!!!

Don't forget to have your students watch "Commanding Heights" and utilize the awesome web site PBS built around the documentary. Superb material! Paints the Austrian School in a very positive light.

BTW, I bet you could make it in a bigger school. You'd be surprised how much respect one can gain by demonstrating intellectual integrity. Maybe not in the Ivy League. Maybe not in the top tier research institutions, but it can be done. Thanks for agreeing with me! How sensible of you. ;^)