David Cromwell excels at identifying key points of friction between public and private interests. In this excerpt he examines how higher learning is being bent to fulfil its corporately mandated responsibilities to society.
“This [Academia] is a privileged sector where critical thought and enquiry into human society, the natural world and the cosmos ought to be the norm; not where overwhelming pressure to conform to state-corporate interests should be exerted on teaching and research agendas.
How can academic ‘collaboration’ with large corporations which are, after all, centralised systems of illegitimate power, not lead to compromise, distortion or worse? It is clearly not in the interests of such institutions to promote rational and honest study into the problems of a corporate-shaped society. It is in their interests to commandeer the publicly-funded research while co-opting supposedly neutral and objective academia as ‘partners’. And all the better if highly trained university researchers working in narrow, focused disciplines remain disconnected from the interests in other disciplines, or more importantly, from the concerns of the general populace.
‘To work on a real problem (like how to eliminate poverty in a nation producing eight hundred billion dollars’ worth of wealth each year) one would have to follow that problem across many disciplinary lines without qualm, dealing with historical materials, economic theories, political obstacles’, observed historian Howard Zinn, author of The People’s History of the United States, who died in 2010. ‘Specialisation ensures that one cannot follow a problem through from start to finish. It ensures the functioning in the academy of the system’s dictum: divide and rule.’ Zinn provided a potent example: ‘Note how little work is done in political science on the tactics of social change. Both students and teacher deal with theory and reality in separate courses; the compartmentalisation safely neutralises them.’
Any management vision of how the university sector, or any place of higher education, ought to develop that does not recognize the nature of the iniquitous capitalist society in which the university finds itself embedded, is short-sighted. And, moreover, any such ‘vision’ that is not committed to making radical changes in the way society is structured is tacitly, if not actively, supporting the status quo. The same argument applies to any major institution in society.”
-David Cromwell. Why Are We The Good Guys? pp. 216 – 217
So, great you have a degree, well done sport! Did they teach you to comply or to question the society that you inhabit?
6 comments
May 4, 2016 at 7:38 am
VR Kaine
So, great you have a degree, well done sport! Did they teach you to comply or to question the society that you inhabit?”
Exactly!
Let’s extend this outwards to research of all kinds. We see a lot of flaws where greed, narcissism, or both are skewing what gets published or even studied. A lot of press on that in the medical field, for instance. Why should social studies be any different? Special interests know how to manipulate and a lot of institutions are greedy enough in order to let them do it.
Click to access PIIS0140-6736%2815%2960696-1.pdf
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21588069-scientific-research-has-changed-world-now-it-needs-change-itself-how-science-goes-wrong
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/11/lies-damned-lies-and-medical-science/308269/
Granted, however, that our society is set up were most would be best-served by complying with whatever shit sandwich is given to them, but at least have the congnizance to be aware of how and why that shit sandwich is there so one can seek out opportunities to change their situation and make it better…
.But that also requires individual fortitude and leadership which does not seem to be getting taught in our institutions. Just the opposite? It seems that we’re nurturing a society of co-dependents, losers, and wimps.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/278386-bloomberg-booed-for-criticizing-college-safe-spaces-in
LikeLike
May 4, 2016 at 8:48 am
Sha'Tara
Quote: “So, great you have a degree, well done sport! Did they teach you to comply or to question the society that you inhabit?”
“What? Why? They taught me how I could use it to make money and pay back my student loans. What else is there?”
LikeLike
May 4, 2016 at 9:42 am
The Arbourist
@Vern
Do you think so? I know we have friction between what the power balance between society vs the individual is and stuff – I would argue that the thrust of this post, and the article I’m going to link point to a systemic problem that individuals, as motivated or as maverick as you’d like to make them, cannot make a difference.
“I’m a professor and my liberal students terrify me” has probably been on your radar as, I imagine, as it resonates with your PoV.
The problem, as the OP suggests, and I am suggesting now is that the institutional features of our higher education are set up to prevent critical thought and prevent the sort of radical thinking that brings people together to actually change society (in a way that individuals, regardless of their motivations/prowess, can do).
LikeLike
May 4, 2016 at 9:46 am
The Arbourist
@Sha’Tara
I’m going to assume at least a touch of sarcasm with this comment. The situation you describe, I would venture, is not a happenstance, accidental occurrence.
Debt bondage is yet another stick to keep people within the ‘acceptable’ limits of society. Hard to change society when marginalized and bankrupt.
LikeLike
May 4, 2016 at 2:00 pm
The Intransigent One
I would argue that debt bondage is one of the biggest sticks to keep people in line. People who have nothing left to lose can, and will, do pretty much anything. Give people stuff up front and keep them paying for it for the rest of their lives or else it will get taken it away, and you’ve created a class of perfect worker bees.
LikeLiked by 1 person
May 4, 2016 at 11:02 pm
VR Kaine
@Arb,
“…as motivated or as maverick as you’d like to make them, cannot make a difference.”
I don’t make these people mavericks or not – they either are or they aren’t, and either go against the grain with their own personal leadership or they don’t.
I’ll read your article soon, but for right now I’d challenge your statement on face value – especially in academia. Why are wussy liberal students blocking free speech or shouting down speakers, then, if they supposedly feel like they “can’t make a difference”?
I’m just watching how a conservative African American author of “Please Stop Helping Us” was uninvited from speaking at Virginia Tech. Apparently all strong and powerful enough to push an agenda and block free speech, yet when they see they can get more playing TOTAL victim, now they’re powerless and now need the safe rooms, cookies, and puppies? Not buying it. More of the classic liberal perpetual victimhood play as an excuse for inaction, I think.
Fact is outside academia we see individuals making a difference all the time, whether in this country or other countries. Sanders’ campaign, Trump’s campaign, and Malala are immediate examples that come to mind. Individuals are changing the world all the time – they just have to have the guts. I think the people saying they can’t change anything are simply chicken-shit and gutless. Trump got creamed in 2012. Sanders wasn’t even heard of. Both weighed in with individual guts and got out there. And Malala – if a young Pakistani girl who was shot in the face can get her voice out there and move people, then anyone can if they stop being wimps.
LikeLike