The Politically Irrelevant: Walking Wounded of the Campus Wars : PERSONAL PERSPECTIVES

We are the Silent Majority in today’s campus wars. We have learned too much, since 1968, to slide into neoconservatism and the comforts of alleged universal “standards.” But we remember too much to embrace the relativism and racial separatism of the multicultural left. Neither correct nor incorrect, we are the “Politically Irrelevant.”

We PIs embody principles that both the tenured radicals and their foes find passe. We remain integrationists, although we’ve become suspicious of calls for assimilation and respect the achievements of many separatist programs. We still seek to reward merit, but recognize the difficulties in defining it.

We cling to the belief that government can and should do good things for people--a rather quaint position to hold in 1992, when both the politically correct and the crusading neoconservatives share a recalcitrant anti-statism. The “politically correct” view the state as a “rogue policeman” hellbent on banning abortions, censoring art and (yes, they still say it) “replicating the social relations of production.” Meanwhile, the neocons portray the university and cultural agencies of government as a rogue museum curator--defacing the masterpieces of Western civilization, mounting immoral exhibitions, corrupting youth and eroding (yes, they still say it) “standards.”

The argument--in fact, the entire PC war--just bypasses us. So what can a poor PI do?

Keep Issues Clear. The PC-bashers cleverly conflate a bunch of discrete questions into a single, concerted attack on civilization as they know it. Affirmative action in admissions, the content of the humanities curriculum, campus speech codes, deconstructionist literary theory--all conspire to menace standards, according to the foes of political correctness. But it just ain’t so. These do not constitute a coherent radical program; you need not be simply for or against it. In fact, you can favor affirmative action--on, say, integrationist grounds--without hoping to dismantle the literary canon. You can even articulate strong views on speech codes without understanding deconstruction.

Rely on What Works. Forget rights, values and fundamental principles for a while and concentrate on policy. Sure, this is a bitter pill to swallow. Most Americans--even professors--love to elevate any question to a matter of first principles. Abortion, affirmative action, health care, even traffic congestion are debated as matters of rights. I have heard impassioned arguments about the right to life, the right to decent health care, even the right to drive. Try arguing that rights aren’t at stake in these matters, that we should attempt to promote the general welfare and choose workable solutions, and you could be condemned as a communist-fascist or reactionary.

But it makes sense to deal with many issues in such earth-bound terms. You can decide, for example, whether to create a new ethnic studies program without debating the vices and virtues of Western civilization. Someone has to figure out how much the program will cost, who will teach it, how it will affect other course offerings and the like. These are hardly glamorous issues--as the author of an insomnia-curing book on public policy, I know just how boring these matters can be--but somebody’s got to decide them. We are all better off if someone decides them well.

Take the Green Way Out. Refugees from the campus wars have fueled the astonishing growth of the environmental movement in recent years. I know dozens of liberals who have fled the minefields of race and ethnicity for the greener pastures of environmentalism. After all, ecology is the one political battleground where liberal universalism still seems relevant. Environmentalists can still maintain that we’re all in it together. Green politics also offers a rationale for activist government. Sure, it is a little cowardly to go underground like this. But sometimes the best way out of a stale debate is to change the subject.

Revive Ethnic Memories. Nothing so shocked me, when I moved to the West Coast, as my immediate transformation into a WASP, or, in California terms, an “Anglo.” A single plane trip turned a striving ethnic--a New York Jew--into a comfortable representative of the dominant culture. In my four years at Yale--where I befriended people with first names like Dwight, Halstead and Jefferson--I certainly learned I was no WASP. Indeed, I embraced the college’s venerable traditions and the standard literary canon because I always doubted whether they ever could be wholly mine.

Many contemporary college teachers share such memories. We embrace the dual responsibility these memories lay upon us. We cannot ignore the alienation of nonwhite students; we must include their concerns in the curriculum and their selves in the university.

In my course on Recent United States History, I am deeply distressed by minority students’ estrangement from political history. African-American and Latino students contribute to discussions of civil rights and immigration, but routinely grow silent when the course turns to Watergate or Vietnam. “Political history does not belong to me,” one student said. The academic left is right to demand that we draw connections between these topics and students’ lives; we must offer these subjects to them, just as Shakespeare, Abraham Lincoln’s speeches and New Deal programs became part of our inheritance.

But, in so doing, we cannot forget or surrender the transforming power of education. Ultimately, the university’s purpose is to enroll its students into the community of educated people, into a new “culture,” with its own rituals and mores, ethics and principles. Education succeeds only if it does, to some degree, rip people out of their communities and immerse them in a new and broadening world. We can strive for “relevance,” and emphasize inclusion, but we cannot shield students from the profound dislocations true education demands.

Promote Civilization (Seriously). In an oft-repeated, and probably apocryphal anecdote, a curious Englishman approached Gandhi and asked him what he thought of Western Civilization. The Mahatma replied, “Western Civilization? It would be a good idea.”

A strong dose of “civilization,” especially in the sense of the word meaning politeness and open discussion, is just what the university most needs. None can better champion this rather old-fashioned notion of civil behavior than those who feel estranged from the current battles over political correctness.

We need to take these steps because alienation from politics--these feelings of irrelevance--are not the lot of a few college teachers; they extend beyond the campus. As a nation, we need to find a basis for diversity other than a multiplicity of separate, hostile communities. We need to rebuild a sense of national identity without underestimating human variety. To do it, we require a forum for public discussion--and where else to find it but the university, where what seems irrelevant today might offer essential guidance for tomorrow.