Here’s how conservative scholar Steven F. Hayward responded to the question, which was asked by the Intercollegiate Review Michael Sandel, who is a critic of the left from within the left; Robert Putnam, whose work tends to ratify a lot of conservative insights about social order; William Galston, one of the few liberal students of […]
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As part of its series on higher ed issues in the 2012 campaign, the Chronicle of Higher Education has a long opinion piece in the form of a news article accusing Republicans of hypocrisy. In “Self-Sufficient, With a Hand From the Government,” author Scott Carlson claims to find “a striking dissonance” between the moving “pull-oneself-up-by-the-bootstraps […]
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This week featured some interesting political news regarding campaign contributions: confirming the partisan shift on Wall Street, Business Week revealed that around 70 percent of Goldman Sachs employees who have donated to this year’s presidential campaign send funds to Mitt Romney. The contrast to 2008, when about 75 percent who made contributions had donated to […]
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We noticed an article the other day on The Atlantic web site, arguing that the Republican Party is turning against higher education. The evidence cited for this apparently alarming development was scant: Rick Santorum referred to colleges as “indoctrination mills,” and Mitt Romney told high-school seniors to shop around for low college tuition and not […]
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The law school at the University of Iowa, like so many departments at so many institutions of higher learning, has a faculty that is politically pretty much of one mind, with (as of 2007) 46 registered Democrats and only one registered Republican. When instructor Teresa Wagner applied for a professor’s post in her specialty, legal […]
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By now the “Cupcake War” in which the Berkeley College Republicans sold cupcakes with different prices for various ethnic/racial/gender groups is well known. Drawing less attention is why it produced the panicky overkill reaction, including strong condemnations from some university administrators. After all, the anti-affirmative action bake sale hardly threatens the diversity infrastructure and is […]
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It’s hard to tell whether it’s a news story or a media meme: Florida’s Republican Gov. Rick Scott, a fan of Texas Republican Gov. (and current GOP presidential candidate) Rick Perry, is reportedly considering foisting on Florida’s public universities the same much-criticized reform proposals that Perry has been trying to foist on public universities in […]
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Some readers of Minding the Campus may have noticed the little fracas at University of Iowa between College Republicans and anthropology/women’s studies professor Ellen Lewin. You can read about it in any of the many stories listed on this Google news page. The details are simple. UI College Republicans sent out a mass email, approved […]
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By now, most people who follow either politics or higher education know the story of William Cronon. The University of Wisconsin professor published a lengthy post critiquing the policies of Governor Scott Walker, and a week later penned a New York Times op-ed raising similar themes. In between the dates of the two essays, the […]
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Art Robinson, an unsuccessful Republican candidate for Congress last fall in Oregon’s 4th district, is making very serious allegations against Oregon State University—that as payback for his campaign, the university is moving to expel three of his grown children from Ph.D. programs, and in two of these cases, allowing other scholars to take over their […]
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What’s in a name? A great deal, if it happens to be Stephen A. Douglas. A hundred and fifty years ago, Stephen Arnold Douglas was the most powerful politician in America. He had begun his political career as a hyper-loyal Andrew Jackson Democrat, snatched up one of Illinois’ U.S. Senate seats in 1846, and rose […]
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Closed Minds? Politics and Ideology in American Universities, published in September to little fanfare, has caught on amid its intended audience: those who believe indoctrination of students is a figment of the conservative imagination and not really a factor on our campuses. The New York Times, calling indoctrination “an article of faith” among conservative critics […]
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To the surprise of few, donations from the Harvard College faculty in the presidential campaign have gone to Barack Obama over John McCain by a ratio of 20 to 1. A report in the Harvard Crimson said, “The words ‘liberal’ and ‘faculty’ seem to have been conjoined at the College for generations.” Nationally, academia has […]
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Jay Greene has compiled a list of political donations from the employees of the top ten U.S. News and World report universities. What did he find? The most “balanced” university in terms of donations was Duke, where 84% of donations and 81% of the overall dollar value went to Democratic candidates. How about the fabled […]
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Overwhelming evidence attests to the liberal tilt on our college campuses. Studies show that the faculty at most mainstream institutions are overwhelmingly registered with the Democratic party and give a disproportionate share of their political donations to left-leaning candidates. A recent study of donations by faculty at Princeton University during the current Presidential election season […]
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Bruce Benson, the wealthy oil and gas executive and conservative Republican activist, was approved Wednesday as president of the University of Colorado in a straight party-line vote of the board of regents. All six Republicans voted for Benson. All three Democrats voted no. (see Controversy In Colorado)
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Scott Jaschik of Inside Higher Ed has a long and excellent article on the Gross-Simmons study on the political and social views of professors, as well as on the Harvard symposium last Saturday that discussed the findings. The study concluded that the professoriate is more moderate than many believe, with younger instructors less activist and […]
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After 25 years in the corporate world, I decided to head back to the campus. In a way, I hadn’t really left since my dissertation. I had published several refereed articles in academic journals, five academic books (one a best seller in the field) and had conducted large research studies, collected a lot of data, […]
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A colleague forwarded the following to me, found in The New York Times Re “Young Americans Are Leaning Left, New Poll Finds” (front page, June 27): As a professor who for years has spoken on the virtues of liberalism, I find it extremely pleasing to know that young Americans are once again beginning to lean […]
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It is hard to exaggerate the extent to which a left-wing ideology has captivated university life. I sometimes get the impression that the ghost of Antonio Gramsci is parading among academic faculties spreading his soteriology to “useful dupes.” I recently participated in a discussion on Iran at Columbia University sponsored by the college Democrats, Republicans, […]
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