The areas that are most commonly left out in the cold are interdisciplinary fields for which there is little funding. By the logic of disciplines, these fields are simply ignored. Only when there is a popular movement do universities sometimes find that there is an area of study worthy of attention. For example, the rise of the environmental movement in the 1960s led many universities to set up environmental studies programmes. But because these programmes didn’t fit neatly into disciplinary boxes, they were vulnerable to cutbacks and amalgamations as the years wore on.
If disciplines are thought of as fiefdoms based on monopolies over separate bodies of knowledge, this helps to explain a number of features of academia.[5] If the members of the discipline claim that they alone are qualified and knowledgeable to make decisions about the discipline, then it is helpful if it is difficult for outsiders to understand what is going on. Jargon fits in here. The specialised language and concepts of the discipline are convenient for those in the know. They also are convenient for ensuring that outsiders can’t quickly see through to the essence of the issues.
Research is the process of testing existing knowledge and developing new knowledge. Research is generally rarefied and accessible only to specialists. Hence, it bolsters disciplines, since disciplines are essentially based on claims built around bodies of knowledge.
By contrast, teaching is a process of helping others to understand bodies of knowledge. Teaching is necessary to reproduce the discipline by training new recruits, but if it makes the core of the discipline seem too easy or obvious, then it can undermine the credibility or mystique of the discipline. It should be no surprise, then, that in most universities research has far more status than teaching. Teaching is problematic for a discipline — necessary, but potentially threatening.
More definitely threatening is popularisation, namely making ideas of the discipline readily accessible to a wide audience. Popularisation undermines the mystique of the field, helping outsiders to gain insight into central areas. Many academics look down on popularisers even when such individuals are accomplished scholars. Ironically, some popularisers serve their disciplines by building public support. But just as theory is venerated in universities although most funding comes for applications, so esoteric research contributions are lauded whereas those who are popular with students and the wider public are greeted with suspicion. The latter are a threat because they have a power base not controlled by the discipline itself.
One more factor is vital in this complex situation: hierarchy. Not everyone doing research is equal. At the top are directors of research institutes, university managers and editors of prestigious journals. Research hierarchies seldom are straight up and down like in the military, but involve a complex array of positions. A researcher can be influential through supervising many research students, heading a department, sitting on a research grants committee, being an official in a professional association, or editing a journal. The figures who combine many of these roles are powerful in the discipline.
Hierarchy helps to orient research to sources of funding and to disciplinary priorities. The more powerful researchers often have personal or professional links with powerful figures in funding organisations. Junior researchers who might be tempted to stray from conventional research topics are brought into line by the competition for positions, funding and status. To get a job, to get research grants, to get promotions, it is highly advantageous to follow the beaten track, innovating enough to distinguish oneself from others but not so much as to threaten the existing system of knowledge. Most prominent popularisers are senior figures who have already established their scholarly reputations and have secure jobs. Younger scholars keep their heads down.
Education for hire?
From the point of view of the classical ideals of higher education, which can be summarised by the phrase “the pursuit of truth,” modern higher education has many failings.
Knowledge is treated as a commodity, passively accepted and absorbed by student consumers.
Classroom experience is organised around the premise that learning results only from being taught by experts.
Knowledge is divided into narrow disciplinary boxes.
Original, unorthodox thoughts by students, and nonconventional choices of subjects and learning methods, are strongly discouraged.
Competition prevails over cooperation.
Knowledge and learning are divorced from social problems or channelled into professional approaches.
Credentials, the supposed symbols of learning, are sought more than learning itself.
Performance in research takes precedence over commitment to teaching.
Most research is narrow, uninspired and mediocre, useful only to other experts or vested interests.
Scholarly openness and cooperation take second place to the academic rat race and power struggle which involves toadying, backstabbing, aggrandisement of resources and suppression of dissidents.
Original or unconventional thoughts by staff, or action on social issues, are penalised, while narrow conformist thought and action are rewarded.
The existing system of knowledge production is quite complex, but understanding its main features explains a lot.[6] It can be summarised as follows. Funding in particular areas and for particular applications is of fundamental importance in government and corporate research laboratories. Within the university sector, funding is important but so are disciplines. Knowledge production and teaching are divided up according to disciplines and research specialties. Some disciplines are closely tied to particular professions, but disciplinary elites have a great deal of power. Finally, hierarchy within research communities keeps most junior researchers in line. The essence of the academic system is remarkably stable in spite of periodic upheavals. Although funding, disciplines and hierarchy help to orient most research to groups with more money and power, the system is not totally controlled. Researchers sometimes align themselves with goals and groups outside the mainstream.
Intellectuals on their own are not major wielders of power. They mostly operate to serve other powerful groups, especially governments, corporations and professions, by providing useful knowledge and by providing legitimacy for policies and practices.[7] For example, engineers do their job to help improve roads, factories, electricity systems and computer networks, and thus serve transport departments, industrial enterprises, electricity authorities and computer companies. By being the experts in designing such systems, they provide legitimation for the process, in which nonexperts have little say unless they are key figures in the relevant organisation.
Social activists often express great frustration and annoyance with academics who are in such a good position to help the cause but do so little. A tenured academic has job security, a good salary, flexible working hours and a great deal of control over areas to research — not to mention, in many cases, specialist knowledge and considerable skills in writing and speaking. Such a person could be a tremendous asset to a hard-pressed activist group dependent on volunteers and without the capacity to carry out in-depth investigations. While quite a few academics sympathise with environmental, peace, feminist, antiracist and other social movements, very few become heavily involved. Hence the frustration.
5
For critiques of some disciplines, see for example Stanislav Andreski,
6
Some good treatments — all of US higher education — are J. Victor Baldridge,
7
Charles Derber, William A. Schwartz and Yale Magrass,