Academia's Role in Strengthening the Foundation of a Democratic Society
Richard M. Freeland
President Emeritus, Northeastern University
November 9, 2006

I am an educator, a historian, and a former college president. I love my work. I love the daily contact with young people, the fellowship of colleagues who pursue knowledge, the bustle of campus life, and the satisfactions of commencement.

But what matters most to me is the opportunity to participate in the most revolutionary movement in human history and the most powerful force for social justice ever conceived. For that is what higher education has become.

The founding fathers were clear about this. Thomas Jefferson’s belief that an enlightened citizenry is the foundation of democracy has been reaffirmed over the years, by educators from Horace Mann to Charles Eliot, philosophers from Ralph Waldo Emerson to John Dewey, and statesmen including Woodrow Wilson and Lyndon Johnson.

For me, the political significance of education first registered when I was a young Ph.D., inspired by John F. Kennedy’s call to public service. At age 28, surveying the range of institutions in which I might work, I could see no better way to strengthen our democracy than to teach at a great urban university. Today, 37 years later, after ten years as president of Northeastern, I still believe what I believed then, only more intensely.

Most Americans would quickly identify representative government, free elections, the rule of law, and a free press as essential institutions for a healthy democracy. But few would as readily include our higher education system on such a list, although colleges and universities are a vital foundation of our political system.

Higher education sustains democracy in four ways:
1) We provide a protected arena for free expression and the nurturing of new thoughts.
2) We cultivate an appreciation of democracy and a disposition to public service.
3) We offer individuals a chance to discover and develop their talents.
4) We foster economic growth and, therefore, individual opportunity.

How successful has academia been in carrying out each of these missions?

A Forum for Free Speech and New Ideas
Our role in facilitating the free expression of ideas is obvious, though our record over the past half-century has been uneven. During the 1950s, some institutions succumbed to anti-Communist politics that compromised this critical function. During the Vietnam War, free speech was largely protected and campus-based protests influenced national debate on foreign policy.

More recently, two developments have threatened academia’s position as an unconstrained forum for free expression. One, of our own making, has been the phenomenon of political correctness. Some institutions have made efforts—swiftly struck down by the courts—to craft formal codes limiting speech. Some ideas do have trouble being heard.

Since September 11, 2001, new worries have arisen. The University of North Carolina faced legislative attack for assigning a book about the Koran. A conference on Islam at the University of Texas was covertly investigated by federal agents. And while the Patriot Act of 2001 includes some necessary measures, it also contains other unfortunate provisions, such as the requirement that university librarians disclose individuals’ reading habits.

These phenomena tell us that higher education is vulnerable to the political pressures of the day and that courage and leadership are required to protect freedom of expression. We cannot, even today, take the blessings of freedom for granted. That said, neither political correctness nor post-9/11 anxieties have altered the fundamental reality that American academia represents one of the freest arenas for both inquiry and speech on the face of the earth.

To Respect and to Serve
When we turn our attention to higher education’s role in instilling an appreciation for democracy, we also see a mixed history. During World War II and the Cold War, democratic values were readily enshrined in core curricula. During the 1960s and 1970s, however, the context of Vietnam, followed quickly by the rise of multiculturalism, discredited the notion that a university should explicitly support any particular political system.

Today, higher education is conflicted. Clearly, academia’s belief in free speech provides young people with an essential foundation for democratic life, as does our commitment to respecting individuals from all backgrounds. Yet it would be difficult to persuade the faculty of any major university to endorse democracy formally or adopt degree requirements intended to promote democratic political forms.

In the contemporary academy, active support for democracy occurs around the edges of academic programs rather than within the curricular core. Many colleges and universities promote community service. Extracurricular life remains a fertile training ground for democratic participation. Many institutions encourage students to exercise the right to vote and encourage civic engagement through invited speakers.

These activities, though valuable, are marginal. Higher education should do more, both within the curriculum and in the extracurricular arena, to foster an appreciation of democratic values, without compromising openness to ideas of all kinds.

Springboard for Mobility
Though higher education has a mixed record in promoting civic values, it has had outstanding success in providing opportunities for individuals to develop themselves. Since World War II, higher education has evolved from an enclave of privilege to a springboard for social mobility. Traditional barriers to college have been reduced or eliminated, and the expansion of the public sector, combined with heightened attention to merit and financial aid among private institutions, has created the world’s first system of mass higher education.

But these gains in access are not secure. One significant challenge stems from the assault on affirmative action in admissions. In California, Florida, and Texas, the presence of minorities in state institutions has already declined, though subsequent enactment of plans guaranteeing access to top high school graduates has partially compensated for the loss. Although the Supreme Court decision in the Michigan case allowed for a continuation of appropriately crafted affirmative action policies, Michigan's passage this week of a referendum banning affirmative action creates doubts about the future salience of that decision. It would be tragic for this practice to be abandoned in the absence of other, equally effective means to ensure minority access.

A second contemporary challenge to access comes from reduced public spending for higher education, a phenomenon that most severely impacts students in low-income brackets. At a time when postsecondary education represents the dividing line between a decent prospect for economic success and a lifetime of struggle, we cannot afford to exclude bright but poor students from college without undermining our democracy.

Priming the Economic Engine
The fourth context in which higher education has advanced democracy is economic growth, which higher education fosters through innovation in research and the preparation of a skilled workforce. In recent times, no other country comes close to matching the United States in the arenas of discovery and technological innovation. While we academics may grumble that neither federal nor corporate support for academic research is strong enough, and while there are concerns about specific issues such as stem cell research, Americans can be secure about the strength of our research enterprise.

The biggest challenge academia faces as an engine of the economy is in workforce development. Not enough young Americans are entering scientific, mathematical, and engineering disciplines to fuel a technology-oriented economy, and our graduate and research programs in these fields have become far too dependent on foreign students who may depart after graduation. More broadly, we are not doing enough across all our institutions to ensure that a college degree truly prepares students for the demands of economic life. While some incremental gains have been made in both of these areas, much work remains.

Shoring Up the Foundation
That concludes my quick review of academia’s track record in protecting the strength of American democracy. How does it balance out? Would Jefferson, Mann, or Dewey be pleased with our work? And should our fellow citizens be satisfied?

In some areas, there is solid cause for confidence. Intellectual life on American campuses has never been more vibrant. We may complain about ideological bias and worry about constraints on free inquiry, but, in the final analysis, the intellectual vitality of our academic enterprise is sufficiently strong to meet these challenges. For this same reason, we also can be optimistic that the nation’s research enterprise will continue to generate ideas and innovations to drive economic development and opportunity.

We should be less certain, however, that the blessings of education will continue to be accessible to all young people, or that the quality of undergraduate education is as high as we want it to be. We must be vigilant, lest longstanding barriers like race and income continue to constrain opportunity, and we need to ensure that, once in college, students encounter challenges that will prepare them to flourish in our highly competitive economy.

Finally, we need to pay more attention to preparing young people not just for personal success, but also for active citizenship. As our nation grows more pluralistic and multicultural, the bonds that hold us together must be strengthened and the ground rules for democratic decision making reinforced. We must continue to ask, what does America mean? What does it mean to be an American?

Overall, we can be proud of academia’s record in sustaining and extending democracy. But there is an old saying in politics: There are no final victories. It continues to take individual acts of courage to protect free speech, stand up for minority access, and protect unfettered inquiry. More public understanding will be needed before equal opportunity will be a reality in this land.

We therefore have work to do to ensure that the academic foundation on which our democracy rests is solid, that the cornerstones described here are firmly in place. That is why, 35 years after I first dreamed of being a college president, I am as inspired by the possibilities for service afforded by my work as I was then.