Bringing Culture Wars to Campus

The university does not exist to generate talking points

We spend a lot of time arguing about and wrestling over institutions—church, schools, libraries, companies, and more. All the drama makes some people want to start fresh. Fair enough. There is room for improvement in all of these areas. 

All too often, however, people forget that institutions need to be founded on, and operate from, positive aims. So many of the new supposedly alternative options are not actually very different from what is already on offer.

Consider the case of the University of Austin. It was launched with great fanfare in 2021—a new institution with big names and big money. The goal was an independent university to fight the rise of illiberalism. Its denizens would be unafraid to bring up unpopular views. University of Austin offers “forbidden courses.” Some of its founding figures included “higher education critics and iconoclasts such as former New York Times columnist Bari Weiss, Harvard academic Steven Pinker, former Harvard University president Lawrence H. Summers and playwright David Mamet.”

Almost immediately, the University of Austin was trolled online by others associated with higher education. Despite being in it for free speech and allegedly unconcerned about consequences, many of the big names quickly began dropping out. Steven Pinker was one of the early figures to depart. On the one hand, this could look like nothing more than a reaction from, as the critics might put it, the “illiberal left” or “institutional elites.” After all, who opposes a “university dedicated to the fearless pursuit of truth?” 

But the truth was a little more nuanced. The University of Austin was supposed to be an alternative to other institutions. In reality, it wasn’t even accredited. They couldn’t offer degrees. Two years later they still don’t offer degrees. They teach “forbidden courses,” but to what end? The University of Austin launched as a solution to the crisis in higher ed without being able to provide higher ed. This wasn’t a serious alternative founded by serious people. It was a haven for people with unpopular opinions, built to cash in on the culture wars. When they encountered friction, many big names fled.

There is real room for alternative approaches to college. But the temptation to build an institution tied to the culture wars is just too strong for many people. Add a few big names and the right talking points and funders seem easier to find. It would be refreshing to see donors give to new universities that are all about quality and are not all about making waves. After all, a university should be about educating its students, not generating talking points. It would also be refreshing to see donors willing to give to existing universities that are quietly doing good work, offering degrees, and not tying themselves to political fortunes. Unfortunately, there is cash in the culture wars.

Many of the “alternatives” to allegedly overly political campuses are just differently political campuses. A couple years ago R.R. Reno wrote an op-ed explaining that he now avoids hiring Ivy League graduates. He claimed that such grads were either “woke,” or too easily cowed by student activists, or too damaged. He wrote, “I’ve met recent Ivy grads with conservative convictions who manifest a form of posttraumatic stress disorder. Others have developed a habit of aggressive counterpunching that is no more appealing in a young employee than the ruthless accusations of the woke.” Instead, he recommended hiring from places like Hillsdale. Of course, Hillsdale is not some neutral alternative to a “woke” campus; it is increasingly politically conservative and entangled in partisan politics. In fact, probably no elite or state university is as remotely involved in the culture wars, on all levels of society, as Hillsdale is currently.

In order to achieve change in higher ed, we have to face the truth about the campus culture wars. Students and professors are certainly part of the picture, but parents and politicians are constantly weighing in. Many campuses have become battlegrounds primarily because of outside factors. It’s a shame, because when we bring the culture wars to campus, institutions become tools. It doesn’t help anyone learn and it can lead to students being unfairly labeled based on where they graduated. Ostensibly we argue over colleges because we care, but we don’t do things to actually reduce tuition or secure better faculty. Instead, we war over syllabi for upper-level electives and get involved in individual tenure cases. We don’t acknowledge the universities that uphold the ideal. 

There are plenty of reasons to complain about higher ed, but a reactionary approach won’t lead to improvement—or genuine alternatives. The response to the perception of an overly politicized campus shouldn’t just be a differently politicized campus. Higher education is as ripe for innovation and alternative visions as any other industry, but to create meaningful change we have to see our universities as significant institutions with positive aims, rather than as tools in a larger project. Students deserve better. A university should be a place of learning, not a platform. 

Elizabeth Stice is Associate Professor of History at Palm Beach Atlantic University. Her essays have appeared at Front Porch Republic, History News Network, and Mere Orthodoxy.