The Higher Learning in America: A Memorandum on the Conduct of Universities by Business Men

by Robert Maynard Hutchins

Perhaps the pivotal book in the reform of higher education in the United States, Robert M. Hutchins' classic is once again available, with a brilliant personal and professional appreciation by Harry S. Ashmore. When it was published in 1936 The Higher Learning in America brought into focus the root causes of the controversies that still beset the nation's educational system. Taking office in 1929 as president of the University of Chicago, Hutchins began his tenure by declaring the learning available in even the most prestigious universities grossly deficient. He cited himself as case in point. At Yale he had graduated at the top of his college class and set a record in the law school that led to appointment as professor and, at 26, promotion to dean. But he had acquired only "some knowledge of the Bible, of Shakespeare, and Faust, of one dialogue of Plato, and of the opinions of many semi-literate and a few literate judges, and that was about all." The curricular reforms and administrative reorganization he undertook at Chicago are set forth in this volume, along with the philosophical arguments he worked out to explicate and defend his views. His goal was to reestablish the liberal arts and humanities as the basis for undergraduate education, consigning specialization and research to graduate and professional schools. Hutchins envisioned the university as a community of scholars who, in addition to teaching and research, provided independent thought and criticism of a society being rapidly transformed by science and technology. Challenging the educational establishment at every pertinent level, he became the most celebrated―and most controversial―intellectual of his era. After twenty-two years at Chicago, Hutchins became associate director of the newly enriched Ford Foundation, where he was primarily responsible for the bold reforms sponsored by its Fund for the Advancement of Education and Fund for Adult Education. In 1960 he established the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions at Santa Barbara to maintain an ongoing dialogue between scholars and practitioners that would "identify and clarify the basic issues of our time, and widen the circles of discussion about them."

Genres: Education

152 pages, Paperback

First published June 15, 1979

About the author

Robert Maynard Hutchins (LL.B., Yale Law School, 1925; B.A., Yale University, 1921) was an educational philosopher, dean of Yale Law School (1927-1929), and president (1929–1945) and chancellor (1945–1951) of the University of Chicago.

While he was president of the University of Chicago, Hutchins implemented wide-ranging and controversial reforms of the University, including the elimination of varsity football. The most far-reaching reforms involved the undergraduate College of the University of Chicago, which was retooled into a novel pedagogical system built on Great Books, Socratic dialogue, comprehensive examinations and early entrance to college. Although the substance of this Hutchins Plan was abandoned by the University shortly after Hutchins resigned in 1951, an adapted version of the program survives at Shimer College in Chicago.

Editor-in-Chief of Great Books of the Western World and Gateway to the Great Books; co-editor of The Great Ideas Today; Chairman of the Board of Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica (1943-1974).
He was the husband of novelist Maude Hutchins.

Reviews

[Comptes Rendus de René Guénon]

Janvier 1938

Robert Maynard Hutchins. The Higher Learning in America (Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut). – Ce livre, dont l’auteur est président de l’Université de Chicago, est une sévère critique de la façon dont l’enseignement supérieur est actuellement compris et organisé en Amérique, critique qui pourrait certainement trouver à s’appliquer aussi en d’autres pays, car, à un degré ou à un autre, on retrouve partout la même confusion entre l’étude désintéressée et la simple préparation professionnelle, et la même tendance à sacrifier la première à la seconde, en un mot ce qui est ici dénoncé sous le nom d’« anti-intellectualisme », et qui est bien caractéristique de la mentalité « pratique » de notre époque. Il y a lieu de noter spécialement l’attitude de l’auteur à l’égard d’un « progrès » qui ne consiste en réalité qu’en une accumulation toujours croissante de faits et de détails, aboutissant finalement, avec l’appui des théories évolutionnistes, au triomphe de l’« empirisme » et du « professionnalisme » dans tous les domaines, et à la dispersion indéfinie en « spécialités » qui rendent impossible toute éducation d’une portée générale et vraiment intellectuelle. Il ne nous appartient pas d’examiner les remèdes proposés pour réagir contre cet état de choses, mais il est tout au moins un point qui est pour nous digne d’attention : l’enseignement d’une Université, tel que le conçoit l’auteur, devrait être ordonné tout entier par rapport à une discipline centrale qui en serait comme le principe d’unité ; la théologie jouait ce rôle au moyen âge ; il pense que cela n’est plus possible dans les circonstances présentes, mais qu’on pourrait plutôt revenir à quelque chose d’analogue à ce qui existait chez les Grecs, en faisant appel à cet égard, à la métaphysique, qu’il paraît d’ailleurs concevoir dans le sens aristotélicien, c’est-à-dire uniquement « ontologique » ; si limitée que soit cette conception par rapport à tout ce qu’est la véritable métaphysique entendue traditionnellement, il n’y en a pas moins là, une idée assez remarquable et dont la réalisation serait fort à souhaiter, d’autant plus qu’il ne faut pas oublier qu’il ne s’agit en somme que d’un enseignement « exotérique », comme tout enseignement universitaire l’est par définition même, et où, par conséquent, il ne serait sans doute guère possible d’aller plus loin en ce sens.

[Matt Ely · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is best read for the perspective of a university insider's critique of higher education rooted in a specific philosophy. The reader may find Hutchins' solutions untenable, and that's okay. But it's only because he has a clear vision of what the university ought to be that he can point out its shortcomings so clearly. This is the advantage of a systemic critique that can resort to a canon of authority, much like he advises for general education, instead of piecemeal disagreements with specific policies.

The reader will also find it interesting to see how much language is equally applicable ninety years later.

The language really is the key here. You read Hutchins in order to find a way to speak about higher education in different terms. This is a great, compact introduction to a perennialist approach to that conversation.