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Passing on the Right: Conservative Professors in the Progressive University
Few seem to think conservatives should become professors. While the left fears an invasion of their citadel by conservatives marching to orders from the Koch brothers, the right steers young conservatives away from a professorial vocation by lampooning its leftism. Shields and Dunn quiet these fears by shedding light on the hidden world of conservative professors through 153 interviews. Most conservative professors told them that the university is a far more tolerant place than its right-wing critics imagine. Many, in fact, first turned right in the university itself, while others say they feel more at home in academia than in the Republican Party. Even so, being a conservative in the progressive university can be challenging. Many professors admit to closeting themselves prior to tenure by passing as liberals. Some openly conservative professors even say they were badly mistreated on account of their politics, especially those who ventured into politicized disciplines or
expressed culturally conservative views. Despite real challenges, the many successful professors interviewed by Shields and Dunn show that conservatives can survive and sometimes thrive in one of America's most progressive professions. And this means that liberals and conservatives need to rethink the place of conservatives in academia. Liberals should take the high road by becoming more principled advocates of diversity, especially since conservative professors are rarely close-minded or combatants in a right-wing war against the university. Movement conservatives, meanwhile, should de-escalate its polemical war against the university, especially since it inadvertently helps cement progressives' troubled rule over academia.
expressed culturally conservative views. Despite real challenges, the many successful professors interviewed by Shields and Dunn show that conservatives can survive and sometimes thrive in one of America's most progressive professions. And this means that liberals and conservatives need to rethink the place of conservatives in academia. Liberals should take the high road by becoming more principled advocates of diversity, especially since conservative professors are rarely close-minded or combatants in a right-wing war against the university. Movement conservatives, meanwhile, should de-escalate its polemical war against the university, especially since it inadvertently helps cement progressives' troubled rule over academia.
256 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 2016
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March 21, 2016
This book is both courageous and judicious. Clearly it takes courage for two mid-career scholars to argue, in the broadest and most public way (through a scholarly monograph published by Oxford University Press), that the academy - particularly the social sciences they both call home - is rife with bias and prejudice. It is judicious in seeking, as much as possible, to find common ground with members of that biased academy, to give their prejudices and hypocrisies the most generous possible construction, and to recommend modest solutions rather than a radical overhaul.
The core of the book is an extensive study of 153 conservative faculty at 84 colleges and universities. Authors omitted religious colleges or universities in which hiring decisions are bound by statements of religious belief or confession (though, given their conclusion that the discipline of sociology is itself effectively promulgating a secular religion, one wonders whether there may be interesting parallels). There are two central contributions the book makes. First is to advance an argument as to the reasons why conservatives are scarce among faculty in the social sciences; second is a portrait of the largely isolated - even closeted - conservative professor.
Regarding the former claim, Shields and Dunn put to rest well worn arguments that the conservative mind is somehow unsuited for academic work - angry, reactionary, authoritarian - while the liberal mind is open and alive to novelty, persuasion, and transformation. They cite evidence that upsets this categorization, and that even demonstrates that conservatives are far better able to understand the liberal point of view than liberals are to understand the conservative point of view. They suggest that this results from the simple fact that liberals have simply never encountered conservative beliefs. Particularly interesting in this regard are their repeated findings that many conservative (or conservative-friendly) scholars were persuaded about the sensibility of conservative ideas after encountering them in books, or through students or academic colleagues. This thread runs throughout, and is a powerful part of their argument for intellectual diversity.
Nevertheless, the overwhelming cause of the leftist slant in the social sciences is the simple fact that more left-leaning graduate students enter the academy than right-leaning graduate students. They cite research that only 20% of students who express an interest in completing a Ph.D. identify as conservative; conservatives are outnumbered 4 to 1 even at the start of the graduate school pipeline, before entering the liberal echo chamber of the academy. And to call this academic echo chamber "liberal" is itself an understatement. They argue that there are three times the number of Marxists as Republicans in the social sciences, and point out repeatedly that disciplines like sociology are animated by a Marxist Utopianism that turns an academic pursuit into a religious vocation. (Let us remember that these are likely the only Marxists who exist in America, beside the authors of Slate.com.) More, they caution their liberal social scientist colleagues by drawing heavily on the work of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt to the effect that humans are terrible at being aware of our own biases, and deeply prone to rationalizing those biases when we flatter ourselves that we are engaging in reason. Their book has a salacious appeal in sharing anecdotes about the obnoxious and condescending ways in which leftist faculty engage with their conservative colleagues.
The authors are both conservatives themselves, and are clearly aware of these patterns of an intellectually insular majority engaging in what might otherwise be called "micro aggressions" against conservative faculty. This part of the book, in which conservative faculty speak about the loneliness, isolation, and fear they experience, often as "closeted" conservatives, within the academy, is the most poignant. At the bare minimum, it becomes clear why so few conservatives are willing to pursue an academic path; indeed, the authors find that over 20% of conservative faculty actively dissuade conservative students from entering the academy. Stepping back from this sad portrait of conservatives in the academy, though, one can see in these scholars a remarkable bravery in their devotion to the highest ideals of scholarship in pursuit of truth.
Shields and Dunn are not entirely negative in their portrait of conservatives in the academy. They do point out many stories of conservatives who feel fulfilled in the academy, and who have good professional relationships, even friendships, with liberal colleagues. They indicate that in some circumstances conservatives are welcome by liberal colleagues - sometimes as a novelty, but also because of a legitimate interest on the part of some to engage with conservatives and their ideas. And they express a lack of patience for conservative political movements that seek to demonize the academy, or that seek some kind of conservative "affirmative action". Their longer term project seems to be to that of demystifying the academy to talented young conservatives who may enjoy a career in ideas, and in demystifying conservatives to liberals in the academy who embrace the academy as a place of intellectual diversity, academic freedom, and, perhaps most highly, collegiality.
The core of the book is an extensive study of 153 conservative faculty at 84 colleges and universities. Authors omitted religious colleges or universities in which hiring decisions are bound by statements of religious belief or confession (though, given their conclusion that the discipline of sociology is itself effectively promulgating a secular religion, one wonders whether there may be interesting parallels). There are two central contributions the book makes. First is to advance an argument as to the reasons why conservatives are scarce among faculty in the social sciences; second is a portrait of the largely isolated - even closeted - conservative professor.
Regarding the former claim, Shields and Dunn put to rest well worn arguments that the conservative mind is somehow unsuited for academic work - angry, reactionary, authoritarian - while the liberal mind is open and alive to novelty, persuasion, and transformation. They cite evidence that upsets this categorization, and that even demonstrates that conservatives are far better able to understand the liberal point of view than liberals are to understand the conservative point of view. They suggest that this results from the simple fact that liberals have simply never encountered conservative beliefs. Particularly interesting in this regard are their repeated findings that many conservative (or conservative-friendly) scholars were persuaded about the sensibility of conservative ideas after encountering them in books, or through students or academic colleagues. This thread runs throughout, and is a powerful part of their argument for intellectual diversity.
Nevertheless, the overwhelming cause of the leftist slant in the social sciences is the simple fact that more left-leaning graduate students enter the academy than right-leaning graduate students. They cite research that only 20% of students who express an interest in completing a Ph.D. identify as conservative; conservatives are outnumbered 4 to 1 even at the start of the graduate school pipeline, before entering the liberal echo chamber of the academy. And to call this academic echo chamber "liberal" is itself an understatement. They argue that there are three times the number of Marxists as Republicans in the social sciences, and point out repeatedly that disciplines like sociology are animated by a Marxist Utopianism that turns an academic pursuit into a religious vocation. (Let us remember that these are likely the only Marxists who exist in America, beside the authors of Slate.com.) More, they caution their liberal social scientist colleagues by drawing heavily on the work of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt to the effect that humans are terrible at being aware of our own biases, and deeply prone to rationalizing those biases when we flatter ourselves that we are engaging in reason. Their book has a salacious appeal in sharing anecdotes about the obnoxious and condescending ways in which leftist faculty engage with their conservative colleagues.
The authors are both conservatives themselves, and are clearly aware of these patterns of an intellectually insular majority engaging in what might otherwise be called "micro aggressions" against conservative faculty. This part of the book, in which conservative faculty speak about the loneliness, isolation, and fear they experience, often as "closeted" conservatives, within the academy, is the most poignant. At the bare minimum, it becomes clear why so few conservatives are willing to pursue an academic path; indeed, the authors find that over 20% of conservative faculty actively dissuade conservative students from entering the academy. Stepping back from this sad portrait of conservatives in the academy, though, one can see in these scholars a remarkable bravery in their devotion to the highest ideals of scholarship in pursuit of truth.
Shields and Dunn are not entirely negative in their portrait of conservatives in the academy. They do point out many stories of conservatives who feel fulfilled in the academy, and who have good professional relationships, even friendships, with liberal colleagues. They indicate that in some circumstances conservatives are welcome by liberal colleagues - sometimes as a novelty, but also because of a legitimate interest on the part of some to engage with conservatives and their ideas. And they express a lack of patience for conservative political movements that seek to demonize the academy, or that seek some kind of conservative "affirmative action". Their longer term project seems to be to that of demystifying the academy to talented young conservatives who may enjoy a career in ideas, and in demystifying conservatives to liberals in the academy who embrace the academy as a place of intellectual diversity, academic freedom, and, perhaps most highly, collegiality.
July 13, 2017
I consider it ironic and hypocritical that the liberal and progressive scholars who preached things like diversity, are making lives of conservative professors harder than it should. It is like being a conservative just as the same as practicing heresy. This tendency is prevalent in most of the social science studies, except economics, which is more tilted towards libertarianism. But if you are a cultural conservative, you are playing the game of life the hard way. I can say so, for I am still currently undergoing undergraduate study, and I can name a few lecturers who are unashamedly political in their teaching, and mostly are leftists. Diversity of opinions is an utopian notion in campus these days.
October 24, 2017
-Efficient
-Matter of fact
-Well researched
-Self-Critical
I enjoyed this book immensely and am resolved to become a professor having read this.
-Matter of fact
-Well researched
-Self-Critical
I enjoyed this book immensely and am resolved to become a professor having read this.
May 24, 2021
4.5/5
This book is absolutely great. In barely more than 200 pages, it packs a lot of punch. I expected interviews with conservative and libertarian professors, and it is that too. It offers a look into the lives of right-wing academics that is often shocking and yet not unexpected. The people in this book told stories of clandestine meetings with similarly minded academics in hotel rooms were they could speak freely. They talked about losing out on job opportunities because their political alignment was discovered, and they talked about losing friends when they “came out”. However, Shields and Dunn also cover what conservatism is versus how it is often understood by more progressive academics, what a conservative sociology might look like, what academics have argued are the reasons there aren’t more conservatives in academia (and why they’re wrong), and why we should even care about what political views are represented in the social sciences and humanities.
Passing on the Right is, most importantly, a book we need right now. Because progressive bias in academia is real. A friend of mine and I have lately been discussing whether we should pursue academic careers. On the one hand, we both love our subjects. On the other, we’re worried about the politicization of our disciplines, and how we’ve both experienced that our opinions have been labelled too conservative – and we’re centrists. And if only people of a particular political inclination feel comfortable expressing their views, those who care about academic freedom and the pursuit of knowledge should worry.
If I have one complaint, it is that this book is focused entirely on America. Some of the professors they interview are immigrants, but they all work in the United States, and American politics is at the heart of this book. It makes sense to make the US their main focus for what is a short and to-the-point book rather than a large comprehensive study, but I would have appreciated a few paragraphs where they discuss how and why we see a similar (albeit not identical) trend in non-American universities.
Passing on the Right might seem niche, but I wholeheartedly recommend it. I’m not sure whether it made me feel more hopeful about the future of academia or less – on the one hand, these professors have been able to make careers, but often at a personal cost (be that hiding their political alignment or being harassed by colleagues). Nevertheless, books on political diversity in academia are actually being published these days, and with its accessible writing and breadth, I hope Passing on the Right reaches a broad readership.
This book is absolutely great. In barely more than 200 pages, it packs a lot of punch. I expected interviews with conservative and libertarian professors, and it is that too. It offers a look into the lives of right-wing academics that is often shocking and yet not unexpected. The people in this book told stories of clandestine meetings with similarly minded academics in hotel rooms were they could speak freely. They talked about losing out on job opportunities because their political alignment was discovered, and they talked about losing friends when they “came out”. However, Shields and Dunn also cover what conservatism is versus how it is often understood by more progressive academics, what a conservative sociology might look like, what academics have argued are the reasons there aren’t more conservatives in academia (and why they’re wrong), and why we should even care about what political views are represented in the social sciences and humanities.
Passing on the Right is, most importantly, a book we need right now. Because progressive bias in academia is real. A friend of mine and I have lately been discussing whether we should pursue academic careers. On the one hand, we both love our subjects. On the other, we’re worried about the politicization of our disciplines, and how we’ve both experienced that our opinions have been labelled too conservative – and we’re centrists. And if only people of a particular political inclination feel comfortable expressing their views, those who care about academic freedom and the pursuit of knowledge should worry.
If I have one complaint, it is that this book is focused entirely on America. Some of the professors they interview are immigrants, but they all work in the United States, and American politics is at the heart of this book. It makes sense to make the US their main focus for what is a short and to-the-point book rather than a large comprehensive study, but I would have appreciated a few paragraphs where they discuss how and why we see a similar (albeit not identical) trend in non-American universities.
Passing on the Right might seem niche, but I wholeheartedly recommend it. I’m not sure whether it made me feel more hopeful about the future of academia or less – on the one hand, these professors have been able to make careers, but often at a personal cost (be that hiding their political alignment or being harassed by colleagues). Nevertheless, books on political diversity in academia are actually being published these days, and with its accessible writing and breadth, I hope Passing on the Right reaches a broad readership.
November 16, 2016
Passing on the Right is a thought provoking book whose ambiguously phrased title reflects a tension at the heart of the authors’ argument. On the one hand, Shields and Dunn would like to perpetuate (“pass on”) and even expand the presence of conservatism in the modern, progressive university. This entails, in part, encouraging young conservatives to consider careers in academia. On the other hand, they make a powerful case that the contemporary university is in many ways an inhospitable, unwelcoming place for conservative scholars and perspectives in the social sciences and the humanities. In fact, many conservative professors lead or have led closeted existences, “passing” as liberals so as to avoid trouble. Shields and Dunn thus pitch various arguments to academic progressives on behalf of greater ideological tolerance. Here is their challenge: If the authors make the modern university seem too inhospitable, they risk losing potential conservative talent. Yet if they paint too rosy a picture, they not only do a disservice to aspiring conservative scholars who definitely need to understand the challenges they face and their rather circumscribed range of career choices, they also fail to critically engage the academic progressives whose minds they’d like to change.
Shields and Dunn proceed by providing a look at right-wing professors, and their findings run counter to many voices on the right and left which argue that conservatives and modern universities are a bad fit. They make clear that for many conservative professors, the university itself served as the cradle of their intellectual and political identities. In terms of political identities, this is much more true for libertarian conservatives than social conservatives. (By the way, conservatism in this book is treated as a loose coalition of perspectives united in opposition to modern liberalism.) Intellectually speaking, professors across the conservative spectrum are often animated as least as much by their professional identity as their political one. For instance, as the authors show, the methodological fault lines in disciplines tend to be more central than political preferences. Also, some areas of inquiry are just extremely remote from contemporary politics. A shared intellectual commitment to undergraduate liberal education is yet another, not uncommon link that transcends politics. Not surprisingly, then, as children of the university, conservative professors tend to identify with it, and often are among its ablest defenders. Along with progressive intellectuals, they tend to distrust conservative populism and attempts from outside sources to interfere with the workings of academia, and share the notion that a learned elite cultivated and proved in a modern research university should play a larger role in guiding society. As presented by Shields and Dunn, conservative professors in many ways fit the profile of mainstream academics. And they are a successful, academically productive group.
Even so, conservative professors in the social sciences and the humanities are a rare breed.The authors think that the biggest reason for this is that a progressive “spiritual project” is apparent in many disciplines; conservatives are skeptical of the secular-utopian outlook this project entails, and tend to stay away. (There is of course a kind of utopianism to be found among some radical libertarian conservatives, though they obviously differ from the progressives over the status of “planning.”) So Shields and Dunn think that inevitably, there will be more liberals than conservatives in certain politically charged fields. However, our authors think there are other factors at play, including various types of discrimination against conservative academics. (Social conservatives generally have a rougher experience than libertarians.) Their examination of such mistreatment, and of various coping strategies employed by conservative professors, makes for some powerful reading. Though some conservative reviewers seem upset that the authors did not take a more enraged tone, rage would have ill served the authors’ constructive goals. At any rate, Shields and Dunn have provided enough evidence of conservatives being treated unfairly to nag at the conscience of any progressive professor honestly concerned about tolerance. And as if to balance their catalogue of mistreatment, they also enunciate several advantages they think conservative professors end up enjoying over their more liberal counterparts, and provide advice as to which disciplines and academic sub-fields are most accessible to conservatives.
Shields and Dunn also supply several reasons why the university would be stronger with more conservative professors. For instance, they argue that both teaching and research would likely improve if their was more ideational/political plurality. Though a good teacher can conscientiously expose students to ideas and perspectives the teacher rejects, and even portray them fairly sympathetically for pedagogical purposes, not all professors make the effort, and there is also something to be said for students hearing ideas from teachers who actually believe them. A more pluralistic setting could also enable professors to model civil discourse over points of intellectual disagreement for the students. Also,the general importance of ideational pluralism as a spur to better research and scholarship is presented as especially important in the case of conservatives, whose skepticism concerning the ultimate realization of a secular utopia and willingness to question progressive sacred cows brings a certain “realism” to the collaborative effort to better guide society through coordinated intelligence. The authors also argue that an increase in the number of conservative professors might help head off the attempts of republican governors to cut off funding for social sciences and the humanities, which are currently viewed as training grounds for progressive activism.
I think Shields and Dunn should be commended for highlighting the mistreatment of conservative scholars in academia, for providing a useful guidebook for potential conservative scholars in the rising generation, and for demonstrating that conservative professors are in fact children of the university, committed to its integrity and successful participants in its endeavors. I also agree with them that the university would be a better place with more conservative professors. I am not an academic, but I do have an undergraduate degree from a liberal arts college, and I can say from experience that undergraduate liberal education would be vastly improved with greater ideational/political pluralism. It also seems fairly obvious that the authors make a valid point when they say research in universities would benefit from a more robust conservative presence in the social sciences.
However, I have some criticisms of the book. I think the authors somewhat downplay the negative effects that going to a contemporary college/university can have on students, likely because they don’t want to scare away potential conservative scholars from entering the academic pipeline. I would agree with them that the amount of deliberate indoctrination tends to be smaller than it is often purported to be-though it is still a problem-but certainly the lack of pluralism, especially at “the best” colleges, means there ends up being a whole lot of socialization toward left leaning assumptions and interpretations about the world. Shields and Dunn seem to half heartedly acknowledge this. Though they claim that the political identity of students tends to remain fairly stable over time, they concede that students probably become more liberal as a result of college. The progressive college/university experience is not merely, as the authors would have it, a missed opportunity to explore other perspectives-and a fairly expensive missed opportunity at that!-it tends to socialize students while not giving them the resources to understand what has been done to them.
Also, I must confess that as a teacher at the secondary level who witnessed the destructive technocratic failure known as No Child Left Behind, and knowing that this education undermining monstrosity had support from many conservative and progressive academics, I am inclined to dwell on the idea that the more pluralistic modern research university the authors envision would still not be immune to the hubris and conceits of scientism. In fact, since Shields and Dunn indicate that a “weakness” of critics of scientism is their inability to develop research agendas, one must assume a technocratic bias will always be built into the system.
Speaking of some problematic effects of elitism, I would like to add that the authors’ general portrayal of conservative professors’ attitudes leaves me with the strong impression that the vast majority of conservative professors were likely more comfortable with Bill Kristol’s “never-Trumpism” than with the insightful point of view articulated in “The Flight 93 election.” It seems clear from Passing on the Right that to be a conservative academic means to be a brave person who has endured much in order to earn “a place at the table;” perhaps this is a noteworthy factor in explaining why these conservative academics collectively seem more concerned with keeping their place at the table as “acceptable” junior partners than with really attempting to strike a blow at the progressive juggernaut.
Shields and Dunn proceed by providing a look at right-wing professors, and their findings run counter to many voices on the right and left which argue that conservatives and modern universities are a bad fit. They make clear that for many conservative professors, the university itself served as the cradle of their intellectual and political identities. In terms of political identities, this is much more true for libertarian conservatives than social conservatives. (By the way, conservatism in this book is treated as a loose coalition of perspectives united in opposition to modern liberalism.) Intellectually speaking, professors across the conservative spectrum are often animated as least as much by their professional identity as their political one. For instance, as the authors show, the methodological fault lines in disciplines tend to be more central than political preferences. Also, some areas of inquiry are just extremely remote from contemporary politics. A shared intellectual commitment to undergraduate liberal education is yet another, not uncommon link that transcends politics. Not surprisingly, then, as children of the university, conservative professors tend to identify with it, and often are among its ablest defenders. Along with progressive intellectuals, they tend to distrust conservative populism and attempts from outside sources to interfere with the workings of academia, and share the notion that a learned elite cultivated and proved in a modern research university should play a larger role in guiding society. As presented by Shields and Dunn, conservative professors in many ways fit the profile of mainstream academics. And they are a successful, academically productive group.
Even so, conservative professors in the social sciences and the humanities are a rare breed.The authors think that the biggest reason for this is that a progressive “spiritual project” is apparent in many disciplines; conservatives are skeptical of the secular-utopian outlook this project entails, and tend to stay away. (There is of course a kind of utopianism to be found among some radical libertarian conservatives, though they obviously differ from the progressives over the status of “planning.”) So Shields and Dunn think that inevitably, there will be more liberals than conservatives in certain politically charged fields. However, our authors think there are other factors at play, including various types of discrimination against conservative academics. (Social conservatives generally have a rougher experience than libertarians.) Their examination of such mistreatment, and of various coping strategies employed by conservative professors, makes for some powerful reading. Though some conservative reviewers seem upset that the authors did not take a more enraged tone, rage would have ill served the authors’ constructive goals. At any rate, Shields and Dunn have provided enough evidence of conservatives being treated unfairly to nag at the conscience of any progressive professor honestly concerned about tolerance. And as if to balance their catalogue of mistreatment, they also enunciate several advantages they think conservative professors end up enjoying over their more liberal counterparts, and provide advice as to which disciplines and academic sub-fields are most accessible to conservatives.
Shields and Dunn also supply several reasons why the university would be stronger with more conservative professors. For instance, they argue that both teaching and research would likely improve if their was more ideational/political plurality. Though a good teacher can conscientiously expose students to ideas and perspectives the teacher rejects, and even portray them fairly sympathetically for pedagogical purposes, not all professors make the effort, and there is also something to be said for students hearing ideas from teachers who actually believe them. A more pluralistic setting could also enable professors to model civil discourse over points of intellectual disagreement for the students. Also,the general importance of ideational pluralism as a spur to better research and scholarship is presented as especially important in the case of conservatives, whose skepticism concerning the ultimate realization of a secular utopia and willingness to question progressive sacred cows brings a certain “realism” to the collaborative effort to better guide society through coordinated intelligence. The authors also argue that an increase in the number of conservative professors might help head off the attempts of republican governors to cut off funding for social sciences and the humanities, which are currently viewed as training grounds for progressive activism.
I think Shields and Dunn should be commended for highlighting the mistreatment of conservative scholars in academia, for providing a useful guidebook for potential conservative scholars in the rising generation, and for demonstrating that conservative professors are in fact children of the university, committed to its integrity and successful participants in its endeavors. I also agree with them that the university would be a better place with more conservative professors. I am not an academic, but I do have an undergraduate degree from a liberal arts college, and I can say from experience that undergraduate liberal education would be vastly improved with greater ideational/political pluralism. It also seems fairly obvious that the authors make a valid point when they say research in universities would benefit from a more robust conservative presence in the social sciences.
However, I have some criticisms of the book. I think the authors somewhat downplay the negative effects that going to a contemporary college/university can have on students, likely because they don’t want to scare away potential conservative scholars from entering the academic pipeline. I would agree with them that the amount of deliberate indoctrination tends to be smaller than it is often purported to be-though it is still a problem-but certainly the lack of pluralism, especially at “the best” colleges, means there ends up being a whole lot of socialization toward left leaning assumptions and interpretations about the world. Shields and Dunn seem to half heartedly acknowledge this. Though they claim that the political identity of students tends to remain fairly stable over time, they concede that students probably become more liberal as a result of college. The progressive college/university experience is not merely, as the authors would have it, a missed opportunity to explore other perspectives-and a fairly expensive missed opportunity at that!-it tends to socialize students while not giving them the resources to understand what has been done to them.
Also, I must confess that as a teacher at the secondary level who witnessed the destructive technocratic failure known as No Child Left Behind, and knowing that this education undermining monstrosity had support from many conservative and progressive academics, I am inclined to dwell on the idea that the more pluralistic modern research university the authors envision would still not be immune to the hubris and conceits of scientism. In fact, since Shields and Dunn indicate that a “weakness” of critics of scientism is their inability to develop research agendas, one must assume a technocratic bias will always be built into the system.
Speaking of some problematic effects of elitism, I would like to add that the authors’ general portrayal of conservative professors’ attitudes leaves me with the strong impression that the vast majority of conservative professors were likely more comfortable with Bill Kristol’s “never-Trumpism” than with the insightful point of view articulated in “The Flight 93 election.” It seems clear from Passing on the Right that to be a conservative academic means to be a brave person who has endured much in order to earn “a place at the table;” perhaps this is a noteworthy factor in explaining why these conservative academics collectively seem more concerned with keeping their place at the table as “acceptable” junior partners than with really attempting to strike a blow at the progressive juggernaut.
January 27, 2018
If you were thinking this book would just be conservatives griping about the liberal academy, you would be dead wrong. Rather, this is a thoughtful, balanced, data-driven analysis of the relationship between politics, research, and teaching that makes a lot of fascinating points. The authors are conservatives, and I definitely don't agree with everything they say, but they did a great job in a modest-sized book showing how conservatives fare in academia and how more of them (or a certain type of them) would benefit the social sciences/humanities as a whole.
It's important to note Shields' method first. Shields interviewed a couple hundred self-identified conservatives in the social sciences and humanities, many of whom were "passing on the right," or hiding their political views in order to safeguard their academic careers. There are a number of distinct risks an untenured conservative can run by being open: shunning from colleagues, not getting jobs or promotions, difficulty publishing, and social isolation. The book itself couples interviews with these professors and studies of politics and academia going back in the last few decades.
When we talk about conservatives in the academy, we are really talking about 2 kinds. First is what Shields calls "Madisonian conservatives" (could also be called Burkeans). These people are pretty far from Trumpers or the Christian right. They tend to believe that because of the frailties of human nature, human beings need to be constrained by institutions, norms, laws, traditions, and social structures that give them meaning and set the grounds for flourishing. In many ways, they could be called classical liberals. There are a good number of social/cultural conservatives as well, although these are more clustered in Christian colleges. The other group are libertarians, who are close to liberals on social issues like abortion but close to conservatives on the size/role of government and the market. This group is clustered in economics, which was by far the least political and most ideologically balanced discipline in the study, probably because it is so quantitatively driven and methodologically rigorous. The polar opposite of this was "studies" (ethnic, LGBT, racial, gender), from which Shields could literally find no conservative scholars to speak to because they do not exist. If your discipline requires that you hold certain political views to be a member, it isn't a discipline, it is a political and ideological enterprise. The fact that you effectively cannot be a conservative ethnic studies professor speaks volumes about these "disciplines."
One thing I really admired about this book was its balanced tone and perspective. Most interview respondents didn't catastrophize or exaggerate the liberal/left bias of their colleagues. The author and most of his subjects agreed that the majority of professors care about unbiased research and teaching and are open and civil to conservative colleagues. There was, of course, variations by discipline. Some disciplines, like sociology, have adopted openly political mission statements. The liberal/left vision of the purpose of sociology is to bring about the emancipation, equality, and moral affirmation of all people as autonomous agents with the right to live out their lives as they desire, constructing their own identities and entering/exiting relationships free of restraint or judgment. I'm paraphrasing here, but it is clear to me that this is a heavily ideological mission that makes clear assumptions about human beings. It's equally clear that that research based on this viewpoint would heavily focus on certain issues and gravitate to certain explanations while ignoring others. This is how a discipline becomes staid, self-referential, and discredited in the public eye. Shields looks at what a conservative sociology might look like in what I found to be one of the book's most fascinating points: it would look at the preservation of social institutions to guide the wayward tendencies of individuals, it would treat the individual as embedded in systems and structures of meaning that are not inherently oppressive, it would warn of the risks of tinkering with long-standing norms and institutions, it would ask why some nations/communities do better at managing human frailties, and it would treat things like sex differences as not entirely socially constructed. The point here is not that this approach to the discipline would be free of bias or that it would capture all of what sociology should capture. The point is that thinking about what a discipline would be like if its ideological composition flipped is a useful mirror for seeing the biases of the discipline as it is. Having more people around who would hold opposed visions of the discipline and assumptions about human behavior broadens our thinking and forces us to challenge rather than just reaffirm our thinking.
In terms of the role of history in society, I'm probably closer to conservative and moderate liberal visions. I like to think of historians as referees more than players in political/ideological disputes, telling each side where they are right and wrong. Before you say "you can't be neutral on a moving train," let me ask if we can credibly act as expert judges if we are openly identified with one side of the debate in all cases. I for one think that the average liberal's view of history is much more informed and accurate than the average conservatives, so I believe by being the honest broker historians will end up furthering liberal causes more often than not.
So let me wrap up by making a liberal's case for more conservative scholars in academia. In a Millian sense, any community benefits from a diversity of viewpoints, which compel you to dig into the premises and assumptions behind your own ways of thinking. This requires that we work against our innate tendency to silence the dissenters in our midst. Going further with Mill, there's no substitute for hearing these ideas straight from the horse's mouth. I can give a good lecture on, let's say, the thought of Edmund Burke, but a conservative who treats Burke as a foundation of her own thinking will put her whole heart into presenting Burke and will probably do a better job than me. In a teaching sense, it is disquieting that students will go out into a center-right nation in which conservative ideas are incredibly prominent without learning about those ideas in college either from a conservative or a fair-minded liberal professor. For example, there are 3x more Marxists in the social sciences and humanities than there are conservatives, which is pretty dang skewed compared to the general population. We are absolutely doing them a disservice in this sense, feeding their belief that conservatism is solely about prejudice and fierce defenses of the status quo. In research terms, more conservatives will broaden the questions we ask and the answers we develop. They will also help us speak to a much larger audience and resolve the somewhat distorted public image of universities as leftist brainwashing mills. Lastly, treating "out" conservatives as parts of our disciplines, committed to teaching and research, will help resolve polarization or at least offer a model for how a community devoted to certain goals can mitigate that polarization. This can be as simple as just talking to them as if they weren't the enemy but colleagues.
Reading into conservatism doesn't actually make me more or less liberal. It helps me understand what being a liberal means, what assumptions I make about the world, and how that affects my teaching and research. This activity may chasten some of my liberal tendencies (like my tendency to focus on social constructions), but it strengthens others (like my view that conservatism is intellectually "easier" but morally weaker in the sense that it allows for more acceptance of the way things are and more justification of extant evils). It also helps me differentiate among conservatives so I can see where people's actions are coming from, why they do stuff I disagree with, and how we can even team up to defeat certain orange-haired threats to the Constitution and human rights.
So don't be afraid. Make an effort to see how the other side sees it without the distorting lens of someone on your own side. I recommend this book for everyone in academia: it is balanced, enlightening, and highly relevant.
It's important to note Shields' method first. Shields interviewed a couple hundred self-identified conservatives in the social sciences and humanities, many of whom were "passing on the right," or hiding their political views in order to safeguard their academic careers. There are a number of distinct risks an untenured conservative can run by being open: shunning from colleagues, not getting jobs or promotions, difficulty publishing, and social isolation. The book itself couples interviews with these professors and studies of politics and academia going back in the last few decades.
When we talk about conservatives in the academy, we are really talking about 2 kinds. First is what Shields calls "Madisonian conservatives" (could also be called Burkeans). These people are pretty far from Trumpers or the Christian right. They tend to believe that because of the frailties of human nature, human beings need to be constrained by institutions, norms, laws, traditions, and social structures that give them meaning and set the grounds for flourishing. In many ways, they could be called classical liberals. There are a good number of social/cultural conservatives as well, although these are more clustered in Christian colleges. The other group are libertarians, who are close to liberals on social issues like abortion but close to conservatives on the size/role of government and the market. This group is clustered in economics, which was by far the least political and most ideologically balanced discipline in the study, probably because it is so quantitatively driven and methodologically rigorous. The polar opposite of this was "studies" (ethnic, LGBT, racial, gender), from which Shields could literally find no conservative scholars to speak to because they do not exist. If your discipline requires that you hold certain political views to be a member, it isn't a discipline, it is a political and ideological enterprise. The fact that you effectively cannot be a conservative ethnic studies professor speaks volumes about these "disciplines."
One thing I really admired about this book was its balanced tone and perspective. Most interview respondents didn't catastrophize or exaggerate the liberal/left bias of their colleagues. The author and most of his subjects agreed that the majority of professors care about unbiased research and teaching and are open and civil to conservative colleagues. There was, of course, variations by discipline. Some disciplines, like sociology, have adopted openly political mission statements. The liberal/left vision of the purpose of sociology is to bring about the emancipation, equality, and moral affirmation of all people as autonomous agents with the right to live out their lives as they desire, constructing their own identities and entering/exiting relationships free of restraint or judgment. I'm paraphrasing here, but it is clear to me that this is a heavily ideological mission that makes clear assumptions about human beings. It's equally clear that that research based on this viewpoint would heavily focus on certain issues and gravitate to certain explanations while ignoring others. This is how a discipline becomes staid, self-referential, and discredited in the public eye. Shields looks at what a conservative sociology might look like in what I found to be one of the book's most fascinating points: it would look at the preservation of social institutions to guide the wayward tendencies of individuals, it would treat the individual as embedded in systems and structures of meaning that are not inherently oppressive, it would warn of the risks of tinkering with long-standing norms and institutions, it would ask why some nations/communities do better at managing human frailties, and it would treat things like sex differences as not entirely socially constructed. The point here is not that this approach to the discipline would be free of bias or that it would capture all of what sociology should capture. The point is that thinking about what a discipline would be like if its ideological composition flipped is a useful mirror for seeing the biases of the discipline as it is. Having more people around who would hold opposed visions of the discipline and assumptions about human behavior broadens our thinking and forces us to challenge rather than just reaffirm our thinking.
In terms of the role of history in society, I'm probably closer to conservative and moderate liberal visions. I like to think of historians as referees more than players in political/ideological disputes, telling each side where they are right and wrong. Before you say "you can't be neutral on a moving train," let me ask if we can credibly act as expert judges if we are openly identified with one side of the debate in all cases. I for one think that the average liberal's view of history is much more informed and accurate than the average conservatives, so I believe by being the honest broker historians will end up furthering liberal causes more often than not.
So let me wrap up by making a liberal's case for more conservative scholars in academia. In a Millian sense, any community benefits from a diversity of viewpoints, which compel you to dig into the premises and assumptions behind your own ways of thinking. This requires that we work against our innate tendency to silence the dissenters in our midst. Going further with Mill, there's no substitute for hearing these ideas straight from the horse's mouth. I can give a good lecture on, let's say, the thought of Edmund Burke, but a conservative who treats Burke as a foundation of her own thinking will put her whole heart into presenting Burke and will probably do a better job than me. In a teaching sense, it is disquieting that students will go out into a center-right nation in which conservative ideas are incredibly prominent without learning about those ideas in college either from a conservative or a fair-minded liberal professor. For example, there are 3x more Marxists in the social sciences and humanities than there are conservatives, which is pretty dang skewed compared to the general population. We are absolutely doing them a disservice in this sense, feeding their belief that conservatism is solely about prejudice and fierce defenses of the status quo. In research terms, more conservatives will broaden the questions we ask and the answers we develop. They will also help us speak to a much larger audience and resolve the somewhat distorted public image of universities as leftist brainwashing mills. Lastly, treating "out" conservatives as parts of our disciplines, committed to teaching and research, will help resolve polarization or at least offer a model for how a community devoted to certain goals can mitigate that polarization. This can be as simple as just talking to them as if they weren't the enemy but colleagues.
Reading into conservatism doesn't actually make me more or less liberal. It helps me understand what being a liberal means, what assumptions I make about the world, and how that affects my teaching and research. This activity may chasten some of my liberal tendencies (like my tendency to focus on social constructions), but it strengthens others (like my view that conservatism is intellectually "easier" but morally weaker in the sense that it allows for more acceptance of the way things are and more justification of extant evils). It also helps me differentiate among conservatives so I can see where people's actions are coming from, why they do stuff I disagree with, and how we can even team up to defeat certain orange-haired threats to the Constitution and human rights.
So don't be afraid. Make an effort to see how the other side sees it without the distorting lens of someone on your own side. I recommend this book for everyone in academia: it is balanced, enlightening, and highly relevant.
February 21, 2025
Fascinating and well-researched. Should be required reading for all administrators and faculty in higher ed to help understand our conservative colleagues and the value they bring to academia.
July 4, 2016
Passing on the Right is an excellent examination of the role of political/cultural leanings and their role in university faculties. This is a far more balanced and nuanced appraisal than most screeds from those outside the academy, but that should be expected.
Some disclosure, I am left leaning (no party affiliation, too many immediately associate leanings with politics exclusively and it is often more cultural and social than pure politics, politics is simply where the cultural is often played out when the natural course runs afoul of those in control of the legislatures) and my time in academia was short and about two decades ago. That should give enough ammo to anyone who chooses to blame my opinions on how I lean rather than address them rationally.
I absolutely agree that there should be more conservatives in academia. Just as the research here indicates, liberal professors are not involved (on the whole, no doubt there is an exception or two) in indoctrinating their students. The conservative faculty I have been associated with also on the whole did not try to indoctrinate. The key is not to prohibit the opinions of the faculty from being included in a classroom situation but to make sure that it doesn't inhibit open discourse. It is the open discourse and exchange of ideas that improves society as a whole and makes each student a better person.
Universities have been liberal leaning for many, many years almost by definition. A liberal stance (not always embodied within specific liberals) is one open to change, debate and progress, thus learning new and conflicting ideas. A conservative stance is about mostly maintaining the status quo, minimizing and slowing change and avoiding the introduction of too much new information which does not contribute to those goals. So universities have usually been liberal (to the point where even the staunchest "political" conservatives on campus are quite liberal as far as their stance toward learning and open engagement). During periods of particular political conservatism universities are typically attacked as being anti-whatever.
So it makes perfect sense for universities to have a wide range of faculty. there is no such thing as a non-politicized classroom. One which masquerades as one is simply one which is content with the status quo and does not want open debate and exchange of ideas. Whether the professor is liberal or conservative, open discourse will make the classroom political, and the professor should not be prohibited from expressing their opinions and ideas. The hard part for some is how to do so without inhibiting the students. The presence of these various ideas across campus will lead to better debate and discourse in the political and cultural realms. There is a horrible lack of open debate currently, to the point where liberal and conservative become the only important signifiers and all of our other identities become subsumed under those two headings.
This volume does an excellent job of debunking some of the worst claims about academia while pointing out where changes need to be made. Hopefully this book will also lead some conservative undergrads and grad students to consider academia as a career, for both self-fulfillment and as a service to society. The liberal students are already doing so for the exact same reasons.
While I readily recommend this book to academics I would also highly recommend it to those outside academia who prefer to blame higher education for society's ills rather than actually think about the problems and find solutions. There is plenty here to engage anyone interested in the future of higher education or society as a whole.
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
Some disclosure, I am left leaning (no party affiliation, too many immediately associate leanings with politics exclusively and it is often more cultural and social than pure politics, politics is simply where the cultural is often played out when the natural course runs afoul of those in control of the legislatures) and my time in academia was short and about two decades ago. That should give enough ammo to anyone who chooses to blame my opinions on how I lean rather than address them rationally.
I absolutely agree that there should be more conservatives in academia. Just as the research here indicates, liberal professors are not involved (on the whole, no doubt there is an exception or two) in indoctrinating their students. The conservative faculty I have been associated with also on the whole did not try to indoctrinate. The key is not to prohibit the opinions of the faculty from being included in a classroom situation but to make sure that it doesn't inhibit open discourse. It is the open discourse and exchange of ideas that improves society as a whole and makes each student a better person.
Universities have been liberal leaning for many, many years almost by definition. A liberal stance (not always embodied within specific liberals) is one open to change, debate and progress, thus learning new and conflicting ideas. A conservative stance is about mostly maintaining the status quo, minimizing and slowing change and avoiding the introduction of too much new information which does not contribute to those goals. So universities have usually been liberal (to the point where even the staunchest "political" conservatives on campus are quite liberal as far as their stance toward learning and open engagement). During periods of particular political conservatism universities are typically attacked as being anti-whatever.
So it makes perfect sense for universities to have a wide range of faculty. there is no such thing as a non-politicized classroom. One which masquerades as one is simply one which is content with the status quo and does not want open debate and exchange of ideas. Whether the professor is liberal or conservative, open discourse will make the classroom political, and the professor should not be prohibited from expressing their opinions and ideas. The hard part for some is how to do so without inhibiting the students. The presence of these various ideas across campus will lead to better debate and discourse in the political and cultural realms. There is a horrible lack of open debate currently, to the point where liberal and conservative become the only important signifiers and all of our other identities become subsumed under those two headings.
This volume does an excellent job of debunking some of the worst claims about academia while pointing out where changes need to be made. Hopefully this book will also lead some conservative undergrads and grad students to consider academia as a career, for both self-fulfillment and as a service to society. The liberal students are already doing so for the exact same reasons.
While I readily recommend this book to academics I would also highly recommend it to those outside academia who prefer to blame higher education for society's ills rather than actually think about the problems and find solutions. There is plenty here to engage anyone interested in the future of higher education or society as a whole.
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
December 7, 2016
Being in an engineering discipline, politics don’t play a huge role. The numbers are the numbers, and that’s the end of that. But this book still struck a chord. The main premise is that conservatives are underrepresented in academia, particularly in the social sciences: sociology, history, literature, political science, and economics.
A few points I found interesting:
Within the social sciences, economics and political science are the most conservative-friendly, many professor even being surprised that such a book was being published.
While not there isn’t really widespread bias regarding ideology within academia, a high proportion of professors agreed that they would be more likely to hire someone who had the same political opinions.
A career as a professor has almost become a liberal career type, much like teacher and nurse are a female career type.
Some effects of the lack of political homogeneity: many conservative professors live “in the closet” until they receive tenure, they have to be careful what they publish and where they publish to “safe” topics, and they have to engage in some form of self-censorship to avoid outing themselves.
Conservative opinions are valuable to both conservatives and liberals on campus. It broadens creativity; conservatives want to research topics that many liberals don’t even consider, such as the role of religion in the civil rights movement, or gender differences. It forces liberals to hold their own research to a higher level of rigor. And it helps everyone have a broader perspective.
A few points I found interesting:
Within the social sciences, economics and political science are the most conservative-friendly, many professor even being surprised that such a book was being published.
While not there isn’t really widespread bias regarding ideology within academia, a high proportion of professors agreed that they would be more likely to hire someone who had the same political opinions.
A career as a professor has almost become a liberal career type, much like teacher and nurse are a female career type.
Some effects of the lack of political homogeneity: many conservative professors live “in the closet” until they receive tenure, they have to be careful what they publish and where they publish to “safe” topics, and they have to engage in some form of self-censorship to avoid outing themselves.
Conservative opinions are valuable to both conservatives and liberals on campus. It broadens creativity; conservatives want to research topics that many liberals don’t even consider, such as the role of religion in the civil rights movement, or gender differences. It forces liberals to hold their own research to a higher level of rigor. And it helps everyone have a broader perspective.
March 9, 2019
Solid information, much too long for the information content.
YES, conservatives are a dying breed in especially the humanities at university. YES, this means that we are in danger of have essentially no actual diversity of thought in the acadamy.
The irony of how many conservatives have to remain "in the closet" behaving as if they were liberals and how similar it is to what the old gay experience was is facinating. It is even sadder because sex is one of the 4 basics of life we share with the animal kingdom ... "Feeding, Fleeing, Fighting and er "Fornicating in 4 letters". The basics are not very intellectual.
Sexual orientation is not mainly intellectual -- political bias is.
As I said, the information is good -- how the left consistently tries to "conservatism" a kind of mental or charachter deficiency that is disqualifying for an academic life. Conservatives fill the role that "Jews and Gays" once filled ... "just not the sort of people that you really want to associate with ... you know, kind of "queer / different".
If you have the time and/or the ability to speed read, perhaps worth it.
YES, conservatives are a dying breed in especially the humanities at university. YES, this means that we are in danger of have essentially no actual diversity of thought in the acadamy.
The irony of how many conservatives have to remain "in the closet" behaving as if they were liberals and how similar it is to what the old gay experience was is facinating. It is even sadder because sex is one of the 4 basics of life we share with the animal kingdom ... "Feeding, Fleeing, Fighting and er "Fornicating in 4 letters". The basics are not very intellectual.
Sexual orientation is not mainly intellectual -- political bias is.
As I said, the information is good -- how the left consistently tries to "conservatism" a kind of mental or charachter deficiency that is disqualifying for an academic life. Conservatives fill the role that "Jews and Gays" once filled ... "just not the sort of people that you really want to associate with ... you know, kind of "queer / different".
If you have the time and/or the ability to speed read, perhaps worth it.
Read
July 15, 2016378.125 S5553 2016
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