Rothman, Kors, O'Brien, Allen, and Agresto 21

but h igher educa t ion itself does not create the one or the o the r quality, and uneduca t ed vice is less powerful in its ability to succeed than educa ted vice.

The h igher primates are curious about the world, and it is ul t imately f rom that curiosity, in the highest pr imate o f all, that all o f our academic sciences arose. The h u m a n being also has empathy, and f rom this so m u c h o f the hu- manities arose. The re are individuals with a burn ing h u n g e r for excel lence, fulfillment, self-awareness, knowledge, and the means o f truly critical thought : pu t t hem together, and you have some insti tution of h ighe r learning. Attack those ethological drives and private passions as regressive, as has been done since the 1960s, and you paradoxically end up with the self-indulgent beast teaching the potential h u m a n being. Banish the cri ter ion of social responsibility f rom our universities, and you paradoxically might restore our curiosity and our drive to critical excel lence to the central place of h o n o r in academic life.

What is the responsibility of h igher educat ion to society? Absolutely noth- ing beyond obed ience to the laws that govern this free society, bu t those laws protect against fraud, deceit, and tort. What is the responsibility I should love to see you all embrace? It is the responsibility to your own true self, c rea ted by your disciplinary and intellectual hungers and by the passions o f your indi- vidual minds, spirits, and sensibilities. Tha t is the light our universities n e e d in the darkness created by the mania of social responsibility. The re is no social justice; there is only justice. Social just ice is a denial o f just ice itself. The re is no social responsibility beyond mainta in ing (at, indeed , individual cost) the rule of law that is the sine qua non of our individual, voluntary pursuits. Be- yond that, there is no social responsibility; there is only responsibility; so-called social responsibility, we see daily, is a denial of responsibility itself.

Plain Pointed Shoes and the Higher Good

Dennis O'Brien: president emeritus, University of Rochester and BuckneU Univer- sity. His most recent book is All the Essential Half-Truths about Highe r Educat ion (University of Chicago Press, 1998).

I want to place the question, "What is Higher Educat ion 's Responsibility to Society?" within the f ramework o f the overall confe rence theme: "Our Univer- sities and Our Culture." The obvious p rob lem with a topic like '~Our Universi- ties and Our Culture" is gaining perspective on "our." Like all self-reflective activities, discoursing on our universities is likely to be defensive, political, idealistic, d i s to r t ed - - any th ing but a sober, dispassionate assessment of the na ture of our beloved or be leaguered beast. Reflecting on self-reflection sug- gested to me a radical strategy for my remarks. I propose to discuss 'Thei r

22 Academic Questions / Fall 1999

Universities and Their Culture." Accept ing that task, the next quest ion is "which there for their?" What o the r universities and cultures would give perspective? It s eemed to me that the most u n c o n t a m i n a t e d " o t he r " - -ye t one with the most p ro found c o n n e c t i o n - - w o u l d be the very first universities in o r d e r to contrast their sense of self and society with ours.

The earliest documen ta ry evidence we have for the existence of the univer- sity is in a papal decree of 1209, Ex litteris vestre. The d o c u m e n t contains Pope Innocen t III's reply to an appeal f rom the masters of Paris. The appeal is lost, so we have to reconstruct the situation f rom the Pope 's reply. The principal issue was that some of the young masters of arts (m0derni doctores liberalum) were not wearing the p rope r cos tume and refusing to a t tend the funerals o f deceased colleagues. In o rde r to correct such breaches o f conduct , e ight depu- ties f rom the faculties o f theology, law, and the arts had drawn up statutes. A certain Master G., having refused to swear allegiance to the new regulations, had been expelled. Master G. then repented his ways; he indicated his willingness to take the oath of submission in order to obtain reinstatement. The original provisions evidently did no t provide for repen tance . The masters o f Paris asked the Pope whether it was p rope r to re-admit Master G. I nnocen t repl ied that if Master G.'s amends satisfied the masters, he could be readmit ted.

Lest one think that p rope r cos tume and funeral duties are trivia accidently d redged up f rom the dust-heap of history, I would po in t ou t that in the fa- mous statutes of the University of Paris drawn up by Cardinal Rober t o f Courson in 1215--s ta tutes which are widely regarded as the magna carta of the univer- sity m o v e m e n t - - f u n e r a l a r rangements for m e m b e r s o f the university are the most e laborate and detai led of the provisions. Nor was cos tume neglected: Courson's d o c u m e n t dictated that, when lecturing, masters were to wear "a simple black round ankle length cope, a pallium, and plain shoes with po in t ed toes. "~ In the t rendy spirit o f deep decons t ruc t ion , I cons ider plain po i n t ed shoes the central po in t o f my remarks. Before we get to the shoes, a few b road observations.

The fundamenta l revelation which emerges f rom Ex litteris vestre is that by the year 1209 there existed in Paris a guild of masters p repa red to establish their own internal rules of conduct . After all, there have been teachers and masters since Pythagoras, bu t what marked the university m o v e m e n t was the format ion of a corpora t ion , a "legal person" which would have pe rpe tu i ty beyond the life o f a single master or a collect ion of individual masters. Thus, the significance o f Innocen t III's ruling that it was up to the masters to dec ide who could and could not be long to the corpora te body. It is the co rpora t ion which we call "university" that is at issue.

I repeat , there have been teachers, intellectuals, scientists, ph i losophers , artists, and so on as far back as we can scan h u m a n culture. Most o f t h e m have not been members of the corpora t ion o f the university. If one were to take an area of the greatest significance to the m o d e r n university corpora te body, natu-

Rothman, Kors, O'Brien, Allen, and Agresto 23

ral science, it is worth recalling that most o f the m o d e r n history o f science took place no t only outside the university, bu t in oppos i t ion to the university. One of the great mistakes in discussing the university is to confuse the body corpora te with high science, art, and intellectual endeavor. The university is a corporate , self-regulating body with specific curricula, faculty qualifications, and the like; it may or may no t be a safe haven and creative cen te r for science, art, intellect, and moral insight. University regulat ions may accept only faculty who wear po in ted shoes, and miss the discalced genius. Recall that Socrates was notoriously "shoeless."

As we all know, the term universitas in the middle ages did no t designate educat ional institutions as such. Universitas was the des ignator for various or- ganized bodies; there was a universitas of weavers, a universitas of gold-smiths. In Paris in 1209 it was a universitas of masters w h o m the Pope addressed. At Bologna, in contrast, the corpora te entity was a universitas of s tudents which hired faculty, set wages, and d e t e r m i n e d what was to be taught. Our university is the descenden t o f the universitas of masters, no t o f students. A universitas was a guild organized a r o u n d a specific t rade or skill. O n e o f the pecul ia r aspects derived f rom Ex litteris vestre is the fact that there was one universitas, one guild, for three different skills: law, theology, and the arts. The medieval mode l should have crea ted three gu i lds - - the precursors no t o f the university bu t o f the American Bar Association and the MLA. That there was one Paris universitas of masters f rom different skills has led a leading historian of the per iod to suggest that what un i ted the g roup was the c o m m o n skill as teach- ers. The original universitas was organized as a place o f teaching skill.

If the original universitas was un i t ed as a teaching guild, it would no t be inaccurate to characterize ou r universities as a research guild. I do no t wish to engage in yet ano the r o f those endless pointless pious discourses a b o u t re- search and teaching that infest con t empo ra ry academic p romot iona l rheto- ric. I don ' t believe that pursu ing research means that one avoids s tudents , neglects p repar ing classes and cor rec t ing papers, and all that p ropaganda . There are great researcher-teachers, there are med ioc re researcher- teachers , and we have more than e n o u g h complaints f rom th i r teenth-century l i terature abou t poo r teaching in the medieval schools to realize that Paris was no t a paradise of pedagogical practice.

I suggest that the sense o f teaching as a c o m m o n skill for the universitas rests on a d e e p e r assumption than energy e x p e n d e d in the p resence of stu- dents. Medieval faculty were teachers because there was a teaching which they were obl iged to convey. It is the be l ie f in the existence o f a teaching that is miss ing- -or at least recess ive-- in the research mode l o f ou r universities. The absence of a teaching is bo th the glory and the l imitation o f ou r universities in relation to our society.

To say that there is a teaching implies that there is authori tat ive truth al- ready at hand; authoritative truth, the teaching to be taught, was assumed by

24 Academic Questions / Fall 1999

medieval scholars. If there is anyth ing that we are clear abou t f rom the peda- gogy of the first universities, it was its rel iance on the m e t h o d of authority. In 1209 there were authorit ies everywhere f rom the Bible to the Fathers of the Church to the dictates of the Roman Pontiff. This was true as well in the area of science: physics was a c o m m e n t a r y on Aristotle, medic ine a gloss on Galen.

The intellectual revolution that resulted in our universities can be marked in Descartes's reflection on his university educat ion:

I have been nourished in letters since my childhood, and since I was given to believe that by their means a clear and certain knowledge could be obtained of all that is useful in life, I had an extreme desire to acquire instruction. But as soon as I had achieved the entire course of s t u d y . . . I entirely changed my opinion. For I f o u n d . . , that the effort to instruct myself had no other effect than the increas- ing discovery of my own ignorance. And yet I was studying at one of the most celebrated Schools in Europe.

This quotat ion is f rom Descartes's treatise titled On Method. It was the m e t h o d of author i ty that he expe r i enced at the Jesui t college at La Fleche which Descartes rejected. The only study that Descartes found fruitful was mathemat - ics, because it relied on rat ional intui t ion, no t the sayings o f the ancients . Descartes's inspiration that true knowledge must be f o u n d e d on some sort o f immediacy, whether o f rational insight or s tubborn empirical fact, is central to the research spirit of the m o d e r n university.

Immediacy of evidence contrasts sharply with the medieval not ion that t ruth is uniquely media ted th rough authorit ies. The central pedagogy of the medi- eval university was the lectio in which the master explicated and c o m m e n t e d on some authoritat ive text, a recovery o f the t ruth therein. The govern ing effort of the con temporary university is not recovery, bu t discovery. Truth is not already there in Aristotle or Galen, it awaits on-going research.

Descartes's rejection o f au thor i ty as an appropr ia te university m e t h o d is widely and deeply accepted. The medieval pat tern of study and its latter-day successor, the classical curr iculum of our n ine teen th-cen tury colleges, are re- garded as narrow, parochial, and constrictive of academic f r eedom in the name of religious dogma. University presidents happily welcome the f reshman class by present ing h igher educat ion as a chal lenge to parochialism. Rather than the m e d i e v a l d e f e n s e o f d o g m a , m o d e r n h i g h e r e d u c a t i o n a i m s a t dedogmat iz ing the s tudent body.

I do not want to denigrate Descartes's scientific impulse. I firmly believe that mode rn medicine is bet ter than Galen. One obvious and m u c h used an- swer to the role of our universities in our society is that the university is a superb provider of scientific knowledge and technical invention. Tha t should be sufficient rationale for our enthus iasm and financial donat ions . However, if the role of the university in society is just if ied in this manner , it is because society has been def ined as economic society. The university provides useful

Rothman, Kors, O'Brien, Allen, and Agresto 25

products and skills for the economic well-being of the nat ion. So it does, so it is continually defended , but such a vision of the university is sharply at odds with the medieval universitas magistrorum.

If we are to recover any apprecia t ion o f the medieval assumptions, we have to look at those movements in the con t em pora ry academy that chal lenge the Cartesian assumptions of the research university. T h e r e is such a chal lenge within the complex p h e n o m e n o n o f m o d e r n feminism. Feminist critics in and outside the university object to the Cartesian mode l for its p re tens ion to an impartial, impersonal perspective. The Cartesian voice, it is c la imed, is anything but impersonal and impartial; it is the voice o f patriarchy, o f male domina t ion , a d i sembodied voice ou t of touch with the e m b e d d e d , bodily reality of humanity, and female bodies in particular.

Given the rejection of a t r anscenden t impartial observer, feminism reverts to a m e t h o d o f authority. If we seek the female voice, we want the authori ta- tive voice. Who speaks authentically for women, of women? The search for the authoritative voice is under taken at least in part through methods similar to that of the medieval masters: the interpretat ion of texts. The difference between a medieval Franciscan interpreter and a mode rn feminist interpreter is that the former approaches traditional texts with a hermeneut ic of faith, the latter with a hermeneufic of suspicion. Feminist critics read traditional texts for the femin ine t ruth that has been suppressed, ra ther than the t ruth expressed. Nevertheless, it is th rough the interpretat ion o f texts that one hopes to recover the h idden voice of women. Consider Luce Irigrary's review of the history of philosophy, which she regards as a "fling," an " in t ro(sed)uct ion" to philosophy.

Advocacy of feminist perspectives within the m o d e r n Cartesian university has caused deep concern. Feminism, a long with various o the r e thnic or sexu- ally o r i en ted studies, seems based on a denial o f the impartial i ty o f truth. Political correctness t r iumphs over dispassionate investigation; academic free- d o m is compromised as certain views are banished as sexist, racist, a n d pho- bic. All this can be genuinely worrying. When Robert of Courson drew up the statutes of the University of Paris in 1215, it was explicitly stated that the fac- ulty was prohib i ted f rom teaching Aristotle on natura l phi losophy and the heretical works of David of Dinant, Amaury of BNne, and Maurice o f Spain. Since Aristotle in his natural phi losophy asserts the inferiori ty of the female species and elsewhere the exis tence o f natura l slaves, one could imagine a m o d e r n PC advocate banishing Aristotle f rom the curr iculum.

Heresy is no t jus t get t ing some fact wrong or m u d d l i n g a proof , heresy denies the m e t h o d which gains revelation and truth. Thus, for the Cartesian mind, political correctness is an academic heresy since it seems to deny the very me thodo logy o f fruitful science. Upp ing the rhetorical ante: the life o f science is u n d e r m i n e d . Feminists and medieval scholastics would a rgue in rebuttal that the impartial life o f science is no t life female life or h u m a n l i fe-- in all its partialities and personal meaning .

26 Academic Questions / Fall 1999

In the University Statutes of 1215, David of Dinant and Amaury of B6ne were judged heretical. Why? It seems that they were some sort of pantheists. Pantheism, the absorption of God and all else into nature, offers a fundamen- tal threat to the particularity of the historical voice-- the human or divine person. Christianity was based on an authored text that revealed the voice of a personal God, and thus, so it was held, the authentic voice of sinful humanity. If one is searching for a method to explore human life in all its culture and quirks, something other than transcendent observer status is necessary. Inter- est in human life, authentic human life, the good life calls for strategies above, beyond, or below the Cartesian mind-set.

Maybe I can now try to address the question, "What is the responsibility of higher education to society?" I have already suggested that in one sense that is an easy question to answer. The university's responsibility is to produce knowl- edge, skill, and invention for the society. That justification is fundamentally economic but, for whatever it is worth, that was not the responsibility of the medieval university to its society. Aristotle and the whole classical tradition in ethics made a distinction between the goods necessary for living: food, shel- ter, health, and so on and the good life. The goods necessary for living are economic goods--recall that oikonomia is the Greek for "managing a house- hold"- -and they are sharply distinguished from higher goods, which deter- m i n e the good life for individuals and society. In pursuit of higher goods one may forgo any or most of the household economic goods. The soldier puts his life at peril, the monk abjures wealth. The goods of the soldier, monk, artist, or leader of the polis are what Charles Taylor calls "hyper goods." If higher education has a responsibility to society beyond household goods, it will have to deal in hyper goods; it will have to discuss, define, and defend visions not just of goodies, but the good life. The medieval universities were, of course, very much into hyper goods in so far as theology was the defining discipline, the queen of the sciences. If the university is to have a responsibility to society beyond household goods, my contention is that it will have to do theology or a reasonable facsimile thereof. The queen of the university sciences will be a defense of hyper goods, the good life, the authentic human life. Without get- ring into the metaphysics of theology and hyper goods, what is needed is a methodology for the higher things. Affirmation of hyper goods is nothing more or less than affirming the authoritative voice of human exper i ence - - men, women, sinners, and all the saints.

The medievals were confronted with various competing authoritative voices proclaiming hyper goods and authentic life. Medieval theologians had to deal with their own complex Biblical tradition, the Sic et Non of the Patristics, the subtlety of Averroes and Maimonides, the scope of Aristotle's natural philoso- phy. For better or worse, they thought that they could argue across this range. A medieval theologian would construct a summa that ordered, evaluated, and hierarchized the various claims. Faced with a cacophony of competing voices,

Rothman, Kors, O'Brien, Allen, and Agresto 27

the medievals differ f rom present day multiculturalists by seeking a methodol - ogy of resolution, rather than del ight ing in Derrida's "dance of innumerab le choreographies." Lacking a me thodo logy for assessing and order ing hyper goods, one falls into easy tolerance, meaningless difference, and inarguable relativism.

I said that I would c o m m e n t on funerals and poin ted shoes .Johan Huizenga in his classic Waning of the Middle Ages comments that in medieval times life was stark. When it was light it was light, but when night fell it was darkness itself. A cry in the night, the tolling of bells rang out in the ambien t silence of a world without mo to r cars and radio chatter. Cities were clearly def ined spaces with formidable enclosing walls, no t the sprawling conurbat ions o f the m o d e r n world. Let me pick up that theme and speculate on all those detailed funeral proscriptions. If the world was stark, so indeed was the distinction of life and death. Death was an ever-present reality, the thief in the night. Present life was crucial for eternal life. Having a good life was no t someth ing merely to pon- der and postpone. Funerals were powerful reminders of the stark reality of life. A master who skipped a funeral may have been regarded as misunder- standing the very situation of life, which it was his duty to profess. Socrates said that the purpose of phi losophy was "learning how to die," which meant , of course, learning how to live the sort of good life for which one might be willing to die. If the fundamenta l point of educat ion is the good life and learn- ing how to die, funerals are powerful symbolic momen t s not to be trivialized by a serious educator.

I close with plain po in ted shoes. The cos tume ensemble dictated in the statutes of 1215 was part of university and church reform initiated by Inno- cent III. (Robert of Courson who promulga ted the rules was the papal legate to France.) There had been repea ted complaints about the luxurious living of masters: great banquets, excessive drinking, rich garments. The statutes of 1215 restricted banquets, urged that clothing be given to the poor, and estab- lished a plain clerical black for the masters. In its own way, these c lo th ing restrictions were an outward sign of the noneconomic funct ion of the univer- sity. If the university were simply a place which merchandised goods for the society, there was no reason that the traders in such goods should no t enr ich themselves by that trade. But if the university was a place that dealt in hyper goods, these were goods not subject to economic evaluation. Masters and monks who championed hyper goods should, display a life style and costume in keep- ing with that belief.

I suppose these remarks end by advocating that faculty reinstate the vow of poverty. This will hardly win me friends in the AAUE But while I am no t advo- cating a re turn to monasticism, a black ankle length cope, and po in ted shoes, I do think that the university in exercising responsibility for society should (1) look beyond economic goods, (2) champion hyper goods, and (3) seek with all earnestness an ordered methodology for assessing hyper goods.

28 Academic Questions / Fall 1999

Note 1. Principal data regarding the origins of the university are from Stephen C. Ferruolo,

The Origins of the University: The Schools of Paris and Their Critics 1100-1215 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1985). This reference appears on pages 307-8.

Education as M6tier: Finding the Fabulous in the Universal

William B. Allen: professor of political science, Michigan State University, East Lan- sing, MI, and former director, State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. Dr. Allen's most recent book is The Federalist Papers: A C o m m e n t a r y (Peter Lang, Inc., 1999).

I wish to recall someth ing of inest imable value in this culture, which is the first peaceful transition of g o v e r n m e n t f rom one party to another . T h o m a s Jef ferson accompl ished that and, thereby, es tabl ished that a great ambi t ion could be realized: the ambi t ion to end the cycle o f regimes, to enab le p e o p l e to contes t for political power within the conf in ing s t ructures o f a consti tu- tional regime, and wi thout resor t ing to coups d '6 ta t (which are the cus tomary h u m a n practice when it comes to making political changes) .

Our country is un ique in that respect (which is no t to say that the English const i tut ion has no t been long lived). But ou r coun t ry is un ique in having deliberately set ou t to const ruct a way o f life in which peop le could con tes t differing concept ions o f their political future wi thout having to resort to prac- tices of exclusion, out r ight warfare, and the defea t o f the e n e m y in o r d e r to p roduce consti tutional changes. It used to be (consul t Aristotle's Politics and you will discover it laid ou t as clearly and analytically as is possible to be laid out) that you could no t envision a change o f regime, a change o f rul ing struc- ture or of those prevailing in office, wi thout con templa t ing a literal over throw o f those in office. That does no t h a p p e n in the Uni ted States. All happens quite peacefully, within a const i tut ional s t ructure that is accep ted by all par- ticipants. The re is no legi t imate poli t ical a m b i t i o n - - n o legitimate poli t ical amb i t i on - - t ha t canno t be pu r sued within the confines of the Const i tu t ion of the Uni ted States. And it was T h o m a s Je f fe rson and his e lect ion o f 1800 that, with some difficulty to be sure, nevertheless establ ished that wonde r fu l prece- dent, consistent with the designs o f the Founders . Now app roach ing ano t he r such change in this country, we are made somewha t h u m b l e by the ref lect ion that it is two h u n d r e d years roughly since we first l ea rned how to do it. So, perhaps we should no t take over-great pr ide in ou r accompl i shment , when we recognize the size of the giant shoulders u p o n which we stand in pract ic ing it.