Editor's Introduction: Revisioning Higher Education

• Date: 01 May 2017
• Published date: 01 May 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ajes.12193

The AMERICAN JOURNAL of

ECONOMICS and SOCIOLOGY

Published Q U A R T E R L Y in the interest of constructive

synthesis in the social sciences, under grants from the

FRANCIS NEILSON FUND and the ROBERT SCHALKENBACH

FOUNDATION. Founded in 1941

Volume 76 May 2017 Number 3

Editor’s Introduction:

Revisioning Higher Education

Introduction

What is the purpose of higher education? In this issue, seven schol-

ars address that question from a variety of perspectives. Most are

from the United States and Canada, but one article is by a team

from China. Although China’s current enrollment rate in higher edu-

cation is lower than the world average, its growth rate has been

almost 12 percent per year, even faster than its legendary 10 percent

economic growth rate. Nevertheless, as in the United States and oth-

er countries, the rationale for higher education is in flux in China.

The fundamental question is one of practice versus principle: Is

attending college supposed to increase the probability of finding a

good job, or is it supposed to be an opportunity for intellectual and

personal development?

1

In the past, there was little conflict between

those two aims. When only a small percentage of the population

attended college, there was a close fit between schooling and pro-

fessional job openings. That began to change during two periods of

democratization of higher education for white students (but not for

African Americans): the 1862 Morrill Act that created land grant

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 76, No. 3 (May, 2017).

DOI: 10.1111/ajes.12193

V

C2017 American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Inc.

colleges and universities and the 1944 G.I. Bill that provided soldiers

in World War II with tuition vouchers. The more accessible higher

education became, the more competitive the job market became for

those with college degrees.

In recent decades, enrollment has undergone another democratic

transition. In 1974, only 17 percent of 18-to-24 year-olds enrolled in

four-year colleges in the United States. By 2015, the enrollment rate

had almost doubled to 30 percent (NCES 2016). With so many peo-

ple in the labor force with a bachelor’s degree, a job that might

once have been open to a high school graduate is only open to a

college graduate. Most professional jobs now require a graduate

degree of some kind.

These changing conditions, combined with rising costs, have left

a growing number of Americans frustrated with the system of higher

education. Approximately two-thirds of Americans still expect col-

lege to prepare students for a career, but that does not mean their

expectations are satisfied. As recently as 2009, a majority (55 per-

cent) of Americans said one must have a college degree to succeed

in life. But by 2013, only 42 percent agreed with that view. Part of

the reason for this loss of confidence in higher education lies with

the common view (among 59 percent) that colleges these days oper-

ate like businesses and are not really concerned about the quality of

education (Public Agenda 2016).

Nothing New: Frustrations with Academia

The frustrations that Americans currently experience regarding

higher education are far from novel. In large part, this stems from a

cultural conflict over whether a college education is “practical.”

Parents sacrifice to send their children to college, but then they are

dismayed by the strange ideas that their children are taught.

The Enlightenment taught us to think of the future as the place

where the truth lies, whereas the past contains only error and super-

stition. Yet, there are times when a study of history gives us a new

perspective on our present concerns. In the case of higher educa-

tion, a three-century leap backward may help us see that the

The American Journal of Economics and Sociology528

problems of the modern university may not have a simple, technical

solution. The frustrations experienced today were known long ago.

Jonathan Swift ([1726] 1939: 149–182) penned a brilliant satire of the

learned societies and universities of his day in Part 3 of Gulliver’s Trav-

els, where Gulliver is brought to the island of Laputa, floating a few

miles above the surface of the earth. There he encounters a kingdom

of intellectuals who are completely out of touch with the world imme-

diately around them: “One of their eyes turned inward, and the other

directly up to the zenith” (Swift [1726] 1939: 149). Each of these men

whom we might call “absent-minded professors” is followed by a ser-

vant, whose sole task was to force the master, when necessary, to

notice surrounding events. The members of this strange society regard

as contemptible all practical matters, such as making clothes that fit or

building sturdy houses. Scholars are devoted entirely to pure mathe-

matics and music theory, which makes their lives unbalanced and full

of abstract speculations, so they are unable to carry on a conversation.

In his commentary, Swift makes clear he favors an education that we

would now call “liberal arts”—a curriculum that gives students the

capacity to talk about any domain of human understanding and to see

its connection with others.

In Lagado, the earth-based capital city of the kingdom governed

by the Laputians, Gulliver discovers that the love of pure theory has

largely destroyed the kingdom. The researchers in the academies on

the ground, influenced by the intellectuals in the air, believe they

can make improvements in every aspect of life, but their theories

are not infused with the humility of true science:

In these colleges, the professors contrive new rules and methods of agri-

culture and building, and new instruments and tools for all trades and

manufactures, whereby, as they undertake, one man shall do the work

of ten, a palace may be built in a week, of materials so durable as to last

forever, without repairing; all the fruits of the earth shall come to maturi-

ty at whatever season we think fit to choose, and increase an hundred

fold more than they do at present; with innumerable other happy pro-

posals. The only inconvenience is, that none of these projects are yet

brought to perfection; and, in the meantime, the whole country lies mis-

erably waste, the houses in ruins, and the people without food or

clothes. By all which, instead of being discouraged, they are fifty times

Editor’s Introduction 529