Will We Ratify the Constitution of Knowledge?

• Author: Daniel Cullen
• Position: Professor of Philosophy, Rhodes College
• Pages: 959-973

Will We Ratify the Constitution of Knowledge?

DANIEL CULLEN*

ABSTRACT

The commitment to free speech and academic freedom or, more comprehen-

sively, to what Jonathan Rauch calls “the constitution of knowledge” is not

compatible with “inclusion” as the latter is understood in administrative initia-

tives on its behalf. But a reconciliation comes into view once we pose the naı

¨

ve

question: “Inclusion in what?” The answer proffered here is: an academic com-

munity of inquirers, inclusion in which is as expansive as possible but for rea-

sons independent of identity. Parsing the meanings of free speech and academic

freedom brings the impersonal character of academic community into the fore-

ground and clarifies the ethical demands associated with free inquiry.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. RECONCILING FREE SPEECH AND INCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 959

II. FREE SPEECH VERSUS FREE EXPRESSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 961

III. THE VIRTUES OF THE CONSTITUTION OF KNOWLEDGE . . . . . . . . . . 963

IV. THE CONSTITUTION OF KNOWLEDGE AND INCLUSIVE FREEDOM . . 966

V. FREE SPEECH AND OPEN INQUIRY AS A PATH OF INCLUSION . . . . . 968

VI. THE FIRST AMENDMENT IS NOT ENOUGH .

.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 970

VII. CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 972

I. RECONCILING FREE SPEECH AND INCLUSION

Is free speech threatened by the colleges and universities that ought to be its

guardians or is college education threatened by it? While the question has been

debated in higher education circles since the 1980s, the public was taken aback in

2017 by the spectacle of students demanding freedom from speech and using dis-

ruption and force to achieve it. At Middlebury College the “free speech under

* Daniel Cullen is Professor of Philosophy, Rhodes College. His writings include Freedom in

Rousseau’s Political Philosophy; Liberal Democracy and Liberal Education (ed.); and various essays

on political philosophy, democratic theory, and liberal education. © 2022, Daniel Cullen.

959