Why would Professors at a public university lean towards a party/political movement that has consistently demonstrated anti-intellectualism and reduced public university funding?
Professors may very reasonably care deeply about public-university funding and oppose candidates or policies they believe threaten it. But that does not mean support for the other party, or for conservative ideas generally, can only reflect indifference to education or anti-intellectualism. People weigh many issues, including academic freedom, free speech, the size and role of government, taxes, regulation, and the proper purpose of higher education.
More importantly, the study was not arguing that faculty should vote Republican. It found that the faculty who make campaign donations are unusually concentrated on one side and asked whether students are consequently less likely to encounter serious advocates of other viewpoints. A university should be the place where the claim that a political movement is “anti-intellectual” is examined and debated, not treated as a reason to exclude that movement’s ideas from serious academic life. To dismiss the other side outright is, in a sense, to make the case for why viewpoint diversity matters.
Why would Professors at a public university lean towards a party/political movement that has consistently demonstrated anti-intellectualism and reduced public university funding?
Professors may very reasonably care deeply about public-university funding and oppose candidates or policies they believe threaten it. But that does not mean support for the other party, or for conservative ideas generally, can only reflect indifference to education or anti-intellectualism. People weigh many issues, including academic freedom, free speech, the size and role of government, taxes, regulation, and the proper purpose of higher education.
More importantly, the study was not arguing that faculty should vote Republican. It found that the faculty who make campaign donations are unusually concentrated on one side and asked whether students are consequently less likely to encounter serious advocates of other viewpoints. A university should be the place where the claim that a political movement is “anti-intellectual” is examined and debated, not treated as a reason to exclude that movement’s ideas from serious academic life. To dismiss the other side outright is, in a sense, to make the case for why viewpoint diversity matters.
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