COLLEGE AVENUE: Self-Selection or Political Bias?
Zywicki, Todd
COLLEGE AVENUE TODD ZYWICKI Self-Selection or Political Bias? THis PAST SPRING, Stanley Rothman, S. Robert among College Faculty," The Forum: Vol. 3: No. 1, Article 2) that argued for the...
...Scholars Barry Ames, David C. Barker, Chris W. Bonneau, and Christopher J. Carman responded with a critique of that study ("Hide the Republicans, the Christians, and the Women: A Response to 'Politics and Professional Advancement Among College Faculty,'" The Forum: Vol...
...But according to one survey of eight of Duke's humanities departments ("DCU sparks varied reactions," The Chronicle Online, February 10, 2004), Duke has 142 registered Democrats and eight registered Republicans (17.75 to 1...
...2, Article 7), challenging the inference of discrimination and offering the alternative hypothesis that the ideological disparity results not from discrimination but from self-selection...
...In other words, the faithTODD ZYWICKI based reasoning of Christian fundamentalism (and by extension, of most socio-cultural conservatives) is essentially incompatible with the mission of contemporary research universities...
...I will consider each element in turn...
...My beloved alma mater Dartmouth College is one of two rural institutions in the Ivy League (Cornell is the other...
...The study surveyed 1,643 faculty members across the United States and found "that liberals and Democrats outnumber conservatives and Republicans by large margins...
...Summers's great heresy was to suggest that certain faith-based tenets of the modern academy could be subjected to testing by the scientific method...
...But I will treat it as a serious hypothesis for the sake of argument...
...More generally, do we really think that rural Midwestern small colleges (the three factors the authors identify) like Oberlin, Grinnell, and Kenyon are overrun with conservative faculty...
...The only difference, of course, is that traditional religion is shunned in the modern academy, while political correctness is the academy's official religion...
...Rothman et al...
...The only case study I have seen in this regard is of Duke University, unquestionably one of the most prestigious institutions in the South...
...3. Willingness to Apply the Scientific Method: The fact that the authors would propose this explanation, seemingly with a straight face, is evidence of the straw-grasping going on here...
...The authors concluded that "complaints of ideologically-based discrimination in academic advancement deserve serious consideration and further study...
...Again, the testable hypothesis here is that elite schools in the South should attract a disproportionate number of faculty conservatives relative to similarly prestigious schools in more liberal areas of the country...
...First, there may be a rural/urban divide driving the relationship...
...1, Article 2) that argued for the presence of wide- Lichter, and Neil Nevitte published a statistical study ("Politics and Professional Advancement spread ideological discrimination in higher education...
...OCTOBER 2005 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR 49 COLLEGE AVENUE Mathematics: 4.1 to 1 Physics: 6 to 1 Chemistry: 2.2 to 1 Biology: 4.4 to 1 Computer Science: 2.8 to 1 Engineering: 2.6 to 1 Economics: 1.4 to 1 In the humanities and social science departments, the following divides were found: English Lit: 29 to 1 History: 7.7 to 1 Philosophy: 16 to 1 Theology/Religion: 16.6 to 1 Political Science: 40.5 to 1 Sociology: 8.6 to 1 Psychology: 10.5 to 1 So, the ideological divide is much narrower in the fields where the scientific method is used (including Economics), and widest where it is most absent...
...This is just one data point, of course, but it casts doubt on the idea that conservative academics have an unusual pro-rural preference...
...Again, the available data do not seem to support this hypothesis...
...Here's the authors' alternative hypothesis, followed by my analysis: We offer self-selection as the likely culprit...
...fundamentally, Ames et al...
...In fact, the ideological gap is much narrower in those fields where the scientific method is most relevant...
...Second, regional selection affects hiring...
...It is no secret that Midwesterners and, especially, Southerners are more conservative, more religious, and less Jewish than Northeasterners...
...1. Rural/Urban Divide: The authors argue that conservatives prefer to live in more rural areas and so will be disproportionately found at schools in such areas...
...If the authors are correct about a rural preference, then we should expect to find more conservatives on the Dartmouth faculty than at urban-situated Ivy League schools, such as Harvard, Columbia, Penn, or Brown...
...Furthermore, cultural conservatism...
...also found that conservatives and Republicans "teach at lower quality schools than do liberals and Democrats...
...The authors argue that conservatism draws from fundamentalist religion and this makes them hostile to the scientific method...
...Make no mistake about it: The orthodoxy of political correctness is just as at odds with the scientific method as traditional religious belief...
...A recent examination of party identification, however, finds that 66 percent of Dartmouth professors are Democrats and the ratio of registered Democrats to Republicans is 12.5 to 1, comparable to the ratios at urban Ivy League and other elite institutions...
...This naivete demonstrates the authors' blind spot occasioned by their 50 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 2005...
...If conservatives are hostile to the scientific method, then the disparity in ideology should be greatest in those fields where the scientific method is strongest—mathematics and hard sciences...
...Thus, given the strong correlation observable between the metropolitan density of a particular county and the mean conservatism of its citizens, it would not be surprising if conservatives, academic or otherwise, prefer to work in smaller, more rural areas...
...As Larry Summers of Harvard learned the hard way, modern-day political correctness is a faith just as strong as, if not stronger than, religious faith...
...More As Larry Summers of Harvard learned the hard way, modernday political correctness is a faith just as strong as, if not stronger than, religious faith...
...Third, many conservatives may deliberately choose not to seek employment at top-tier research universities because they object, on philosophical grounds, to one of the fundamental tenets undergirding such institutions: the scientific method...
...The authors offer no evidence to support these explanations, which, on examination, are unpersuasive...
...Again, this is subject to testing...
...If this is so, then an easy test of the hypothesis presents itself...
...Fundamentalism, by definition, is an absolutist, "faith-based" allegiance to a particular dogma, the veracity of which is considered beyond question or argument...
...Conservatives may want to live in communities whose ideological climate is more consistent with their own belief structure...
...THE AUTHORS ALSO CLAIM that "it is difficult even to imagine ideological discrimination occurring at the point of hiring...
...The Duke History Department pitched a 32-0 Democratic shutout...
...By contrast, the gap should be narrower where the scientific method is least relevant, such as in the humanities...
...Consider this summary by Yevgeny Vilensky (April 6, 2005, blogger.com) of another study, which found the following ratios of liberal/conservative identifications among faculty members in math and science departments: The authors argue that conservatives prefer to live in more rural areas and so will be disproportionately found at schools in such areas...
...It is also in New Hampshire, historically the most conservative of the northeastern states...
...If this is so, then an easy test of the hypothesis presents itself...
...Self-selection is a deeply flawed explanation for the prevailing ideological imbalance on college cam48 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 2005 puses...
...The situation at the University of Chicago, a rare institution with a historic reputation for a conservative presence, suggests that there exist counter-examples in the opposite direction as well...
...My beloved alma mater Dartmouth College is one...
...are simply incorrect to argue that the religious beliefs of conservatives make them unable to apply the scientific method...
...has been shown to stem in large part from an embrace of Christian fundamentalism as a dominant worldview...
...Again, this is just one sample and only of humanities departments, but it lends little support for the conclusion that conservative professors are disproportionately drawn from and prefer to remain in the South...
...2. Regional Selection: The authors argue that the South is disproportionately conservative, and as a result, conservatives might self-select for Southern schools...
Vol. 38 • October 2005 • No. 8
