The Marketplace of Ideas: Reform and Resistance in the American University (review)

"Knowledge is our most important business" (13), writes Louis Menand in the opening line of The Marketplace of Ideas: Reform and Resistance in the American University. "Knowledge is a form of capital that is always unevenly distributed," he continues, "and people who have more knowledge, or greater access to knowledge, enjoy advantages over people who have less" (13). Despite this provocative opening line and the book jacket's claim that "The Marketplace of Ideas is certain to spark a long-overdue debate about the condition of American higher education," little space is given to exploring how the humanities can innovate and thrive under the pressures of the marketplace in an increasingly corporatized university system. The Marketplace of Ideas traces some interesting historical origins for the insularity of humanities departments and the conflicts inherent in perpetuating constricting professional circles, but the author's more provocative proposals for how professors might revitalize the contributions of the humanities are sadly relegated to afterthoughts. Menand's book remains a tepid entry into the burgeoning discourse concerning the fate of the humanities following the rise of the corporate university.

Though the marketplace is explicitly mentioned in the title, there is relatively little in Menand's book about the "business" of knowledge or the effects of corporatization on the university (for a succinct review of the historical development of the American university system in accordance with corporate logic and values, turn instead to Frank Donoghue's The Last Professors: The Corporate University and the Fate of the Humanities [2008]). The repercussions of shifts in the economy of academia, such as the unemployment and underemployment of academics, rising student debt, the erosion of academic freedom, and the assault on tenure, are left untouched. Given that Menand's book was published following the financial meltdown of 2008, it is disappointing that it gives little consideration to the ways in which the global financial crisis has affected the humanities in higher education.

Perhaps Menand's argument seems lacking in vision only in comparison to other recent publications on the topic. 2010 has proven to be a bountiful year for strong and provocative books on the condition of higher education. Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus's controversial book Higher Education? How Colleges Are Wasting Our Money and Failing Our Kids—and What We Can Do About It (2010), contends that our colleges and universities spend far less on student teaching than they should. Mark Taylor's Crisis on Campus: A Bold Plan for Reforming our Colleges and Universities (2010) has raised eyebrows with its argument that the university as we know it is outdated and broken, and requires nothing short of radical restructuring. Among Taylor's many suggestions for change are salary increases for productive faculty and decreases for unproductive ones (213); creation of a National Teaching Academy to support teaching excellence around the country (190); and adding a fourth division for schools of arts and science called "Emerging Zones" in addition to the more traditional tripartite division of the natural sciences, social sciences, and arts and humanities (145). His most controversial claim though is to do away with tenure: "The only way for American higher education to remain competitive," writes Taylor, "is to abolish tenure and impose mandatory retirement at the age of seventy" (204).

Other effective studies on higher education published this year include Cary Nelson's No University is an Island: Saving Academic Freedom (2010), and Ellen Schrecker's The Lost Soul of Higher Education: Corporatization, the Assault on Academic Freedom, and the End of the American University (2010). These books call for a wider discussion of the ways in which the corporatization of higher education erodes academic freedom, shared governance, and tenure. Compared to the strong studies noted above, Menand's book is strong on history, but lacks bite. While beautifully written and well researched (Menand is a staff writer for The New Yorker and won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize in history...