Public perception of the university. Is this problem real or imaginary? Will the university manage to retain its vital role in the society and defend itself as an academic sanctuary for scholarship? Is its somewhat special status often grotesqued by the ivory tower metaphor worthy to continue? Or, after an almost imminent tenure pogrom, its place will be at the Wal- Mart plaza as a warehouse of packaged job training courses?
The ripples of the infamous "Framework Regarding Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination in Ontario Universities" issued in 1993 by the Ontario NDP Government are felt well beyond Ontario and perhaps even beyond Canada. This document, immediately nicknamed Zero Tolerance policy, is just one of many manifestations of the sickening political mentality of the corporately imposed social engineering.
For Peter Emberley, Professor of Political Science at Carleton University in Ottawa, the Zero Tolerance policy is only one of many phantoms haunting the university. His analysis of the multifaceted identity crises the Canadian universities are now coming through, concludes that the university as a social institution is at the verge of the spiritual, political and financial collapse. It is quickly losing battle to the cumulative action of numerous social and political vectors attacking the university system from all directions.
The traditional scholarly individualism, now vastly added by the fierce inter- and intra-disciplinary rat race competition for the research funds among the academics, diminishes their ability to generate a sufficient unity of actions to defend their own alleged values. The inquiry which followed the Fabrikant murders at Concordia denounced the spirit of the "production driven culture" popularly known as "grantsmanship" which became so central to the academic life. Such cherished notions as academic freedom and tenure principles are facing the growing public mistrust and scorn, not lastly because of growing indifference to students' concerns.
The legion of demons sieging the university from the inside and outside is truly impressive. The corporate right of the privileged old boy network versus the cultural and feminist left, the demands of all-inclusivity, accessability and the financial self-sufficiency, the hyperbolized notions of excellence, performance indicators, and the total quality management þ and this is only the short list þ all this tapestry of factors leaves very little hope that business as usual can go on for much longer.
Emberley gives a comprehensive and convincing exposition of the main factors haunting the university. Furthermore, he provides a set of sensibly looking recommendations which, he believes, may salvage the university from complete demise. His key recommendation is the centrality of scholarship as the most valued offering the university has. Inevitably, Emberley does not have a final answer whether our universities find the internal strength to re-define themselves in the new economical and political reality, or continue their slippery slope towards further marginalizations and social irrelevancy. But it appears that the answer to this will be forthcoming in the not too distant future.
Alexander A. Berezin
Engineering Physics
Peter C. Emberley, Zero Tolerance (Hot Button Politics in Canada's Universities). Penguin Books, 1996. 313 pp.