Has the ‘left’ done it again? American humanities scholars get there in a recent report from by because they threaten to subordinate the pursuit of knowledge and objective truth to the pursuit of social and political goals.
In the State of scholarship-report, made at the request of two American universities, a group of academics criticizes the ‘postmodern relativism’ of the humanities. According to them, these are dominated, especially in anthropology and gender studies, by the idea that knowledge is relative and ‘always political’, and can therefore better serve a progressive, emancipatory goal.
The situation is not critical, but serious, the report said. In its bluntest form, the criticism that the humanities have fallen prey to the idea that objective knowledge does not exist is incorrect, the authors say. But, they believe, every discipline they examined shows “traces of this pathology.”
The evidence in the comprehensive report is meager. The authors confine themselves to a series of quotes from anthropology, gender studies and feminist epistemology that knowledge is never neutral, always socially constructed and politically charged. That belief leads to the undermining of scientific standards for research, they believe, and to abstract prose “bordering on nonsense.”
Creeping erosion of standards
It is a well-known criticism that was already heard in the 1980s. What is more remarkable is that it now comes from renowned philosophers such as lead author Paul Boghossian, Kwame Anthony Appiah and Kit Fine. The group is aware of the sensitive context of their report, now that American universities are under heavy fire from the Trump administration. They warn against drastic measures. The problem is not the political orientation of scientists, they write, but the creeping erosion of standards that research must meet. An ideological ‘correction’ would “only make matters worse.”
Reactions to the report are divided. Just one person is enthusiastic about the argument by Boghossian and his associates, many critics dismiss it as an unwelcome repetition of the culture wars from the 1990s about ‘postmodern’ science. Boghossian already conducted an extensive polemic against this in his book Fear of Knowledge. Against Relativism and Constructivism (2006).
Despite the authors’ warnings against politicizing their findings, the report “will inevitably give oxygen to the anti-intellectual forces that now threaten academic research,” says American philosopher Jason Stanley. He also criticizes the philosophical “muddle” in the reportwhich puts everything under the heading of a reprehensible ‘relativism’ about facts and values.
Criticism that leading universities are too ‘political’ or left-wing is growing in the US. Harvard says it wants to strive for more ‘diversity of views’ among professors, Yale put on the sackcloth in April after a report concluded that universities are to blame for declining public trust due to high tuition fees, unclear academic standards and restrictions on freedom of expression.