The Colleges and Participatory Democracy
American colleges and universities pride themselves in their rich tradition of service to this country. They have had a major hand in educating most of its leaders; they have been the wellspring of much of its technological development; they have spawned a sizable portion of its economic and political theory; they have preserved, idealized, even enriched its heritage. From their semi-detached position they have continuously scrutinized its posture and analyzed its values in the context of history and against the totality of human knowledge. They have been valued partners in its evolution from a frontier-colonial community to a postindustrial society-from a federalist republic to a participatory democracy. If they have helped create the viability and flexibility of the American society, they also have helped lead i t to its present condition. Fortunately or unfortunately, the rates of advance of technical knowledge, of social consciousness and responsibility, of cultural revolution and secularized humanism have reached near-explosive proportions at virtually the same time in this country and perhaps in many of the developed countries of the world. The result is that the cultural, sociological, and technological tides are running faster than the capability of our institutional structures to control or even to adjust to their ambivalent forces. This is, of course, a time of great potential danger but also a time of unprecedented opportunity-one which calls for thoughtful and energetic response from all segments of the American intellectual community. And whether it is appealing or not the colleges and universities are guing to have to become involved-directly and intimately. There is simply no other institution or group of institutions in America prepared to provide the representative manpower and brainpower to examine with any measure o f ' competence and insight or with any real hope for long term accommodation, a problem as far-reaching and as important to all men as that of integrating the cultural, social, and technological forces acting within the American society today into a comprehensible, controllable, and freedom-centered model for human progress. Nor can the colleges and universities hope for success unless they make this effort a major commitment and mobilizs accordingly. We believe that this commitment must be based on at least two important principles. The first is that the job is important enough and the institution's obligation is deep enough that all faculty and all students should be involved on a regular and continuing (week-by-week) basis. The second is the idea that only through extensive interdisciplinary dialogue can a problem of this magnitude be thrashed out successfully.
Ieditorially I
speaking
I n effect, we are suggesting that colleges and universities establish weekly seminars, each involving say four faculty members, representing different disciplines, and twenty students; that such seminars be devoted to various aspects of the fundamental problems and issues that now confront our democracy; that faculty members and students prepare for these sessions at least as thoroughly as they prepare for normal claseei; that all members of the academic community actively participate in such seminars on a regular basis; that the cogent ideas developed in these sessions be published and circulated promptly on the campus and more widely if desirable; that such seminars become an essential part of the course offerings and requirements of the institution. We recognize that implementation of such a plan imposes numerous hardships on the institutions, their facukies and students, yet we feel the alternatives to controlling the tides of change make the hardship somewhat the less inconvenient. We also realize that isolated groups in many colleges and universities already sponsor seminars s u c h a s those proposed and that several private and government agencies have task forces dedicated to finding acceptable solutions to the major problem. While the experiences of such groups in looking at this matter would be most helpful as starting points for the more broadly based seminars, our understanding is that these groups have reported little progress to date. Hopefully the addition of many more minds, much wider experience, and an exponential increase in the human energy involved will heighten the chances of success. The nature of our times and the increasing complexity of the problems that confront us will require from our institutions of higher learning a stronger, more immediate response to intellectual challenges from without and graduates who understand in considerably greater measure the subt,leties and practicalities of the society as it is. While institutions of higher learning cannot be all things to all men, neither can they afford the intellectual priggishness that makes in-depth dialogue between disciplines unfashionable if not distasteful. The scientist, the economist, the sociologist, the humanist all have contributed much and will continue to cont,ribut,e more from their respective disciplines to the development of this country and to the education of its citizens. But beyond all this lie the urgent needs of the present which clearly call for that unique brand of creative synergism that accompanies commitment-reinforced interaction among scholars of all interests and citizens of all ages. WTL Volume 46, Number 1 , January 1969
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