April 06, 2005

A Fresh Look at Republicans and Science

Paul Krugman, vaunted columnist for the New York Times, has recently written a piece describing his spin on why there are fewer conservatives (Republicans) in the sciences, and therefore fewer as tenured faculty in academia: Republicans hate science.

It's not the "hating science when you're in high school because dissecting frogs was icky" kind of hate, but a mistrustful hate, if you are to believe Krugman.

Today's Republican Party - increasingly dominated by people who believe truth should be determined by revelation, not research - doesn't respect science, or scholarship in general. It shouldn't be surprising that scholars have returned the favor by losing respect for the Republican Party.

So the hatred isn't just science, but all forms of scholarship as well. Pictures of preppy jocks in letterman sweaters making fun of the science geeks are beginning to float around in my head.

But does the Right really have a burning hatred of all things scientific and scholarly? I don't think so, and neither does James D. Miller, who writes for Tech Central Station on the subject. In fact, Miller has a different opinion of academian politics altogether...and he should know something about it, as he is an associate professor of economics at Smith College. Miller makes the case that it's the academic Left that has it in for science.

Larry Summers hinted that women on average might not be as qualified as men to be science professors. Paul Krugman wrote that Republicans en masse are categorically not as qualified as everyone else to be professors. Larry Summers was almost universally condemned by academia for his comments, not because theywere necessarily wrong, but because it was considered wrong for him to make negative generalizations about an under-represented group. In academia, Republicans are far more under-represented than women are. So if Paul Krugman is not widely condemned by academics it will constitute pretty strong evidence that academia is biased against Republicans.

Many college leftists want more women but fewer Republicans in their ranks. They cite diversity as the reason for desiring more women, but this creates a problem since this diversity rationale would seem to indicate that they should also seek to hire more Republicans. Krugman, therefore, is aiding the intolerant college left by claiming that Republicans are so anti-science that colleges would suffer by having more of them around. Fortunately for Republicans, much of the college left is so hostile to science that even few college professors will accept Krugman's arguments.

Much of the left in humanities departments doesn't believe in science. They feel that it's wrong to privilege scientific over other types of knowledge. Leftists have been known to use literary theory to demonstrate flaws in science. Such anti-scientific silliness lead to the Social Text hoax.

This is probably why we hear more about people like Ward Churchill, who spends his time making up theories rather than looking for credible evidence to support existing theories. The so-called social sciences are a lot splashier and gain a lot more attention than chemistry and mathematics.

Krugman correctly points out that self-selection is part of the reason there are so few Republicans in academia. But much of this self-selection is because of leftist bias. For example, consider the academic field of Women's Studies. True, few Republicans will self-select to become Women Studies professors, but only because this field is totally defined in left-wing terms. Similarly, the fields of African-American Studies, History, English and Sociology are increasingly devoted to left-wing topics. A smart undergraduate who tells her academic advisor that she wants to get a Ph.D. focusing on military history will likely be told to go to law school instead because few colleges will consider hiring a military historian. In contrast, if this same undergraduate announced her desire to study how capitalism has promoted environmental racism she would be told of the rich academic job market that will await her after she completes her Ph.D.

Bias against Republicans in academia is an intensely personal issue for me. Smith College recently tried to fire me by denying me tenure. I believe that I was denied tenure for being a conservative. Fortunately, Smith's five person faculty Grievance Committee found that my academic freedom had been violated during my tenure review. As a result I came up for tenure again and this time succeeded. (My story is well told here.) Based on my experience and knowledge of academia, however, I have advised other Republicans to be wary of academic careers.

My previous post today, in fact, is about the trials and tribulations of a conservative European faculty member at a pretigious university.

Why would a conservative want to pursue an academic career if, instead of being judged on academic merit, he is judged on his political views?

Perhaps Krugman should hang out in the faculty lounges and offices of Harvard, Yale, Cornell and other ivory towers to see what it's really like. Would he report honestly? Or is he too enamored of the same views held by Leftist faculty members to be fair and balanced?

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