A review of The UnCivil University
reviewed by Elizabeth Warren
As a child growing up in a small town in the South, I had little knowledge of anti-Semitism. All I knew about Israel came from reading a paperback copy of Leon Uris’s Exodus. While my knowledge has increased over the decades, the novelty of the subject made me approach my reading of The UnCivil University, by Gary Tobin, Aryeh Kaufmann Weinberg and Jenna Ferer, with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.
The UnCivil University is the first volume in the series, Politics and Propaganda in American Education, published by the Institute for Jewish and Community Research, in San Francisco. The text is organized into three sections with the first “define[ing] anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism as an ideology,” the second “provide[ing] evidence about the expression of anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism to understand how this ideology presents itself as behaviors as well as ideas” and the third “examin[ing] how the presence of anti-Semitism and anti-Isrealism on campus reveals where reform is needed in higher education.”
The first part of The UnCivil University reads (albeit in a rambling fashion) as an indictment of 1960s liberalism, academic freedom, and tenure, which the authors believe to be the primary ills impacting 21st century American higher education. The misuses of academic freedom and multiculturalism derive, they argue, from the “stale legacy of the 1960s” and flourish in part because of the bureaucracy of the university. The authors cite three major factors in the “perfect storm” that has undermined the civil university. The first is the continuing legacy of the 1960s on campus culture. The second is the impressive level of fiscal inattention, which creates bureaucratic quagmires. And the third is the abdication of moral leadership by many entrusted with the university’s well-being.” It is the “drive for resources without a moral compass” that lies at the “core of the uncivil university.”
The second section of the book discusses the ideology of anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism, thereby providing an appetizer for the information contained in the third section. In dealing with many issues, however, the authors have served the entrée in the second section and crumbs in the third. The book rambles from topic to topic, often with little regard for logical sequence. For example, an indictment of Ward Churchill (the University of Colorado professor who said the victims of 9/11 were “Little Eichmanns who may have deserved punishment for their participation in what went on in the sterile sanctuary of the twin towers”) comes early in the first section, followed by an explanation of what he did several pages later; then another reference to him in the third section, with a similar, though shorter, explanation. This elliptical approach does nothing to clarify the discussion, and makes The UnCivil University an arduous read.
The third section zeroes in on what seems to be the book’s major point about anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism on college campuses: evidence of their existence and needed university reform. Unfortunately, it takes the authors half of the book to reach the following, pivotal conclusion:
A widespread ideology has the potential for harm; belief systems can have real impact over time.
It is dangerous to ignore the rhetoric of Al Qaeda, the racist rantings of the Aryan Nations, of Kim Jong Il of North Korea, as it was to ignore the psychosis of Hitler about his desire to kill Jews. Ignoring anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism on campus, or dismissing them as insignificant, limited in scope, or claiming that the bigots do not really mean what they say, are all forms of denial. Anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism are dangerous belief systems, especially on college campuses, where they should be unwelcomed (p. 150).
It is hard to imagine how a reasonable person could take issue with that premise, especially after reading the evidence amassed by the authors, including more than 50 personal interviews with students from a variety of campuses; more than 40 key informant interviews with Jewish organizational leaders; a content analysis of hundreds of anti-Israel materials distributed on college campuses or designed for student protest; monitoring of 25 news outlets on a daily basis; the collection of news and opinion articles pertaining to anti-Semitism and anti-Isrealism; an analysis of more than 30 websites; and investigation of 15 campus newspapers. Many of the examples presented, especially of students’ own experiences, are real and no doubt very painful for those who endured them. Unfortunately, by the time the authors arrive at their conclusions, the reader is worn out by the book’s earlier, rambling prose.
Having amassed ample evidence of intimidation and anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli writings, speeches, protests, and even instruction, on college campuses, the authors recommend that universities take the following steps (among others) to eliminate anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism:
• Implement more internal review of Middle East Studies departments, centers and institutes;
• Establish rules about civil discourse (no shouting down speakers, physical threats, or using of racial/ethnic slurs);
• Encourage trustees to become more involved in tenure decisions;
• Provide donors and alumni with greater accountability of how their money is spent.
For all its copious research, The UnCivil University is not a fair and balanced look at both sides of the Israeli/Palestinian issue. While the title for the series, Politics and Propaganda in American Education, may connote for many of us “information, rumors, etc. deliberately spread widely to help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, nation, etc.,” we should be mindful of Webster’s definition of “propaganda” as “the particular doctrine or principles propagated by an organization or movement.”
The ultimate irony of The UnCivil University is that, in attempting to fulfill the goal of the Politics and Propaganda in American Education series to review “information deliberately spread to harm a group” from the targeted group’s point of view, the book unwittingly propagates its own “particular doctrines and principals” and, in the process, functions as propaganda. Moreover, its disorganized and tedious introductory sections, with their often inaccurate and over-stated premises, are simply too wearing to make reading this book a good use of time.
