Let's Be Reasonable: A Conservative Case for Liberal Education

by Jonathan Marks

A conservative college professor's compelling defense of liberal education

Not so long ago, conservative intellectuals such as William F. Buckley Jr. believed universities were worth fighting for. Today, conservatives seem more inclined to burn them down. In Let's Be Reasonable , conservative political theorist and professor Jonathan Marks finds in liberal education an antidote to this despair, arguing that the true purpose of college is to encourage people to be reasonable―and revealing why the health of our democracy is at stake.

Drawing on the ideas of John Locke and other thinkers, Marks presents the case for why, now more than ever, conservatives must not give up on higher education. He recognizes that professors and administrators frequently adopt the language and priorities of the left, but he explains why conservative nightmare visions of liberal persecution and indoctrination bear little resemblance to what actually goes on in college classrooms. Marks examines why advocates for liberal education struggle to offer a coherent defense of themselves against their conservative critics, and demonstrates why such a defense must rest on the cultivation of reason and of pride in being reasonable.

More than just a campus battlefield guide, Let's Be Reasonable recovers what is truly liberal about liberal education―the ability to reason for oneself and with others―and shows why the liberally educated person considers reason to be more than just a tool for scoring political points.

Genres: Education, Nonfiction, Politics, Philosophy

1 pages, Audio CD

Published March 1, 2021

Reviews

[Chris Boutté · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wasn’t familiar with the work of Jonathan Marks, but someone recommended this book, and I’m all about reason, so I gave it a chance. After reading this book, I honestly think this is one of the most important books of recent years, and I really hope it gets the attention it deserves. It’s definitely up there with books like The Coddling of the American Mind and others that are trying to repair the college experience through honest and difficult conversations. Marks identifies as a conservative, and in this book, he provides some criticisms of “his side” while arguing for liberal education. As soon as I started this book, all I could think was that I wish more left-leaning figures would do the same. Through philosophy and logical arguments, Marks makes a great case for steps colleges across the country can take to foster a diversity of ideas and mold our youth into better thinkers with an ability to listen to opinions they disagree with.

My only critique of the book is minor, and it may just be because of my lack of interest/understanding of the history and politics of Israel. In chapter 5, Marks focuses on the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement (BDS), and it just felt out of place for me. Again, this may just be a “me” thing, and I may be ignorant to this issue on college campuses. But other than that, I can’t recommend this book enough, and it bums me out that I only learned about it months after the release by chance. It deserves much more recognition.

[Corinne Blackmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a professor, I am not as wedded as Jonathan Marks is, to having students read the Great Books. I have no objection to them per se (after all I teach the Hebrew Bible) but think two things: one, that students can gain access to wisdom through other books, and two, students often need "bridge texts" that are closer to their lived experience to retain their passion for and interest in reading. The author has an excellent section on the malign influence of the BDS movement on college campuses, and also has wide ranging and sensible comments on the dangers of politicizing knowledge and attacking academic freedom. I thought one of his best insights was that leftist extremists often gain control because they are willing to push the envelope and most of their colleagues, who just want to be left alone, go along to avoid "rocking the boat," as well as to maintain collegial relations.

[Greg Mcneilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

LET’S BE REASONABLE: A Conservative Case for Liberal Education | Jonathan Marks, Princeton University Press (2021), 231p.

Marks pushes conservatives to not abandon the academy but to reform it. He first tackles common stereotypes and misconceptions about the sources of the failure of higher education economics. Secondly, and more interestingly, he makes the case to embrace the fundamentals of a liberal (small L) education.

Here, Marks pays homage to those who sought to bring elements of the “elite” subjects to the economically distressed.

The author rejects the utilitarian claims for a purpose amongst higher education planners who often use adjectives like, “integrative, interdisciplinary, interconnected, entrepreneurial, twenty-first century, complex, dynamic, and problem-solving...” Nor does the writer support the outcome of a certain kind of “cultural literacy” or the massive production of, in Locke’s terms, those who are “logical chicaners.”

In the end, Marks is arguing for a system that produces productive pluralism which is the type of open inquiry that buttressed the creation of both the Enlightenment and the attendant Industrial Revolution.

Academic freedom only matters when at least two competing ideas can clash - if only one is present, a debate is not. The range and veracity of debate is a keen indicator of the academy’s health and worth.

[James Nasipak · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent book to begin the discussion of the academy as a place for reason and developing reason in individuals. Many conservatives want to throw out the proverbial “baby with the bath water” when it comes to higher education, however. Mark’s makes a good argument to reimagine how to make changes and in turn return higher education to its origins.

[Terry Noel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yes, let's

Outstanding treatment of the issue of what universities should be. Marks lays out a fresh, fair-minded, and well-articulated argument that supports an old but enduring notion: We should be teaching students how to think, not what to think.

[Glenn Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ursinus College - private liberal arts college in Collegeville, Pennsylvania where author Jonathan Marks is a professor of politics

There are about 300 liberal arts colleges in the US. What if this number dwindles down to 50 in the next ten years? Would anything of value really be lost? Jonathan Marks certainly thinks so and articulates his position in Let's Be Reasonable – A Conservative Case for Liberal Education.

However, Professor Marks knows he's fighting an uphill battle as he makes a case for liberal education and a conservative case at that. Reading through he well articulated lines of thinking and arguments where he draws on such thinkers as John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Alexis de Tocqueville, and Allan Bloom, any reasonable reader will discern the great benefits for a student studying at a liberal arts college.

But, oh, the obstacles one must contend with as a conservative on campus, among their number:

Generalizations – Many Americans outside academia making a living grinding it out in the business world look upon anybody who spends a career as a professor of literature, philosophy, classics, art history, music or political science as a wifty liberal egghead. The future for small liberal arts colleges actually paying these people? The fewer the better.

Liberal Voices on Campus – As Jonathan Marks notes, the far left-wing profs and administrators might be a small minority, but their voices frequently have an outsized influence on many campuses. Somewhat ironically, most professors “don't want no trouble” and simply desire to continue their day to day lives teaching students and engaging in their own research. But when those on the far-left enter the political sphere and/or make radical mission statements, everyone on campus bears the brunt. And one can only imagine how these leftist pronouncements are received by individuals who have historically given large sums of money to the college.

Cultural Cesspool - Back in 1978, Alexander Solzhenitsyn delivered the commencement address at Harvard University, where he observed that the West was drowning in commercialism, TV stupor, and intolerable music. Here we are in 2023, forty-five years later, and the situation is even more dire. In many respects, the almighty boob tube, pop culture, and pop music have completely prevailed. Many students coming to college have spent the vast majority of their "free time" in front of a screen—not only TV but also such as social media, tweets, cell phones—all the while listening to pop music. A studious, clearheaded life devoted to books and ideas can come as something of a shock.

Cost – The average cost for tuition (after aid), room & board for one year at a private liberal arts college is $50,000. The cost for a year of college at an online school like Southern New Hampshire University is $10,000. For students from lower and middle-income families this is a big issue, a very big issue.

Religion – After witnessing the rise and popularity of George W. Bush, a US president who actually brought evangelical religion into the political sphere, author Robert Coover knew the time was right to set to work on his novel, The Brunist Day of Wrath. Herein, Coover writes about the current social climate in the US. Huge swaths of the population would rather whip up emotions around the Book of Revelation and the impending rapture than discuss works of classical literature and philosophy in any reasonable way. Reading books and liberal education? Ha! The enemy. The playpen of the devil.

Approaching the Great Books – Jonathan Marks states emphatically that a proper approach sees “reason is not only an authority but also the kind of authority that is an honor to obey and a disgrace to betray, the sense that there's such a thing as conduct unbecoming a reasoner.” His book makes a case for liberal education, whose aim is becoming reasonable in this sense. None of that using reason as a tool to score points or insist on one's views or impress. Further on, the author writes the goal is “to cultivate in our students an experience of and a taste for reflecting on fundamental questions, for following arguments where they lead, and for shaping their thoughts and actions in accordance with what they can learn from those authorities.”

Jonathan Marks has written about a vitally important subject. I encourage you to give his book a careful read.






Jonathan Marks

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good and yes, reasonable, argument for the purpose of liberal education. JM argues that its purpose is to create reasonable people. This means people who are open minded, capable of asking good, critical questions, willing to explore views and arguments they don't agree with honestly, and curious about human experience across time and culture. This is a strong case for the liberal arts, much more convincing to me than "skill-building" or "understanding complexity," which seem like side effects of a good liberal education (or really, almost any kind of undergraduate education). JM navigates skillfully between the Left's belief that the university should be a vehicle of social justice (that's not its purpose, nor should it be) and the Right's increasing desire to tear down the university altogether. He de-dramatizes the debate by showing that college kids aren't nearly as woke as the right believes. He also makes a good case that the Left's conception of diversity is actually quite limited; reading Homer might put a student farther outside his zone of cultural normalcy even more than reading Toni Morrison, although both should obviously be read.

However, the book could have been improved in a few areas. It is very specific to political theory and philosophy; I would have liked more on the purpose of English, history, and other liberal artsy disciplines. Moreover, I thought the book missed some opportunities in its argument against Boycott, Divest, Sanction, the anti-Israeli campus movement. JM does demonstrate how this movement manipulates the truth and betrays the mission of the university (and, frankly, targets Israel for scrutiny and opprobrium applied to no other country all while playing footsie with violent groups).

However, this part of the book felt rant-y, and I didn't get how it fit into the larger flow of the book, which was much more moderated and nuanced. JM doesn't actually consider any of the Israeli policies that have prompted scrutiny from activists around the world. He doesn't assess how a university should relate to problematic foreign governments, including China or Saudi Arabia, who are deeply enmeshed in our universities. Finally, now that many pro-Israeli groups are going along with Trump's crackdown on the autonomy of universities, this argument felt out of date and a little naive. I'd be interested to see what JM thinks now about Trump's appropriation of the Israeli cause to try to crush intellectual life on campus.

Still, this is a concise and worthwhile book that puts forth an interesting and thoughtful argument about what we should all be trying to do in higher ed.

[Jacob Novotny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some arguments were good, but he spent wayyy too much time talking about Israel. It seemed that he had a personal, strongly pro Israel agenda (which I don’t necessarily disagree with) making it two books in one. There was not enough developed thought about the topic that most readers pick up the book for- which is the somewhat strained relationship between conservatives and higher education. Read this as research because this is a very important topic, and went away disappointed.

[Anne Streeter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book club book

Our nonfiction book club enjoyed this book. It gave a conservative college professor's thoughts on the value of a liberal arts college degree, despite evidence of liberal political leanings that have riled up opposition to the academy. Good for discussing among people with varied views and beliefs.

[Ariane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thought provoking book that I had to read for a book club. This is one I need to re-read because the audio version didn't do it justice.

[Michael Chan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good analysis