Political Diversity in a Dutch University

Politicization at a Dutch University Intellectual Diversity and Particular Political Persuasions at 'Proud to be Progressive’ Places BSc. Coen Schuring, 10439625 Master Thesis MSc Urban Sociology First reader: dr. I Tzaninis Second reader: Prof. dr. B. Volker 29-8-2017 [email protected] University of Amsterdam Word count: 23, 827 (Excluding appendices) Table of contents Page Foreword………………………………………………………………………………….. 5 Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………… 7 Chapter 1: Introduction…………………………………………………………………… 8 Social-political relevance of the subject………………………………………….. 8 Problem definition……………………………………………………………....... 8 The university and its identity……………………………………………………. 9 Research question………………………………………………………………… 11 Outline……………………………………………………………………………. 11 Chapter 2: Theoretical framework………………………………………………………... 12 2.1 Explanations for the prevalence of leftist lecturers & students at the FMG………………………………………………………...…………………….. 12 2.1.1 The nature of social science(s)…………………………………….... 12 2.1.2 Political ideology and personality traits…………………………….. 12 2.1.3 Political persuasions and personal preferences……………………... 13 2.1.4 The role of education to the political views of students……………. 14 2.1.5 Possible discrimination against conservatives……………………… 14 2.2. Sociology: A Tale of Two Narratives............................................................... 15 2.2.1 Explanations for the current campus culture at the university…………………………………………………...………….......16 2.2.2 Identity politics and the social sciences…………………………….. 18 Chapter 3: Methodology…………………………………………………………………. 21 The teacher interviews……………………………………………………………. 21 The student surveys………………………………………………………………. 21 2 Chapter 4: Qualitative results ……………………………………………………………..22 4.1 The political identities of teachers…………………………………………….23 4.2 Teachers’ philosophy about teaching………………………………..….......... 23 4.3 The interdependency between the political affiliation of lecturers and education…………………………………………………………………………..28 Identity politics, postmodernism and the curriculum…………………….. 30 4.4 Support for quotas to enforce political diversity in the faculty….…………… 33 Chapter 5: Quantitative results…………………………………………………………… 37 5.1 Demographic information…………………………………………………….. 37 5.2 The political identity of students……………………………………………... 39 Individual political labels…………………………………………………. 41 Political opinions of social science students……………………………… 42 5.3 Political diversity at the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences………... 45 5.4 Politicization of teachers………………………………………………………47 The task of a teacher during the educational process…………………….. 48 5.5 Changing political views of students during their students at the University of Amsterdam……………… …………………………………….. 49 5.6 The expression of (political) preferences on campus………………………… 51 5.6.1 The number of students that do not express themselves during seminar groups……………………………………………………………. 51 5.6.2 Reasons students give for not expressing themselves during seminar groups……………………………………………………………. 52 5.6.3 Support for speech codes on campus……………………………….. 56 5.7 The campus culture at the University of Amsterdam………………………… 57 3 5.8 The most important factors that shape the political views of social science students…………………………………………………………. 59 Ordinal regression analysis……………………………………………….. 62 Chapter 6: Conclusion……………………………………………………………………. 64 6.1 Limitations ………………………………………………………………….. 65 6.2 Recommendations……………………………………………………………. 66 6.2.1 Making the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences more welcoming to non-leftists…………………………………………………. 65 6.2.2 Steps the professoriate can take to let right-wing students join…….. 66 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………… 70 Appendix 1: List of abbreviations ……………………………………………………….. 78 Appendix 2: Political parties that currently have a seat in the Dutch Parliament or were influential during the last national Dutch elections ……………………………………… 79 Appendix 3: The teacher interviews ……………………………………………………... 83 Appendix 4: The student interviews ………..…………………………………………..... 110 4 Foreword This thesis is written as a completion to the master Urban Sociology, at the University of Amsterdam. The subject of this thesis, political diversity at the social science faculty and how the political views of students are shaped by the university, has been a personal topic of interest for quite some time and was chosen after I had some interpersonal experiences during my studies at the University of Amsterdam that I thought were interesting to research sociologically. I would also like to thank both of my supervisors that helped me with my master thesis throughout the last months. My first supervisor, dr. I. Tzaninis, helped me with the formulation of the research question and his recommendations concerning useful literature also were a great help. I would like to thank my second supervisor, prof. dr. B. Volker, for helping me by assessing the thesis proposal, where she provided critical feedback and input that complemented the other feedback I received earlier. I have been conducting research on this topic since April, and I found this period of research very interesting and informative. Coen Schuring Amsterdam, August 2017 5 “He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he really does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion…” - John Stuart Mill, 1859. 6 Abstract Universities have never enrolled so many students as today. Consequently, these places of higher learning have played an ever increasing role during the formative years of countless young adults. This master thesis reviews how students of six educational departments of the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences – namely Sociology, Anthropology, Political Science, Psychology, Human Geography, Planning and International Development, and Communication – are shaped by several different variables, both in- and outside of the university. The (possible) politicization of college students by sociology teachers and how politicization relates to the current climate concerning intellectual freedom will also be covered. Keywords: politicization at higher education, social science students, intellectual freedom, teacher interviews 7 1. Introduction My own interest regarding the question of ‘intellectual diversity’ was sparked after a couple of personal experiences I had with regards to expressing different (political) opinions during several seminar meetings1 of sociology courses. These opinions were mostly connected to the topics of meritocracy, race, social inequality and gender. Expressing these opinions to my fellow students led to some instances of social exclusion, i.e. people not greeting me back or excusing themselves shortly after I had joined their group. It gave the impression of a form of ‘groupthink’, where the smallest infraction of going against the narrative was seen as a dissenting viewpoint and the desire for conformity and harmony was what expected and hoped for. This experienced lack of intellectual diversity is what started my thought process about the absence (or presence) of diversity of thought at the social science faculty of my university. Social-political relevance of the subject Interestingly, the topic of intellectual diversity was also recently discussed in the Dutch parliament, where a motion was put forward by Pieter Duisenberg, a member of the House of Representatives and politician for the political party of the VVD (see the list of abbreviations in Appendix 1 and the list of Political parties that currently have a seat in Dutch Parliament or were influential during the last national Dutch elections in Appendix 2 for a more detailed description of the political parties). The goal of the motion is to let the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen or KNAW) investigate if “self-censorship and limitations of diversity of scientific perspectives play a major role in the Netherlands” (Hendriks, 2017). The fact that the Dutch parliament wants to know if (social) scientific disciplines are influenced by a lack of viewpoint diversity underlines the social-political relevance of my master thesis. The KNAW will have a meeting in the fall of 2017 and subsequently take a position in relation to intellectual freedom within the social science faculty. Problem definition Universities are suitable for this research subject as more Dutch students are attending college than in any other decade (DUO, 2016: 4), these places of higher learning constantly teach and confront students with new ideas and the faculties of higher institutions increasingly have more influence in shaping the ideological predispositions of college students (Horowitz 2006, 2007). This confrontation with new ideas inevitably leads to processes of politicization; however, the 1 A seminar group is when students meet in a classroom and discuss course readings, presentations or other texts. 8 theories on politicization processes do not pay a lot of attention to the experiences of individual students (Hanson et al. 2012: 356). The teaching staff of the sociology faculty, in particular, has been interviewed, seeing as American studies throughout several decades have repeatedly found that sociology professors tend to be the most liberal professors in academia, politically speaking (Turner et al., 1963; Lipset & Ladd 1970,

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