Boundaries Lost: Thorstein Veblen, The Higher Learning in America,and the Conspicuous Spouse

Abstract

The Central concern of Thorstein Veblen'sThe Higher Learning in America(1918), a book that anyone concerned with the bureaucratization of the university or recent assaults on tenure would do well to scrutinize, is the scandalous porousness of boundaries between academia and business. According to Veblen, research universities contaminated themselves at the time of their formation in the late 19th century, not simply by accepting funding from capitalists, but also by mimicking the administrative structure and adopting the values of commercial culture. Although he believes the interests of education and business are “wholly divergent,” Veblen finds that “Plato's classic scheme of folly, which would have the philosophers take over the management of affairs, has been turned on its head; the men of affairs have taken over the direction of the pursuit of knowledge.” While some of the local concerns ofHigher Learningdiffer from problems facing the university today, current interest in what Andrew Ross calls the “corporatization of the modern university” makes the book's broad claims strikingly relevant.