The Right to Earn a Living in a System with Free Higher Education: Part 1

There are two human rights related here in argument, one enumerated the other not. The first is the much debated unenumerated right to earn a living. The other is the less publicized but recognized right to free higher education.

The current system violates both without excuse. These violations prevent academics from earning a living in a higher education system free of tuition or public expense. 

The Cost to Employ Presidents Is Not Fundamental

With higher education in a cash crisis there is predictable interest in the total cost to employ California State University (and other) presidents. The corporate caricature of CEO extravagance and employee sacrifice is now a looming reality for the entire civil enterprise. While other labour is routinely exploited, the average base salary of a university president has climbed to over five times that of faculty.

Pause for a moment.  This intense, almost frantic concern with the cost of presidents is a stinky red herring.

Economic Argument for the Professional Model

There are several lines of argument that favour the professional model for higher education over the current triad model of institutional service providers (universities/colleges), government funding and union labour representation - with intersection on topics such as economics, labour, stewardship, access, and ethics.

The following argument is economic and has important implications for higher education labour conditions, access and ethics.

Academic Cooperative: A Second Alternative

There are in fact two viable and desirable alternatives to the current triad paradigm of institutional service units (universities/colleges), government finance (state/federal) and union labour representation.  Higher education and research do not need to be provided and are not sustainable under the triad, and are better served under the professional and cooperative service paradigms.

Higher Education Can Be More than Mere Election Among Evils

Moral Responsibility

Behaviour considered normative in nature is bound by the familiar Kantian paraphrase, "ought implies can." Proper analysis of the phrase depends on the meaning given to "can" and related notions of possibility, but on one interpretation: if an agent’s behaviour is unavoidable, if there is no possible alternative, then there is no moral traffic.

This is a logical point that partially scribes the domain of ethical theory.

Professional Translation of the Core Service Relationship in Higher Education

A Paradigm Shift

This is the sketch of a single dimension of an alternative means of providing higher education and research, distinct from the reigning rubric of institutions (universities or colleges), governments and unions.

This triad of functionaries has enjoyed monopoly tenure since inception. Absent an alternative paradigm its modern universities and colleges have become curious cultural fixtures routinely mistaken for the civic enterprise they are meant to serve.

The proposed alternative is the professions. This competitive service paradigm exposes and either compensates or corrects for existing systemic deficiencies. In doing so it does not advocate modification but a shift.