Reading Note: Socialism and the Academy
A paragraph in Tony Judt’s Postwar leaps out at me:
It is one of the paradoxes of the Socialist project that the absence of property tends to generate more corruption, not less. Power, position and privilege cannot be directly bought, but depend instead upon mutually-reinforcing relationships of patronage and clientelism. Legal rights are replaced by sycophancy, which is duly rewarded with job security or advancement. To achieve even modest and legitimate objectives — medical treatments, material necessities, educational opportunities — people are required to bed the law in a variety of minor but corrupting ways. (page 579)
With the exception of the last sentence, this looks like a perfect description of academia in America. Can Mr Judt, a doyen of our professoriat, have been directed to word this passage (doubtless correct) by an ivy-league planchette?