I worry about the penetration of the market and its logic into all spheres of social life. I see this almost everywhere I turn. It’s the future of America that Republicans wish for, but it is my nightmare.
In New York City, Mayor Bloomberg has chosen Cathie Black to be Chancellor of the largest public school system in the United States. She is not an educator, never went to public schools, has never worked on school issues and didn’t send her children to public schools. But the mayor still confidently declared her to be the most qualified person, as The New York Times reported, calling Ms. Black “a superstar manager who has succeeded spectacularly in the private sector” and added, “There’s no one who knows more about the skills our children will need to succeed in the 21st century economy.” Hers are market, not educational, qualifications for a management position in the NYC public school district.
In my and the country’s second city, Chicago, where I studied for my Ph.D. at the University of Chicago, in the meanwhile, smaller issues are at stake, a local battle of symbols. The Chicago Transit Authority is selling naming rights “for rail lines and stations, bus routes, retail concessions, and special events. Even the venerable (sic) CTA logo will be on the auction block,” the Chicago Tribune reports.
And where I studied as an undergraduate at the State University of New York at Albany, because of a budget crisis, five humanities programs, including French, Italian, Russian, classics and theater, have been suspended, apparently because these programs don’t contribute to the university’s and the individual’s bottom line. (link) Such majors don’t attract many students, and those who are so attracted upon graduation have trouble finding work. But how can there be a university without the humanities? (link) This hits close to home for me. Albany is the place where I decided to make the unusual move that has defined my career, starting my research by studying the sociology of theater.
How can it be that the business of the New York City school system and of my alma mater is primarily business, and not education? This is disturbing.
The naming of public places is another issue. The CTA faces a practical problem, needing to pay for a public good that requires public investment and maintenance that exceeds public capacity, especially in a troubled economy. The authority recently concluded a $3.9 million deal with Apple Inc. to refurbish the North/Clybourn Red Line stop, partly in exchange for a future naming-rights contract for the station, which is near a new Apple Store. I am not excited about the prospect, but it is a question of balance and judgment. And the Tribune reports that the CTA “will be sensitive to avoid naming rights that are in poor taste or at all questionable. So don’t worry about seeing a Viagra Express or Miller Lite bus route on Rush Street.”
I think market penetration into previously protected public domains should be a matter of careful judgment and public discussion. Sometimes the market can support activities that otherwise may be difficult if not impossible, perhaps DC and the CTA. But sometimes it works against important autonomous values. We should realize when goods other than market ones are at stake, and need to be protected and cultivated. This is something I have been working on for much of my career, most explicitly in my second book, On Cultural Freedom.
As we judge and discuss this problem, we should draw upon commonsense and social science theory and research. On the one hand, the traditional wisdom tells us that there is a time and place for everything, and on the other, a central thesis of the modern discipline of sociology examines a key characteristic of modern society as social differentiation. The founders of the discipline made this central to their intellectual projects, from Max Weber’s notion of the institutional differentiation, to Karl Marx’s and Emile Durkheim’s explorations of the division of labor, to Georg Simmel’s analysis of individuation.
I think the centrality of this aspect of modern life is most clearly explored by Erving Goffman in his classic, Asylums, where he explores the rule by closely studying its breach in total institutions. In normal society, different people do different things at different times. When you are with family, you act one way, at work another way, with friends, yet another. Depending on the situation, different rules, different expectations and different behaviors are forthcoming. Commonsense and sociology agree.
Yet, in recent years, this solid bedrock of normal existence has been challenged by the workings of our economy and by the nature of our media environment, and I fear these challenges feed on each other.
I cannot believe that those are the five humanities programs getting the axe at SUNY. While some of those programs seem to clearly be bachelor’s degrees that must be followed by a graduate program in order to be a successful navigator of the job market, should that not still be an avenue allowed to hard-working students? A BA in classics followed by a JD, or a BA in French followed by an MBA? These are common paths to a successful life.
However, I find it hard not to qualify your criticism of Cathie Black’s recent appointment by Mayor Bloomberg.
You highlight the CTA’s “practical problem” of funding needs. Do you think that the New York public schools or any school, for that matter, doesn’t have the “practical problem” of finding funding and managing its assets? In many ways, it’s a business like any other.
I have had the pleasure of working on a few occasions with Cathie Black (while I was a lowly intern and so I doubt she would remember me). Ms. Black, whom I admire for her work ethic and innovations in her field, publishing, doesn’t have any experience in public schools, that’s completely true. However, neither did her predecessor. I hope we’ll see some positive changes come with her tenure as Chancellor.
There was a recent article in Newsweek that posed the question: has the presidency gotten too big?
I think a similar line can be drawn here: have the requirements of government to provide services to our citizens gotten too outrageous?
I personally feel that the corporate sponsorship of the CTA is interesting, and I can’t wait to watch the public discourse on what is “appropriate” to put in these public spaces and what is not, I think the question of funding in higher education is more complicated. I’ll pose the obvious next question: will this sort of commercialism make its way onto campuses any time soon?
My initial reaction is: I hope not. However, I went to a undergraduate university similar to SUNY in many ways. 300-person classes at a freshman and sophomore level were not uncommon, and were completely ineffective. And we already have, in every institution, named chairs, memorial walkways, branded athletic fields. I would have gladly incorporated more of that (and more professors and scholarships) into my academic life.
Jeff raises a few interesting questions.
Cathie Black’s appointment as Chancellor for Jeff raises an issue as to whether or not the business of the New York City school system is primarily business. From my perspective, the issue looks a little different, but Jeff’s perspective and mine both converge. An alternative rephrasing of the question could be, is the management of New York City’s school system primarily management? Is this a distinction without a difference? I don’t think so.
A business usually implies that there is an exchange of goods or services for money or for one another. All businesses require investments of some kind, customers to serve, and revenues need to exceed costs on a consistent basis and provide a satisfactory return on the investment. Many of these characteristics are present in the NYC school system, but not the profit motive, and the customer base is vague.
The NYC school system is a large institution which poses significant management challenges. It is larger and more complex than many for profit enterprises. It appears to me that the Chancellor’s position is largely management which has characteristics of both science and art. However, all managers must master both process and content. While managers may tend to be stronger in one area than another, in the end effective managers must be proficient in both areas. Cathie Black may be starting with stronger management expertise, but she also acknowledges that she must master content.
While organizational theory has advanced significantly after Max Weber dealt with it in his analysis of bureaucracies, many of his insights still apply. He foresaw the professional manager and rationally structured organizations, and the NYC school system is one manifestation of it.
For me, the naming of public places is more problematic because of the way symbols and meanings influence perceptions. When business symbols in public places co-opt consciousness, a symbolic shift occurs that influences taken-for-granted understandings without the active awareness of the public. While the revenues may be necessary and are frequently put to good uses, the benefits come with a price tag, the influencing of meaning and the way businesses are perceived.
Michael, I think that’s a really interesting continuation of what Jeff brought up in this article. Will the corporate sponsors of these CTA segments [whether that be a station, a line, and train itself] be seen by the public as benefactors of civil service, or corporate advertisers, which is what they are, of course.
In St. Louis, the Busch family and their monolith beer company own some of our city’s best attractions, and most are emblazoned with their name, logos and only serve their beer. There was, until the company was bought by a multi-national conglomerate, a sort of fanatic loyalty to the brand by area residents. Do you think that is what will happen with the sponsors of the CTA?
Lauren, I wish that I could know for sure how the continued exposure to symbols in our environment will influence perception. I think that the process is a cumulative one which has effects over time in direct and indirect ways. The direct ways are fairly obvious, having the name or symbol be exposed to targeted groups and hopefully remembered is the biggest direct impact. In advertising, this is one of the most fundamental objectives. Be remembered. Secondly, I assume that the sponsors like the idea of becoming associated with something that the public finds appealing. Busch Stadium and baseball is a much more favorable linkage than Busch beer and binge drinkers. Once a favorable link is established, my guess is that there are many secondary benefits that appear in all sorts of ways. Aside from the direct element desire to sell more product; there is also a large benefit to raising favorable awareness as it relates to raising funds, obtaining permits, law suits, recruiting talent, etc. The question always involves how much it is worth to the business, and how much is it worth to the community which is turning over its public space. By turning over public space to commercial interests, the community foregoes the opportunity to use this space for the public good, but it does have the cash received which presumably will be used for a public good — or it might ultimately be wasted in an undisciplined budgeting process. Try some time to suspend beliefs and walk into a public place and question all of the symbols to which you are exposed. I think that you might be amazed how many there are, and what their cumulative impacts might be.
What might be addressed with the appointment of Ms. Black, in a decidedly more conservative budgetary environment, are the quantitative aspects of staying “in the black” so to speak. As Bloomberg is very fond of a quantitative approach to things, will he settle for a school system that is more efficient, that is more cost effective, in how it neglects basic student needs? Perhaps there will be more people brought on board to effectively handle the micro issues, that is people with a background, or even a PhD, in education.
However, there are sill some other serious issues being raised such as those in a recent article in the Examiner, which point to the amoral aspects of the American business model, something which I hope she doesn’t bring to the New York school system:
“Black has been directly involved in Coke’s operations in China. Here, the company has, once again, employed a child-marketing campaign to carve out market share while facing accusations of labor violations including the use of prison labor. Black voted against multiple resolutions presented at Coca-Cola shareholder meetings that would have recognized these abuses.”
http://www.examiner.com/bronx-county-independent-in-new-york/killer-coke-campaign-opposes-cathie-black-appointment
Building Muscle…
[…]below you’ll find the link to some sites that we think you should visit[…]…