Higher Education and the Moral Economy

The AP is reporting that California is seeing a rise in demonstrations against cuts in subsidies to the University of California system. Most recently, hundreds of students walked onto Interstate 880 in Oakland during rush hour and blocked traffic for miles. Similar protests have taken place elsewhere in the country.

It reminds me of a time last year when I was approached by a student at UMass Lowell looking to do the same thing. I was then president of our RESD Club of which this student wanted support as part of a larger planned protest against tuition hikes at the school. Regardless of the cause, I wasn’t going to get the club involved in politics, but I was intrigued by the student’s rationale. I stunned him by telling him that maybe we should raise tuition at the school given that it’s lower than any place around and the school could use the funds. He was perplexed at my reaction. “What about poor students who can’t afford it?” he said to which I replied that they could easily take out subsidized loans which they could pay back once they got a decent job. The next question was classic: “But what about English majors?” My reply was maybe we should have less English majors and people should study something that will bring a decent economic return to their investment.

The point of telling you about this exchange is to show the differences in our approach to higher education. I was taking a narrow economic approach (not being naive, mind you, but just as a way to explore this student’s thoughts) while he saw it through the lens of what EP Thompson coined as the moral economy. In his seminal article on the subject, Thompson looks at the food riots that occurred in 18th century Britain. Prior to Thompson, many historians simply assumed that high unemployment and high food prices caused rioting. No one asked why they necessitate rioting. Thompson filled in the black box by looking what the participants thought about the situation. He found that rioting was a response to the perceived injustice of bread prices that were deemed too high. Much like the just price theory of Thomas Aquinas, the idea is that some things are too intrinsically valuable to tag with a price that could fluctuate with market conditions.

Higher education falls under that category today. The students protesting in California as well as the one I talked with all believed that education was so valuable in and of itself that they have a right to it at any cost. Their actions only make sense within this context. Thompson or Polanyi might argue that this gives reason for government intervention to hold back the market as it invades society, but one could just as easily argue that this shows the need for a better explication of economic principles among the general public.

• Josh McCabe