When you鈥檝e been around as long as I have, one gets all manner of intriguing questions. While I usually respond to such queries in private, some seem likely to be of broader interest. So, in 鈥淎sk Rick,鈥� I occasionally take up reader queries. If you鈥檇 like to send one along, just send it to me, care of Greg Fournier, at greg.fournier@aei.org.
Dear Rick,
I鈥檝e seen your new book, . The subtitle says it offers a 鈥渃onservative鈥� vision for early childhood, K鈥�12, and college. That left me wondering why you鈥檇 tell potential readers they鈥檇 only be interested in what you have to say if they identify as 鈥渃onservative.鈥� Shouldn鈥檛 your ideas stand on their own merits without requiring the blessing of an ideological stamp? I don鈥檛 identify as a 鈥渃onservative.鈥� Does that mean I shouldn鈥檛 read your book? I would hope that your work reflects the truth as you see it, not the need to fit an ideological filter.
Sincerely,
Ideas Should Stand on Their Merits
Dear Ideas,
Thanks for a thoughtful note on an important topic. With education as politicized as it is today, this is a really timely issue. Your note prompts several thoughts. I鈥檒l try to order them in a reasonably coherent way and move through them briskly.
First off, this book鈥檚 premise is that the American right has long failed to offer a robust educational vision or agenda. We wrote this book to help change that. So, yeah, it comes at these issues from an unapologetically conservative perspective. And, as guys who favor truth in advertising, my co-author, Mike McShane, and I wanted to be clear with readers about that. That does raise the question of what it means to be a conservative today. For us, it鈥檚 not about being a Republican or a Trump enthusiast. (This is a point I鈥檝e been making at least since 2016.) Of course, if that鈥檚 not what we think conservatism is about, then what do we think it is?
We explore this at some length in the book. If I had to distill it, though, I guess I鈥檇 say that our kind of conservatism emphasizes habits of mind. It appreciates the remarkable nation we鈥檝e inherited, puts stock in arrangements that have stood the test of time, favors competitive solutions over bureaucratic ones, and looks skeptically upon fashionable ideologies and ideological schemes. It emphasizes the personal, the local, and the decentralized, and, as we put it in the book, seeks to secure 鈥渇reedom, community ties, and collective wisdom against the riptides of populism and utopianism.鈥�
How do these apply in practice? Well, fundamental disputes over how schools model norms, set expectations, teach history, and much else are inevitably going to be informed by values. We think schools should unabashedly promote time-tested values like hard work and personal responsibility. We think that American history should not shy away from our many failings but should also take care to acknowledge the immense strides that we鈥檝e made in advancing liberty, equality, and material well-being. We believe schools should set clear expectations for behavior and insist that all students abide by them.
As for excluding potential readers, we鈥檝e done our level best to invite everyone in. To our minds, being clear about where we鈥檙e coming from is a sign that we respect our audience and want to be straight with it. As we observe in the preface, 鈥淧lenty of readers who don鈥檛 regard themselves as conservative may come across insights or proposals they find appealing. Good! You鈥檙e welcome to claim them, whether or not you think they鈥檙e conservative.鈥� In fact, we鈥檇 be delighted if some readers put down the book and conclude that there鈥檚 more common ground than they鈥檇 thought.
That鈥檚 one reason why I鈥檓 proud that the book鈥檚 been endorsed by thinkers who are decidedly not conservative鈥攍ike UMass鈥檚 Jack Schneider, author of , and author Rick Kahlenberg of the Progressive Policy Institute. Even though these colleagues 鈥渄isagree with [me] and McShane most days of the week,鈥� as Kahlenberg puts it, I think they agree about the utility of respectful discourse grounded in clear principles. I believe it鈥檚 useful to be candid about our values and transparent about our perspective. That鈥檚 how we invite meaningful discussion about where we agree, where we don鈥檛, and why. It enables us to explore whether disagreements are fundamental or if they鈥檙e narrower questions of research or practice and it helps us learn how we might bridge our divides. When we鈥檙e opaque or cagey about our beliefs, all of this gets much tougher.
And if you think debates about values are just posturing by awful right-wingers, which is the impression one can get reading education coverage, then I think we鈥檝e stumbled onto the real issue: Many educational advocates, experts, leaders, and funders inhabit a blue ecosystem in which conservative concerns are frequently dismissed as instances of wrongthink or insincere posturing. The result has exacerbated our divides and alienated huge chunks of parents and community members. If anyone imagines we can get past that without talking forthrightly about views and values, I think they鈥檙e mistaken.
