ABSTRACT
Beyond the character-building role of education is its ability to foster the climate of open inquiry, civil debate, and collective discussion that is indispensable for democracy. An entire school of political philosophy defends the vital role of associational activity described by Alexis de Tocqueville in his Democracy in America. Russell Jacoby's brilliant analysis of the changes in the structures of intellectual life over the course of the twentieth century, The Last Intellectuals, requires the sustained attention of anyone interested in the current state of the university. Jacoby's rhetorically dramatic portrait also leaves out the crowning glory of universities and colleges: their students. Granted, the growing emphasis on professional accreditation at the expense of the value of a liberal arts education in itself, together with the insidious recasting of students as consumers, attacks the almost inviolable teacher-student relation upon which true education rests.
