ABSTRACT
This chapter summarizes, specifies, and assesses the state of criticism about college outcomes by examining social critics in two major groups: first, those who regard American higher education as a social disease requiring radical surgery (or even decapitation) and then those who consider it a flawed mixture of positive and negative outcomes in need of constant criticism and renewal. Radical critics generally regard basic American articles of faith in education, including higher education, as one of the central myths of twentieth-century American capitalism. Cast in their most general terms, the fundamental elements of this social myth are clear. The chapter examines two sorts of radical critics of education—neo-Anarchist and neo-Marxist—using as representative examples the work of Ivan Ulich, Samuel Bowles, and Herbert Gintis. The idea of relabeling higher education and rationalizing its structure along the lines of a professional-vocational model is consistent with the pragmatic cast of American culture.
