Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Lessons From Wisconsin About Unions and Higher Education - NYTimes.com

Lessons From Wisconsin About Unions and Higher Education - NYTimes.com

A conversation about unionization and higher education between Stanley Fish and Walter Benn Michaels, professor of English at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

SF: In over 35 years of friendship and conversation, Walter Michaels and I have disagreed on only two things, and one of them was faculty and graduate student unionization. He has always been for and I had always been against. I say “had” because I recently flipped and what flipped me, pure and simple, was Wisconsin.

"The erosion of support for public higher education is a part of a
larger strategy designed to deprive public employees of a voice and
ensure the triumph of conservative/neoliberal policies."