Agent of Democracy - Society for College and University Planning

The Engaged University:
A Tale of Two Generations
Peter Levine
The Higher Education Exchange, an annual publication devoted
to public scholarship, deliberation, and other forms of civic work
in colleges and universities, first
appeared in 1994. It became a
venue for discussing and debating
a new set of practices on college
campuses, which included service
learning, efforts to capitalize on
the increasing diversity of students
and faculty, community-based
scholarship, and experiments with
deliberation. Although various,
most of these practices shared an
important feature: they were openended.
That is, their organizers
did not try to drive participants
toward particular views, but instead
created opportunities for
“Instead of throwing
all professors together
into a single category . . .
I would draw distinctions
by discipline, by type
of institution and career
path, even by age and
generation.”
(“The Engaged University:
An interview with Peter
Levine,”HEX, 2003.)
discussion and practical experimentation that might lead in unexpected
directions. This open-endedness did not imply a lack of
ideals or commitments. On the contrary, participants were committed
to democratic participation, diversity, consensus building, and
constructive problem solving. Those values have deep roots in
American political history. I will describe their reemergence since
1994 by telling a story about two interacting generations.
The Theory of Generations
Because human beings are born continuously, a “generation”
is a something of a fiction. However, Karl Mannheim argued that
most people are forced to develop a stance toward news, issues,
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