Welcome back to University everyone. I've been a busy bee and so you should be seeing an article up here every week unless I forgot to post. I didn't get the following piece in time for the first issue of Woroni so I'll share it with ya'll as my first post for 2012.
Get some depth!
Get some depth!
Most people arrive at university with a head full of strong political convictions. Very few utilise the opportunity university provides to test these convictions. Even for students of political science and related disciplines, university is often merely a battleground for learning how to defend your convictions. People often don’t even learn to nuance their positions. Instead they learn rhetorical points to use as counters.
I am reminded of an acquaintance, a member of the liberal party, who described himself as a ‘classical liberal’, who couldn’t explain the harm principle or what in Adam Smith commended small government. When pushed, he suggested that he didn’t need to know any of these things because his job (as a lobbyist) was to advocate positions, not find the truth.
This is tragic. As policy problems become ever more complex such cutthroat approaches to politics are increasingly detrimental to our polity. We need vigorous discussion and an awareness of the intricacies of the various debates, not rhetoric deliberately designed to divert debates away from truth.
But far be it from me to discuss the state of Australian political discourse in a Woroni article. This is a student paper, and what concerns me is a student issue, namely, that many students don’t seem interested in getting educated, but merely indoctrinated. Rare is the person who changes their political position while at university. Much more common is the person who simply gets better at playing a role.
This is unfortunate not only because our country needs more rigor and less sophistry in its political sphere, but also because university represents the last real opportunity to engage with and experience, in a frank manner, alternate political views. At ANU you have groups that range from the far right of the liberal party to the socialist alternative. More importantly, you have a range of people who occupy views in the centre and can express their positions very articulately.
While we can be forgiven for wanting to fight zealously for our hard-won adolescent political opinions, I have yet to meet an individual who thought they had it right when they were 18–21. So keep an open mind and consider enrolling in courses that aren’t just about contemporary politics. Consider also courses that are purely theoretical. ‘Ideas in Politics’ and ‘Classical Political Theory’ both deal with underlying themes in politics. They are the best place to start for someone who wants the truth of politics and not just confirmation of they already believe. I also happen to tutoring the latter, so if you think I’m wanker come tell me about it.
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