No Ivory Tower: The University Under Siege

Alexander D. Gregor is director of the Centre for Higher Education
Research and Development at the University of Manitoba and the co-editor
of Postsecondary Education in Canada: The Cultural Agenda.

No Ivory Tower examines the effects of the current neoconservative
agenda on the Canadian university. More specifically, it considers the
dangers of applying American models to Canadian institutions. The book
provides an excellent diagnosis of just what seemingly benign notions
like privatization and private-sector involvement in public institutions
mean, and what their implications can be.

The author, a former American now teaching public administration and
political theory at York University, does an effective job of
delineating the structural and ideological differences between the two
countries, and provides a useful conceptualization of just how much of
the new agenda we should accept and what must be resisted. Clearly he is
not overly impressed either with the private sector’s motivation or
with its effectiveness once it enters the domain of public institutions
and programs. This analysis is the strength and utility of the book,
notwithstanding a somewhat challenging academic writing style.

Wilson attempts as well to comment on the internal processes of the
university and to offer various solutions to its current problems. These
forays are limited in their usefulness, since they do not take adequate
cognizance of the available body of higher-education scholarship. It is
Wilson’s assessment of the neoconservative forces and influences that
makes his book a valuable addition to the public debate over the nature
and future of Canadian public institutions in general and the Canadian
university in particular.