Cultivating Virtue in the University 0197599079, 9780197599075

Citation preview

Cultivating Virtue in the University

Cultivating Virtue in the University Edited by

J O NAT HA N B R A N T, E DWA R D B R O O K S , A N D M IC HA E L L A M B

1

3 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2022 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Brant, Jonathan, editor. | Brooks, Edward, editor. | Lamb, Michael, editor. Title: Cultivating virtue in the university / Jonathan Brant, Edward Brooks and Michael Lamb. Description: New York : Oxford University Press, [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021058950 (print) | LCCN 2021058951 (ebook) | ISBN 9780197599075 (hardback) | ISBN 9780197599099 (epub) | ISBN 9780197599105 Subjects: LCSH: Universities and colleges—Moral and ethical aspects. | Education, Higher—Moral and ethical aspects. | Universities and colleges—Social aspects. | College administrators—Professional ethics. Classification: LCC LB2324 .C86 2022 (print) | LCC LB2324 (ebook) | DDC 378—dc23/eng/20220106 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021058950 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021058951 DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197599075.001.0001 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America

Contents Acknowledgments  Contributors 

vii ix

I .   I N T R O DU C T IO N 1. Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?: A Case for Character in Higher Education  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant

3

I I .   T H E U N I V E R SI T Y A S A C O N T E X T F O R C U LT I VAT I N G V I RT U E 2. Virtue and the History of the Modern American University  Julie Reuben

29

3. Virtue, the German University, and the Limits of Critique  Chad Wellmon

44

4. Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults: Perspectives from Neuroscience, Psychology, and Sociology  Brian A. Williams

57

I I I .   I N ST I T U T IO NA L A N D C U LT U R A L BA R R I E R S T O C U LT I VAT I N G V I RT U E 5. The Eclipse of Virtue in the University and Wider Society  Onora O’Neill

83

6. Can Theology Help?  Nigel Biggar

97

I V.   HOW T O C U LT I VAT E V I RT U E I N T H E U N I V E R SI T Y 7. Seven Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in the University  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks

115

vi Contents

8. Closing the Character Gap: Some Ideas from Philosophy and Psychology  Christian B. Miller

157

9. The Beneficial Effects of Cultivating Gratitude in the University  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford

178

10. Forming Virtuous Character: Perspectives from Psychology and Christian Theology  Joanna Collicutt

196

11. Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  Jessica Richard

213

12. The Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin

226

V.  C O N C LU SIO N 13. Character Education in the University: Opportunities and Challenges  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant

253

Index 

279

Acknowledgments This volume originated from a conference on “Cultivating Virtue in the University” at the University of Oxford on May 25–​26, 2017. The conference was organized by the Oxford Character Project; the McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Life at the University of Oxford; and Wake Forest University. The conference was funded by the Templeton World Charity Foundation and supported by other generous cosponsors, including Christ Church, Oxford; the McDonald Agape Foundation; the Oxford Pastorate; and Oxford University Press. We owe our thanks to these cosponsors and especially to Nigel Biggar, Andrew Briggs, Ginny Dunn, Fiona Gatty, Nathan Hatch, Peter McDonald, Andrew Serazin, Claire Shuttleworth, and the Oxford Character Project team for all they did to make the conference a success. We are also grateful to the John Templeton Foundation, Kern Family Foundation, Lilly Endowment, Inc., and a number of donors for supporting our ongoing work to educate character through the Oxford Character Project and the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University. Their support has enabled us to bring this project to completion. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of any of our sponsors. The interdisciplinary conference attracted an international audience from Canada, Hong Kong, United Kingdom, United States, and several countries in Europe. We are grateful to the attendees who asked thoughtful questions that improved the quality of the conference and subsequent volume, and especially to the dedicated contributors whose excellent essays now constitute this book: Nigel Biggar, Joanna Collicutt, Liz Gulliford, Lesley Larkin, Christian B. Miller, Blaire Morgan, Paula M. L. Moya, Onora O’Neill, Julie Reuben, Jessica Richard, Chad Wellmon, and Brian A. Williams. Their scholarly insight, constructive engagement, and patient persistence were essential to the completion of this collection. We would also like to thank Kenneth Townsend and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback on individual chapters and the

viii Acknowledgments volume as a whole, and Dylan Brown and William Morgan for their excellent research assistance. Finally, we owe a special thanks to Oxford University Press for publishing this volume, and especially to Lucy Randall and Hannah Doyle whose steady support and guidance have been instrumental to bringing this volume to publication. We are grateful for all that Oxford University Press is doing to encourage the study and cultivation of virtue in the university and beyond.

Contributors Nigel Biggar is Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology and Director of the McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Life at the University of Oxford. He is also the editor of the Oxford Studies in Theological Ethics Series with Oxford University Press. A frequent commentator on public affairs and the editor of numerous volumes, he is the author of The Hastening That Waits: Karl Barth’s Ethics (1996), Good Life: Reflections on What We Value Today (1997), Aiming to Kill: The Ethics of Suicide and Euthanasia (2009), Behaving in Public: How to Do Christian Ethics (2011), In Defence of War (2013), Between Kin and Cosmopolis: An Ethic of the Nation (2014), and What’s Wrong with Rights? (2020). He has a special interest in the moral purposes of the university. Jonathan Brant is the Founding Director of the Oxford Character Project, an interdisciplinary initiative that combines academic research on character development with a practical program offering Oxford postgraduate students the resources they need to become good leaders and wise thinkers. He is a member of the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford and a Research Fellow of Harris Manchester College, and as the Oxford Pastorate Chaplain, he leads a team ministering to postgraduate students. His book, Paul Tillich and the Possibility of Revelation through Film (2012), draws on systematic theology, film theory, and qualitative research to consider the religious impact of contemporary Latin American cinema. He has coauthored several articles on moral education within the university in the Journal of Moral Education, Journal of Character Education, and International Journal of Ethics Education. Edward Brooks is Executive Director of the Oxford Character Project at the University of Oxford. His work joins research in virtue ethics, leadership, and character development to the design and delivery of leadership and character development programs at the University of Oxford and other universities and organizations around the world. He currently leads a major research project on culture, character, and leadership in commercial organizations, focusing on technology, finance, and law as well as business more widely. Beyond Oxford, he has worked as a Visiting Lecturer in the Department of Education and Social Justice at the University of Birmingham and as a Research Leader in the Faculty of Health, Education and Society at the University of Northampton. In 2020 he led the development of a framework for character and flourishing in higher education along with colleagues at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham. He recently co-​edited Literature and Character Education in Universities: Theory, Method,

x Contributors and Text Analysis (2021, with Emma Cohen de Lara, Álvaro Sánchez-​Ostiz and José Maria Torralba). Joanna Collicutt is a member of the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford and an associate lecturer at Ripon College Cuddesdon. A chartered clinical psychologist, a specialist in neuropsychology, and an associate priest in a west Oxfordshire parish, her research focuses on the intersection of psychology, neurology, ethics, and religion. She is the author of many academic articles and several books, including Ethical Practice in Brain Injury Rehabilitation (2007), The Dawkins Delusion? (2007, with Alister McGrath), Jesus and the Gospel Women (2009), The Psychology of Christian Character Formation (2015), and Neurology and Religion (2019, with Alasdair Coles). Liz Gulliford is Associate Professor in Psychology at the University of Northampton. Since completing her doctorate at Queens’ College at the University of Cambridge (2011), she has carried out extensive interdisciplinary conceptual and empirical work in positive psychology and moral education. She has a long-​standing interest in character strengths and virtues, including gratitude, forgiveness, compassion, optimism, and hope. Her conceptual and empirical work has been published in a range of journals in psychology, philosophy, and education. Previously, she was a Research Fellow in the School of Education at the University of Birmingham’s Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues, where she worked with Blaire Morgan on the “Attitude for Gratitude” project, canvassing the views of over 10,000 individuals in the United Kingdom. She is leader of the “Exceptional Experience and Consciousness Studies Research Group” in the Research Centre for Psychology & Social Sciences at the University of Northampton. Michael Lamb is Executive Director of the Program for Leadership and Character and Assistant Professor of Politics, Ethics, and Interdisciplinary Humanities at Wake Forest University. He is also a Research Fellow with the Oxford Character Project and former Dean of Leadership, Service, and Character Development for the Rhodes Trust. His research and teaching focus on character education and the role of virtues in public life. He is the author of A Commonwealth of Hope: Augustine’s Political Thought (2022) and coeditor of Everyday Ethics: Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life (2019, with Brian A. Williams). His research on character has been published in the Journal of Moral Education, Journal of Character Education, and International Journal of Ethics Education. He is currently a co–​principal investigator on major grants to advance programs on leadership and character in the university. Lesley Larkin is Professor of English at Northern Michigan University. She is the author of Race and the Literary Encounter: Black Literature from James Weldon Johnson to Percival Everett (2015), which traces the strategies developed by modern and contemporary Black writers to challenge, model, and theorize modes of reading race. She is also a coeditor of the forthcoming Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Fiction: 1980–​2020 and is developing a monograph, Reading in the Postgenomic

Contributors  xi Age, which explores how contemporary US and Canadian narratives engage rearticulations of race, gender, and humanness prompted by genomic research. Christian B. Miller is the A. C. Reid Professor of Philosophy at Wake Forest University. He is the past Director of The Character Project at Wake Forest, past Philosophy Director of The Beacon Project, and currently the Director of The Honesty Project, funded by a $4.4 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation. A scholar working on the philosophy and psychology of moral character, he is the author of Moral Character: An Empirical Theory (2013), Character and Moral Psychology (2014), The Character Gap: How Good Are We? (2018), Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue (2021), and Moral Psychology (2021). He is editor or coeditor of Essays in Philosophy of Religion (2006); The Bloomsbury Companion to Ethics (2011); Character: New Directions from Philosophy, Psychology, and Theology (2015, with R. Michael Furr, Angela Knobel, and William Fleeson); Moral Psychology, Volume 5: Virtue and Character (2017, with Walter Sinnott-​ Armstrong); and Integrity, Honesty, and Truth Seeking (2020, with Ryan West). Blaire Morgan is Senior Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Worcester. She received her B.Sc. and Ph.D. from the University of Birmingham, where she later worked as a Research Fellow in the School of Education. Her research focuses on social, moral, and positive psychology, with a particular interest in the character traits of gratitude, authenticity, and empathy. Most recently, her work has focused on character traits on social media, the darker side of positive traits, and the links between character traits and well-​being. A leading expert on the psychology of gratitude, she previously worked on the “Attitude for Gratitude” project at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues. At the University of Worcester, she leads a research theme on “Strengths and Adversity across the Life Span.” Paula M. L. Moya is the Danily C. and Laura Louise Bell Professor of the Humanities in the Department of English and the Burton J. and Deedee McMurtry University Fellow in Undergraduate Education at Stanford University. She is the author of The Social Imperative: Race, Close Reading, and Contemporary Literary Criticism (2016) and Learning from Experience: Minority Identities, Multicultural Struggles (2002), and she has coedited three collections of original essays: Doing Race: 21 Essays for the 21st Century (2010), Identity Politics Reconsidered (2006), and Reclaiming Identity: Realist Theory and the Predicament of Postmodernism (2000). She has also written on the ethical functions of literature, including “Does Reading Literature Make You More Moral?,” and is in the process of writing a monograph entitled Decolonial Feminist Fiction, which explores the decolonial features of multifocal narrative novels. Onora O’Neill is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge, President of the Royal Institute of Philosophy, and a member of the UK House of Lords. She is the former President of the British Academy and the Aristotelian Society, founding President of the British Association of Philosophy, former Principal of Newnham College, Cambridge, and former Chair of the Equality

xii Contributors and Human Rights Commission. She is the author of numerous books, including Acting on Principle (1975), Faces of Hunger (1986), Constructions of Reason (1989), Towards Justice and Virtue (1996), Bounds of Justice (2000), Autonomy and Trust in Bioethics (2002), A Question of Trust (2002), Rethinking Informed Consent in Bioethics (2007, with Neil Manson), Constructing Authorities (2015), Justice Across Boundaries: Whose Obligations? (2016), Speech Rights, Speech Wrongs (2016), and From Principles to Practice: Normativity and Judgement in Ethics and Politics (2018). Julie Reuben is Charles Warren Professor of the History of American Education at Harvard University and Faculty Director of the Phillips Brooks Center for Public Service and Engaged Scholarship. She is the author of The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (1996) and numerous articles about the impact of 1960s activism on American higher education. She is currently researching changing forms of political education in mid-​twentieth-​century American universities and writing about the social responsibilities of universities. Jessica Richard is Associate Professor of English at Wake Forest University, editor of The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (2008), and author of The Romance of Gambling in the Eighteenth-​Century British Novel (2011), as well as articles on works by Mary Shelley, Maria Edgeworth, and Samuel Johnson. She has taught courses entitled “Pursuits of Happiness” and “Education in Eighteenth-​Century British Literature” on the rise of the novel and on Jane Austen. She is the cofounder and coeditor of The 18th-​Century Common, a public humanities website for enthusiasts of eighteenth-​century studies, and an editor of The Maria Edgeworth Letters Project, a collaborative digital edition. Chad Wellmon is Professor of German Studies, with appointments in History and Media Studies, at the University of Virginia. An expert on the role of knowledge and character in the modern research university, he is the author of Becoming Human: Romantic Anthropology and the Embodiment of Freedom (2010), Organizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Research University (2015), and Permanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age (2021), and coeditor of The Rise of the Research University: A Sourcebook (2016). He has written numerous essays on character in the university, including “Knowledge, Virtue, and the Research University” and “Whatever Happened to General Education?” Brian A. Williams is Dean of the College of Arts and Humanities and the Templeton Honors College at Eastern University. He is a former Lecturer in Theology and Christian Ethics at the University of Oxford and Director of Oxford Conversations. He holds an M.Phil. and D.Phil. in Christian Ethics from the University of Oxford, where he was a Clarendon Scholar; an M.A. and Th.M. in Systematic and Historical Theology from Regent College; and a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Ozark Christian

Contributors  xiii College. His current research examines the theory and practice of the liberal arts tradition in the works of Hugh of St. Victor, Philip Melanchthon, and John Henry Newman. He is the author of The Potter’s Rib: The History, Theology, and Practice of Mentoring for Pastoral Formation (2005) and coeditor of Everyday Ethics: Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life (2019, with Michael Lamb).

I

IN T RODU C TION

1 Should Universities Cultivate Virtue? A Case for Character in Higher Education Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant

As universities around the world grapple with the challenges and opportunities of higher education in the twenty-​first century, “cultivating virtue” is perhaps unlikely to be high on the priority list of many strategic plans. This is surely not for lack of relevance. Intellectual virtues such as open-​mindedness, wisdom, curiosity, and creativity are no less important for academic study than in the past. And moral virtues such as empathy, compassion, courage, honesty, humility, and justice would be welcome and important additions to any campus culture or list of “graduate attributes.” However, the language of character and virtue that holds these qualities together as a harmony of human dispositions that promote a flourishing life is largely absent from higher education discourse. While character might be referenced at the occasional matriculation or graduation ceremony, its cultivation is rarely an explicit focus of the multitude of activities in between.1 It wasn’t always so. The cultivation of character was once an explicit educational aim of many universities, especially in Europe and the United States, the higher education contexts that are the primary focus of this volume.2 But as universities navigated increasing academic specialization and cultural pluralism, developments in research and technology, and the economic forces of an increasingly globalized system of higher education, they largely left the intentional cultivation of virtue aside.3 Universities were not the only institutions to follow this path, of course. As Onora O’Neill argues in Chapter 5 of this volume, the twentieth century saw an “eclipse of virtue in both the university and wider society.”4 This book is part of a growing movement to recover and reimagine character education in universities.5 In response to theoretical and practical questions about whether the cultivation of virtue can legitimately be considered an intentional aim of modern educational institutions, this volume

​

​

4  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant encourages an inclusive approach that recognizes the value of character education in the increasingly global, pluralistic, and intercultural contexts of higher education. Running through the diverse disciplinary perspectives in this volume are the convictions that universities, like all educational institutions, do implicitly cultivate character, even if they are often hesitant to admit it; that there are good reasons why they should do so critically and intentionally, even as they welcome plural visions of the good; and that there are ways in which they can do so practically, even as they embrace critical rigor, acknowledge moral diversity, and engage the social, political, and economic contexts of higher education today. We will consider each in turn before providing an overview of each chapter in the volume.

Universities as Sites for the Cultivation of Virtue The language of virtue has its origins in a person-​centered approach to ethics that understands the ethical life broadly in terms of the goodness or flourishing of individuals and communities. Virtues are excellences of character that contribute to and partly constitute human flourishing.6 These dispositions combine thought, motivation, and action, guiding persons who possess them to think wisely (intellectual virtues) and act, feel, and desire appropriately (moral virtues). While intellectual and moral virtues are fundamental, they are not the only categories of virtue. Virtues can also be considered as the excellences required for specific domains such as civic or professional life, leading to an emphasis, for example, on civic or performance virtues.7 In their mature form, virtues endure over time and are stable across situations, but they are not innate. Rather, they are developed through patterns and practices of life from early infancy through adulthood.8 As excellences of character, virtues are the aspirational dispositions on a spectrum of character qualities that also includes harmful ways of thinking, attitudes, and actions that are typically described as “vices.” The aim of character education is to encourage the positive development of virtues rather than vices as stable and enduring parts of one’s character and identity. Importantly, institutions play a vital role in the formation of intellectual and moral character.9 Institutional cultures—​manifest in shared practices, values, narratives, norms, and incentive structures—​inevitably shape the

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  5 thoughts, feelings, and behavior of their members. Over time, these cultural dynamics also shape individuals’ character. This formative effect is heightened in educational institutions given the life stage of students and the direct purpose of schools, colleges, and universities to foster developmental change. Within universities, courses and curricula are structured with a body of knowledge, a set of practices, and a list of learning outcomes and led by instructors who, whether intentionally or not, model particular thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors in the classroom, thereby shaping the character of their students. Beyond the classroom, students inhabit living and learning spaces that inevitably influence what they value and how they perceive and engage the world. As comprehensive communities for learning, the aim of universities is not merely the transfer of knowledge but the transformation of students who, ideally, acquire the knowledge, skills, and “graduate attributes” that enable them to live wisely and well and thereby make a contribution to the good of society.10 The stated educational mission of the University of Oxford is typical in this regard: “Through a commitment to the personal education of each student, we will provide a quality of education and experience which equips students with the values, skills and intellectual discipline that will enable them to make a positive contribution to society.”11 The cultivation of virtue is not named explicitly, but in the objective to develop “values, skills, and intellectual discipline,” the concept is present nonetheless. Yet, if universities are often hesitant to explicitly embrace the language of character, there has also been a notable interest in recovering virtue within the university. In a survey of over 20,000 undergraduate faculty teaching at 143 four-​year colleges and universities in the United States, for example, about 85 percent of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that it is part of their “role” to “develop students’ moral character” and “help students develop personal values.”12 This interest is not limited to the United States. It is appropriate that the international conference on “Cultivating Virtue in the University” that gave rise to this volume took place in Oxford since it was in Oxford where a postwar turn to virtue in the philosophical work of Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot, Mary Midgley, and Iris Murdoch took hold.13 This philosophical recovery of virtue ethics is far from monolithic, but it has informed educational practice through the positive psychology and “positive education” movements and inspired a more philosophically grounded renewal of character education and an interest in virtue across a variety of traditions and disciplines.14 More recently, this movement has

6  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant been advanced in higher education through focused character education research and programs at universities around the world. At our respective institutions—​the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom and Wake Forest University in the United States—​we have made the intentional cultivation of virtue central to our work to reinvigorate and reimagine the role of leadership and character development in a modern pluralistic university. Faculty and administrators are facilitating similar work at institutions such as Austral University in Argentina; the University of Hong Kong in the H.K.S.A.R.; Tilburg University in the Netherlands; the University of Navarra in Spain; the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom; and Notre Dame University, the University of Alabama, the University of Chicago, and the University of Oklahoma, among others, in the United States. In 2020, the Oxford Character Project at the University of Oxford and the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham consulted scholars and university administrators from around the world to produce a framework for character education in universities. Entitled “Character Education in Higher Education: A Framework for Flourishing,” the report sought to clarify the importance of cultivating virtue in the university by emphasizing the relationship between character and flourishing.15 It defined virtues as “stable dispositions that combine perception, cognition, emotion, motivation and action to respond in admirable ways to different situations in different spheres of human life” and divided types of virtues into three categories—​intellectual, moral, and civic.16 Virtuous action is guided by the integrative meta-​virtue of “practical wisdom,” which encompasses deliberation and discernment on how to advance the good in specific situations.17 The report, which has now been presented for discussion with representatives from over a hundred universities, shows how virtues are central to the flourishing of students and important for the research, education, and public impact of universities. The positive assertion from university leaders that “universities shape lives,” alongside a prominent focus on personal and professional development, reveals the ongoing aspiration of universities to contribute to the holistic formation of their students. If universities are inevitably involved in the work of character education, the guiding conviction of this book is that universities can benefit both their students and society by doing so more critically and intentionally.

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  7

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue? In Chapter 8, Christian Miller presents an imagined dialogue with a university leader who asks “whether I as a university president should be trying to intentionally promote virtue in this context?” Miller answers in the affirmative, citing three main factors: (1) student aspiration (“students find virtuous lives admirable and inspiring”); (2) public good (“virtuous lives make the world a better place”); and (3) personal benefit (“good character can be personally rewarding”). He also points to (4) religious faith (“faith traditions often support cultivating virtue”), which is a factor of greater or lesser institutional and personal relevance depending on the context of the institution or the individuals inhabiting it.18 Underlying Miller’s response is the connection between character and human flourishing that is central to virtue ethics. Flourishing has recently been taken up as a candidate for the overarching goal of education,19 and there is a growing body of theoretical and empirical work that analyzes its component parts and measures their presence in populations across the world. While human flourishing involves various external factors such as material resources, mental and physical health, and close social relationships,20 cross-​cultural empirical research by the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard University suggests that it is advanced by the actualization of character virtues, which can be understood as descriptors of human life at its best.21 Moreover, insofar as character is not just personal but relational, it is also prosocial, expressed in other-​oriented action that furthers the flourishing of society. To the extent that universities assume responsibility for the education of young people at a formative time in their personal development and profess a socially engaged and holistic approach to higher education that seeks to prepare students to advance the public good, the cultivation of character virtues can be of significant societal importance. In particular, the relationship between character development and the public good highlights a civic reason why universities may wish to cultivate virtue: (5) it supports the development of good leaders and citizens. Flourishing political communities (especially democracies that depend on citizens to govern themselves) need leaders and citizens who exercise virtues of character—​such as justice, compassion, courage, temperance, wisdom, humility, and honesty—​ in their respective roles. Universities that self-​ consciously aim to educate and prepare students for civic roles in society, then, could benefit from a focus on the virtues that contribute to active and

8  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant ethical citizenship. The relevance of virtue for citizenship is one reason why many scholars have emphasized the connection between citizenship education and character education.22 Cultivating virtue can serve the ends of educating good citizens and supporting flourishing communities. What is more, the fact that most students attend university during the period of “emerging adulthood” provides a further developmental reason (6) for universities to educate character, as Brian A. Williams suggests in Chapter 4.23 While university educators once assumed that qualities of character were settled before the end of adolescence, there is increasing scholarly research suggesting that character continues to develop into adulthood.24 As former Harvard University President Derek Bok notes, “almost all of the desired capabilities can continue to change at least through early adulthood, and . . . some actually tend to develop most during the traditional college years.”25 Character can also support (7) academic development and integrity. Proficiency in advanced undergraduate or graduate study, along with the capacity to contribute to academic discourse and knowledge production, requires students to develop specific skills, disciplined habits of thought and being, and an enacted commitment to the values that underlie and bring coherence to the practices of academic life. The longer one’s academic progression and career is, the more important these practices, skills, and habits become. Insofar as part of universities’ social function is to develop and validate knowledge in a responsible way, all qualifications that bear university insignia confer status on students not simply as repositories of information but as people apprenticed—​to different degrees—​in the values and ways of knowing that the institutions uphold. In particular, many universities help students to develop relevant academic practices by way of training in “study skills” and “critical thinking,” understood as ways of effectively exploring data, probing arguments, and analyzing complex issues. Yet, while such skills are undoubtedly important, they are not self-​sustaining; their value is enhanced when they are supported by personal motivation and embedded within deeper commitments to academic learning, personal development, and social impact. This deeper pursuit means that academic development does not simply engage the intellect but also entails the development of relevant motivations, values, and commitments that shape how one engages and uses the knowledge, skills, and practices that are acquired. For those values and commitments to be enacted consistently over time requires the cultivation

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  9 of virtues—​dispositions of thought, motivation, and action combined in practice in a way that equips students to successfully pursue goals and instantiate academic values as second nature, as part of what it means to be lifelong learners. Among these virtues is Max Weber’s emphasis on “intellectual rectitude,” identified by Chad Wellmon in Chapter 3, as well as intellectual virtues such as curiosity, open-​mindedness, intellectual responsibility, and intellectual humility.26 Yet intellectual virtues, while distinct, cannot be easily separated from moral virtues.27 Generosity is needed, for example, to engage interlocutors, humility to rightly recognize one’s limitations and value others’ contributions, hope and resilience to lean into difficulty and keep working toward a good outcome, courage to make unpopular arguments or challenge the status quo, and justice to give sources, interlocutors, and critics the respect and recognition they are due. In the university, intellectual and moral virtues are mutually reinforcing. In this way, the cultivation of virtue supports not only academic development but also academic integrity, which universities deem to be important to learning and educational attainment. Universities desire their students to succeed academically by doing their own work, giving credit to those whose work has informed their own, and representing themselves truthfully, both inside and outside the classroom. This commitment to academic integrity is why many universities have honor codes and prohibitions against lying, cheating, and plagiarism. The challenge, of course, is that students do not always exhibit such integrity, and institutional efforts to deal with the issue are sometimes ineffective.28 Studies have shown that average rates of cheating among undergraduates are “as high as 60%, 70%, and even 86%.”29 Researchers have suggested several reasons for this trend, including an increased emphasis on performance, a lower sense of self-​efficacy among students, and increased pressure from parents and peers.30 Whatever the causes, concerns about academic integrity present an urgent issue for institutions of higher learning, particularly as the increasing availability of online learning potentially makes cheating easier and proctoring more difficult.31 A commitment to academic integrity supplies an additional reason to educate character in the university: virtues such as honesty, justice, and courage can support academic integrity in individual students and the university as a whole.32 Academic development and integrity, as we have described them here, focus on the development of students as intellectuals in accord with the values and practices of knowledge production that are central to universities.

10  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant But since only a very small minority of graduates will remain within academia, part of the rationale for universities to intentionally cultivate virtues, even academic virtues, rests on their transferable value into the larger society, including into students’ professional lives, which is a final reason (8) that universities should consider cultivating virtue. A career-​focused rationale is perhaps strongest where universities have assumed responsibility for professional education, for example, in fields such as law, medicine, religion, education, engineering, and business. In many university courses in these fields, the lines between academic education (focused on knowledge production) and practical or vocational education (focused on knowledge application) are blurred. Insofar as courses are intended to prepare students for professional practice in particular sectors, however, the values and virtues relevant to the profession fall within the remit of higher education institutions. There is nothing radical about this argument; it simply extends the justification for ethics components of professional degree programs and codes of conduct from a focus on regulation and compliance to a more person-​centered, integrated, and arguably efficacious emphasis on character and ethical practice.33 This argument for character education is supported by an increasing emphasis on culture and character across a number of professional fields.34 In complex professional contexts, good practice requires not only ethical rules but ethical practitioners operating in supportive institutional environments. One crucial aspect of character education in the university, particularly as it relates to public impact, academic development, and professional preparation in pluralistic societies, is the need to engage character critically. One advantage of recognizing that universities inevitably form character is being able to subject that formation to critical scrutiny and engage faculty, staff, and students in the process of intentionally discussing and deciding what formative impact their university should have.35 The need for higher-​level, critical engagement with moral virtues, values, and practices perhaps marks one important difference between the nature of character education in universities and primary and secondary schools. University students are adults capable of critically engaging ideas, reflecting on what they are being taught, and making decisions about how they choose to live. The aim of character education is not to displace students’ reflective capacity to choose but to equip them to choose wisely and well.36 As such, character education in universities should not be taken to imply a didactic pedagogy or the undermining of student autonomy, but the opposite. Character education at the tertiary level should be critical and dialogical, with full recognition and encouragement of

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  11 students’ own moral identity, judgment, and responsibility and an emphasis on intellectual analysis and critical engagement.37 While promoting ethical literacy and strategies of character development may well play a part in such education, responsible efforts will highlight difficulties and challenges along with standard definitions and practices and focus on the cultivation of practical wisdom as the capacity for critical perception, self-​guided deliberation, and discerning judgment about the right course of action.38 Within the university, character education can—​and should—​be done in a way that is both critical and intentional. We have now identified eight potential reasons why universities should develop virtue: (1) student aspiration, (2) public good, (3) personal benefit, (4) religious faith (where that is relevant), (5) good citizenship, (6) psychological and social development of emerging adults, (7) academic development and integrity, and (8) professional preparation and progression. Which of these aims might be compelling or primary in a particular university will depend on a range of factors, including the specific mission, ethos, and educational aims of the institution. However, they at least give universities a reason to examine if, why, and how they might integrate intentional efforts to cultivate virtue. Of course, even if universities recognize that they should cultivate character, many may wonder if they can. Fortunately, recent developments in character education give ample guidance on how faculty, staff, and administrators can educate character.

How Can Universities Cultivate Virtue? In his recent book, Higher Expectations: Can Colleges Teach Students What They Need to Know in the 21st Century?, former Harvard President Derek Bok lays out his proposal for the future of undergraduate education.39 While he focuses on the United States, much is applicable to university education more widely. He argues that significant changes in society—​in particular, radical global interconnection and a shift to an information economy—​call for “fresh thought” when it comes to what universities teach and how they teach it.40 Bok’s vision for twenty-​first-​century higher education extends beyond intellectual knowledge and practical competence to virtue and includes an entire chapter on character.41 In the end, Bok suggests, universities have a responsibility to do what they can to develop the competencies and qualities of

12  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant mind and behavior that will help their students to live successful, responsible, and fulfilling lives. Colleges and universities are among the most influential institutions for teaching and nurturing young adults during critical years in which they are capable of growth not only in their intellects but in other qualities of personality, character and behavior that can help them succeed and flourish after they graduate. For most of these capabilities, there is no satisfactory alternative to college for providing the necessary instruction.42 Bok is careful not to equate the responsibility of colleges and universities to cultivate character with their ability to do so, but he points to recent research in psychology highlighting the possibilities of character development and argues that universities need to embrace these challenges. Development of pedagogical methodologies and curricula, he argues, needs to go hand in hand with controlled, longitudinal studies to measure as best we can the efficacy of such programs.43 Such programs and research are already taking place in several universities, including in our work to develop character and leadership at the University of Oxford and Wake Forest University. Our efforts join academic research on theoretical and empirical dimensions of character and leadership with the design, delivery, and measurement of academic courses and student programs to cultivate leaders of character, combining insights from the humanities and social sciences with new advances in evaluation and assessment. This interdisciplinarity is essential, a point underscored by contributors from various disciplines in the chapters that follow. Also essential is the way that our practical approach relies not merely on intuition or tradition but on theoretically and empirically grounded strategies of character development supported by research in education, philosophy, and psychology—​strategies explained in detail in Chapter 7 and extended in several other chapters. The examples presented in Part III suggest that universities can indeed cultivate virtue in critical, creative, and rigorous ways.

Overview The essays in this volume address the question of character development within the university from a range of relevant disciplinary perspectives—​ education, history, literature, neuroscience, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and theology. The volume also includes examples of theoretically informed practice that applies interdisciplinary research on character

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  13 education to develop virtue in university students. The combination of theoretically sensitive, empirically informed, and practically oriented chapters, along with the authors’ diversity of approach, style, and perspective, illuminates different views of character education in the university and highlights the scholarly and pedagogical value of critically engaging these questions through a wide range of disciplinary and cultural perspectives. While these perspectives are not exhaustive or even always compatible, they supply representative examples of how different scholars and educators are approaching these important issues within a university context. Part I explores the potential of the university as a context for cultivating virtue and positions current debates about whether and how universities should educate character within their larger historical, intellectual, social, and scientific contexts. Some of the most instructive lessons about the role of universities in moral formation come from history. Within the United States and Europe, the American and German traditions of higher education offer illuminating and sometimes conflicting examples of how to approach the development of moral and intellectual virtues in the university. Surveying strands of these two traditions, Chapters 2 and 3 situate the contemporary debate about the intellectual and moral purposes of higher education historically and highlight both the possibilities and limits of such efforts. In Chapter 2, Julie Reuben describes the changing ways in which the cultivation of virtue has been an aim of American higher education throughout its history. In the early years, educating virtue was a central purpose of the American liberal arts college, but as colleges expanded into universities, placed more emphasis on research, and responded to larger cultural, political, and economic changes, virtue was “pushed to the margins,” though “never completely abandoned.” According to Reuben, a focus on neutrality interpreted as broad consensus, combined with concerns about democracy’s future after two world wars, contributed to the return of moral education as citizenship education in the mid-​twentieth century. However, the mobilization of students in movements for equality in the 1960s threatened the consensus vision of neutrality, which was redefined instead as “tolerance of a plural set of political, social, and moral visions.” This shift increased freedom of speech but also led to the dismantling of citizenship education. The 1980s saw efforts to restore general education but also drew universities into the culture wars as faculty and students pushed to diversify courses on “Western Civilization” and placed equality and inclusion at the center of institutions’

14  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant values. Efforts in moral and civic education have continued, notably in the service-​learning movement, yet since the 1980s, programs of moral education have mostly been voluntary, leaving notable gaps in how consistently these efforts can be applied and sustained within and across institutions. Reuben concludes by noting how structural changes that encourage consumerism and ongoing political polarization create challenging conditions for instituting robust forms of moral education in contemporary American higher education. In Chapter 3, Chad Wellmon turns to the history of German higher education to consider what lessons it offers about educating virtue. Beginning with Max Weber’s lecture to a group of German university students in 1917, which was later published as the well-​known essay “Science as Vocation,” Wellmon addresses the long-​standing debate about the relation between the modern university’s pursuit of specialized, scientific knowledge and its role in moral formation—​the debate between Wissenschaft and Bildung in the German context, and between the diverse approaches of liberal arts colleges and research universities in the United States. From as early as the start of the twentieth century, the concern in both German and American contexts was that “higher education had decoupled the pursuit of knowledge from questions of value and meaning and, thus, abandoned its primary historical purpose—​ the moral education of young people.” Wellmon challenges the premise that these two pursuits are opposed, arguing instead that “the research university inculcates virtues by maintaining distinct practices oriented towards clear internal goods,” which he describes as “proximate, not ultimate goods.” To develop this account, Wellmon considers the German concept of scholarship as a form of life focused on one very particular virtue, “intellectual rectitude.” In the nineteenth-​century German context, classical philology was the paradigm of intellectual rectitude, characterized by “ ‘industriousness, attention to the most minute of details, devotion to method, an ethic of responsibility, exactitude, as well as a commitment and facility to open discussion’ and, above all, a critical attitude.”44 In this context, practicing the “scholarly method” was not only a path to academic success but a process of formation, “a form of catechesis.” Returning to Weber, Wellmon argues that the purpose of his lecture was not simply to break the historic unity of Wissenchaft and Bildung, as some have contended, but to propose “a more modest Wissenschaft,” not as a way to answer “ultimate questions” but as a strictly limited yet vital path of intellectual rectitude. Assessing what Weber’s approach might mean for us today, Wellmon suggests that universities

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  15 should recognize their own ethical commitments, resources, and practices and their own important, though proximate, goods while partnering with “other moral traditions and resources” to “help students develop capacities to engage in debates and conversations that take their deepest and oftentimes conflicting values seriously.” If Reuben and Wellmon situate debate about the moral and intellectual purposes of the university historically, Brian A. Williams does so socially, psychologically, and scientifically, showing why the period of “emerging adulthood”—​when many students attend college or university—​is such an important time of moral development.45 In Chapter 4, Williams draws on the neuroscience, psychology, and sociology of emerging adults to explore why universities can play a significant role in helping students to develop the character needed to enter adulthood “unencumbered by serious emotional, physical, and moral harm.” Williams draws upon research with functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to show that the human brain, including the processes most responsible for moral reasoning and behavior, is not fully developed until at least age twenty-​five. Turning to the social sciences, he considers how evolutionary ethics might offer guidance in forging a broad consensus around which virtues to cultivate in the midst of deep pluralism, and he surveys psychological and sociological research showing that “formation is unavoidable any time someone is deeply immersed, especially during several formative years, in cultures that are ‘thickly webbed’ with normative assumptions, exemplars, narratives, beliefs, practices, and obligations.” For these reasons, Williams argues that universities cannot simply opt out of moral formation; they are always implicated in shaping how students think, feel, and act, whether they recognize it or not. Given that moral formation is inevitable, Williams concludes that “it seems reasonable, or not unreasonable, for colleges and universities to attend to the integrated formation of their students.” Williams closes with six implications for moral formation at universities, which together build a strong argument that universities should intentionally seek to develop virtue among the emerging adults in their midst. Part II considers some of the institutional and cultural barriers to cultivating virtue in the contemporary university. In Chapter 5, Baroness Onora O’Neill opens with two hypotheses that might explain the diminished attention to teaching virtue in universities: demographic, financial, and regulatory changes in the universities themselves, and “wider and deeper social, cultural, and philosophical changes in the ways we think about ethics and

16  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant justice.” A leading philosopher of justice and virtue, O’Neill devotes most of her attention to the latter, suggesting that the cultivation of virtue has been marginalized in the university as a result of the reconfiguration of ethics in Western society more broadly. According to O’Neill, the rejection of duty and the substitution of rights has replaced the classical agent’s question, “What ought I to do?” with the question, “What ought I receive?” Identifying who might be responsible for the “counterpart duties” to provide these goods has proved troublesome, as political philosophers have attempted to ground accounts of justice but without complete success. In such a climate, O’Neill asks, “What are [universities] to inculcate in their students if they find themselves in a society that has little to say about what we ought to do and is uncomfortable with the very notions of duty and virtue?” While she acknowledges that the issue is “not something that universities alone can resolve,” they should, at least, engage with approaches that “do not reduce matters of justice to respect for individual rights, or ethical questions to the satisfaction of subjective preferences.” In Chapter 6, Nigel Biggar analyzes some of the institutional and intellectual assumptions that surround the idea of the university. Biggar rejects the idealization of universities as simply seeking knowledge for knowledge’s sake. “Right from their medieval beginnings,” Biggar argues, “they have served private and practical public purposes as well as the sheer amor scientiae.” An important part of this account is that universities have a “public responsibility” that includes “a responsibility to form their students in intellectual and civic virtue.” Recognizing that this claim might be considered “eccentric,” Biggar offers reasons why universities should serve this function. First, he draws on a range of contemporary examples to show that “the civic costs of not cultivating such virtues are very high.” Second, he argues that academics simply do “promote moral virtues in the classroom” but tend to be “morally tongue-​tied” in ways that prevent them from acknowledging what they are doing, leading to “haphazard success at best and outright negligence at worst.” Echoing other contributors, Biggar suggests that universities should recognize the implicit ethical commitments they already embody to make those values and virtues available for critical scrutiny and discussion. Biggar, a theologian, believes that theology can make a valuable contribution to this effort. In particular, he argues, the discipline of theology can help to “give voice” to the unacknowledged moral formation underway in colleges and universities and offer resources for the kind of careful reflection that might result in improved teaching and formation, including in pluralistic

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  17 universities that welcome students, faculty, and staff from diverse moral and religious traditions. Part III turns to the practice of character development in universities from a range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives. Contributors supply theoretical insights from their respective disciplines and practical examples from their own contexts to illuminate the pedagogical value and relevance of their approaches. In Chapter 7, we highlight practical strategies to develop virtue in postgraduate students, who have been largely neglected in a field of character education that has focused primarily on children and adolescents. Drawing on the work of the Oxford Character Project, our chapter seeks to make two contributions to the theory and practice of character education within the university. First, we provide an accessible synthesis of recent research in philosophy, psychology, and education to advance a model of character education that integrates seven research-​based strategies of character development: (1) habituation through practice, (2) reflection on personal experience, (3) engagement with virtuous exemplars, (4) dialogue that increases virtue literacy, (5) awareness of situational variables, (6) moral reminders, and (7) friendships of mutual accountability. Second, in the discussion of each strategy, we supply examples from a case study of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative to show how the strategy can be integrated into a research-​based, practical program for postgraduate character development. By providing both a theoretical framework and practical examples, the chapter seeks to offer guidance for educators who aspire to develop character education programs in their own university contexts. In Chapter 8, Christian B. Miller considers what an institution as a whole might to do educate character. Recounting an imagined conversation between a moral philosopher and a university president interested in cultivating virtue in the university, Miller offers a clear definition of virtue and addresses some preliminary questions posed by his imaginary interlocutor about whether a university president should intend to promote virtue at all and, if so, how to do so in the contemporary university. In response, Miller questions how good or bad students’ characters might be at the outset, arguing that students, like most other people, possess characters that are neither wholly virtuous nor vicious but “mixed.” The chapter then presents a case study of the virtue of honesty, addressing theoretical challenges and incorporating empirical research related to this virtue. Drawing on both philosophy and psychology, Miller considers strategies for cultivating honesty in the

18  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant university, including moral reminders, virtuous exemplars, and “getting the word out” about the somewhat unexpected impact of social and psychological factors on honesty. By targeting the virtue of honesty, Miller highlights the theoretical and practical value of attending deeply and holistically to a single virtue while considering its cultivation as part of a larger institutional strategy to develop character. Much of the recent work on virtue and character education has been supported by empirical research in psychology. Against a range of skeptics and critics, psychologists have offered compelling evidence that virtues exist, that they can be intentionally cultivated, and that their development can be measured using valid empirical instruments. In Chapter 9, Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford highlight the value of a psychological approach to a single virtue—​in this case, gratitude. They argue that the superficially simple concept of gratitude as the expression of politeness can be better understood as a virtue, comprised of multiple components: cognitive, emotional, attitudinal, and behavioral. Working from a broadly Aristotelian approach that conceptualizes virtues as praiseworthy traits of character, they advance a Multicomponent Gratitude Measure (MCGM) that “steers a middle course between the undifferentiated measurement of gratitude offered by existing measures and an overly theoretically prescriptive model which would be intractable from an empirical point of view.” They then highlight the pedagogical implications of their multicomponent approach, explaining why universities interested in fostering the virtue should focus not simply on encouraging grateful feelings but also on promoting grateful cognitions, attitudes, and behaviors. Noting the many studies showing positive correlations between gratitude and well-​ being, Morgan and Gulliford endorse the promotion of gratitude in higher education as a worthwhile effort. Yet they also note the challenges to gratitude in an increasingly commercialized and consumer-​oriented environment and the need to ensure any intentional cultivation “fits with the overall premise of higher education,” namely, that understandings of character and virtue should be “examined rigorously and with a certain degree of critical reflection and open debate.” Morgan and Gulliford then present examples from the University of Worcester of how such inquiry and education might proceed in this context and why it is important. “If gratitude can be cultivated within higher education,” they conclude, “there is reason to believe that this could have beneficial effects on social relationships, well-​being, coping strategies, and even academic performance.”

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  19 In Chapter 10, Joanna Collicutt puts her extensive experience in two different fields—​clinical psychology and Christian theology—​into dialogue to set out an “aspirational vision” of a virtuous university where the educational focus is on “growing wise and authentic individuals.” In Collicutt’s chapter, this dialogue takes place, first, between an understanding of virtue in the Christian tradition and the recent turn to positive psychology. Positive psychology, represented in Seligman and Peterson’s influential Values in Action framework, places the focus firmly on the embodied enactment of virtuous character strengths. What Collicutt’s theological turn emphasizes is a foundation not in a speculative list of virtues but in the virtuous character of a historical exemplar, Jesus of Nazareth. Collicutt turns, second, to the practice of clinical psychology, as it is employed to rehabilitate those with serious brain injury and trauma. Drawing on her own experience as a clinical psychologist in a rehabilitation unit, she describes a practice centered on positive achievement, personal relationships, and “interdisciplinary implementation.” While there are important differences between higher education and rehabilitation practice, Collicutt notes similar practices that are applicable to the task of character development in university contexts, offering ways to advance a more holistic, integrated, and person-​centered account of education. In the conclusion, Collicutt returns to theology, reflecting on the life of Jesus of Nazareth in order to consider how particular habitual attitudes and actions remembered by his disciples might be understood in the context of a contemporary secular university. Collicutt’s aim is to show how the conversation between theology and positive psychology can offer valuable resources to those who live and learn within a university context. With more space in the volume, similar resources from other religious traditions could be considered, but this detailed examination highlights how serious engagement with one influential tradition might inform understandings of moral education in a university context.46 Collicutt’s and Biggar’s accounts might be especially relevant for the numerous Christian colleges, universities, and divinity schools that are guided explicitly by the values of the Christian tradition. Yet even for universities that welcome students from a wide range of moral and religious traditions and disclaim any specific religious aims, their chapters suggest that, in a pluralistic context, critical engagement with theology and religion can increase awareness of implicit moral commitments and provide theoretical and psychological resources for those whose character has been shaped by specific traditions.

20  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant Literature can also provide similar resources for understanding, analyzing, and educating virtue.47 The complex lives of fictional characters in a novel or story can illuminate the nuanced and often messy ways that relationships, structures, and experiences shape moral identity. By encouraging readers to engage both empathically and critically with different characters, literature can serve to inform our moral imagination and highlight the diversity and complexity of human experience. The next two chapters highlight what two very different genres of literature—​nineteenth-​century British literature and contemporary “ethnospeculative fiction”—​can teach us about virtue and its formation. In Chapter 11, Jessica Richard turns to the works of Jane Austen, which have often been understood in light of their moral purposes. Richard considers how teaching Jane Austen in the university classroom illuminates a different vision of her as a “moral” writer: “neither as a writer who inculcates traditional values, whether through affirmation or satire, nor as one who subverts them.” Rather, Pride and Prejudice unsettles our understanding of virtue and emphasizes virtue’s “elusiveness,” chastening the reader to recognize how appearances might at first deceive. Questions of virtue pervade the novel: “How can we assess the virtue of others? What are the markers or signs of virtue? How can we know if the people we meet are good people?” Drawing on both the content of the novel and its distinctive literary form, Richard describes the novel’s complex understanding of virtue as it relates to her university class, illustrating how aspects of the novel can be related to parallel contexts in campus life. Yet even as the novel offers students practice in assessing others’ virtue, it simultaneously underscores the limits of that assessment, highlighting how difficult it is to know someone’s character. For Richard, this effect reveals a central function of great literature: “to render moral complexity, leave questions unanswered, and sustain the practice of assessing virtue (both for characters and readers) while also demonstrating the limitations of this practice.” In this way, Pride and Prejudice uncovers both the perils and possibilities of educating and assessing virtue through literature. In Chapter 12, Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin examine contemporary narrative dystopias that dramatize complex and urgent questions about the state of the world. Their particular interest lies in the cultivation of “decolonial virtue” through “speculative narrative practices that engage and reimagine dystopia not as a future to be avoided but rather as a historical, contemporary, and ongoing reality to be exposed and then redressed.” Recognizing

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  21 literature as “a privileged space for ethical enquiry . . . brilliantly suited to the exploration of what it means to be a virtuous human being in a particular time and place,” Moya and Larkin focus on “ethnospeculative fiction,” that is, “genre fiction (science fiction, fantasy, gothic horror) written by and/​ or about people of color.” Engaging themes of temporality and apocalypse, they show how the particularly “open, engaged, and self-​aware” practice of reading required by ethnospeculative fiction can be directed toward positive ethical aims. In the final sections of their chapter, they recount the ways in which this approach has informed their research and teaching in the college classroom. By striving to model “the sorts of values extolled by thinkers and scholars who speak in the traditional vocabulary of virtue: humility, patience, generosity, empathy, understanding, self-​reflexivity, courage, forbearance, and, of course, love,” they powerfully demonstrate how “ethnospeculative practices expose our most deeply held assumptions and allow us to imagine different, and more just, ways of being in the world.” A concluding chapter summarizes major themes from the volume and highlights some important opportunities and challenges for character education in university contexts. By synthesizing and extending insights from other contributors, the conclusion provides further reason to think that universities do, should, and can cultivate virtue. Ultimately, by bringing together diverse perspectives within and across disciplines, this book seeks to encourage scholars, educators, and students to think critically about the intellectual and moral functions of the university and enliven their imaginations as to how universities might form character in practice. Our hope is that this interdisciplinary volume will contribute to the growing discussion of the role of universities in the twenty-​first century and how they can promote human flourishing in all its forms.

Notes 1. See Michael Lamb, Elise M. Dykhuis, Sara E. Mendonça, and Eranda Jayawickreme, “Commencing Character: A Case Study of Character Development in College,” Journal of Moral Education (2021), doi: 10.1080/​03057240.2021.1953451 2. See, e.g., Julie A. Reuben, The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996); L. W. B. Brockliss, The University of Oxford: A History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 334–​ 335; James Arthur, “Student Character in the British University,” in Citizenship and Higher Education: The Role

22  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant of Universities in Communities and Society, ed. James Arthur and Karen E. Bohlin (Abingdon: Routledge, 2005), 8–​32. By “universities,” we include most tertiary education institutions, including research and teaching universities, colleges, and community colleges. We use “universities” for the sake of simplicity. 3. For a helpful synthesis of research on the trends that led to the decline of moral education in universities in the twentieth century, see Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 6–​9. 4. Onora O’Neill, Chapter 5 (this volume). 5. For other defenses of character education within the university, see, e.g., Anne Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” in Bringing in a New Era in Character Education, ed. William Damon (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2002), 149–​171; Arthur and Bohlin, Citizenship and Higher Education; Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Aim High: A Response to Stanley Fish,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 57–​75; Derek Bok, Higher Expectations: Can Colleges Teach Students What They Need to Know in the 21st Century? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2020). 6. For accessible overviews of virtues of character, see Christian B. Miller, The Character Gap: How Good Are We? (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 3–​24; Julia Annas, Intelligent Virtue (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 8–​15; Nancy E. Snow, Contemporary Virtue Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020). 7. David Light Shields, “Character As the Aim of Education,” Phi Delta Kappan 92 (2011): 48–​53; Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues, “A Framework for Character Education in Schools,” University of Birmingham, UK, Research Report 978-​0-​244-​ 91301-​4 (2017). 8. See Brian A. Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 9. In relation to the university, see Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume); Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume); Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume); Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 152–​ 155; Kiss and Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” 14, 17; Karen E. Bohlin, “Character Education at the University: A Worthy Purpose,” in Citizenship and Higher Education, ed. James Arthur and Karen E. Bohlin (Abingdon: Routledge, 2005), 97, 111. 10. Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 158, notes that “almost all college and university mission statements refer to their responsibility to educate for leadership and contribution to society.” 11. University of Oxford, Strategic Plan 2018-​23, https://​www.ox.ac.uk/​about/​organ​isat​ ion/​strate​gic-​plan-​2018-​23/​educat​ion (accessed May 2, 2021). 12. Ellen Bara Stolzenberg, Kevin Eagan, Hilary B. Zimmerman, Jennifer Berdan Lozano, Natacha M. Cesar-​Davis, Melissa C. Aragon, and Cecilia Rios-​Aguilar, Undergraduate Teaching Faculty: The HERI Faculty Survey, 2016–​ 2017 (Los Angeles: Higher Education Research Institute, UCLA, 2019), 33, also cited by Bok, Higher Expectations, 60.

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  23 13. See Benjamin J. B. Lipscomb, The Women Are Up to Something: How Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot, Mary Midgley, and Iris Murdoch Revolutionized Ethics (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022). 14. See, e.g., Lindsey G. Oades, Paula Robinson, Suze Green, and Gordon B. Spence, “Towards a Positive University,” The Journal of Positive Psychology 6, no. 6 (2011): 432–​ 439; Kristján Kristjánsson, “There’s Something about Aristotle: The Pros and Cons of Aristotelianism in Contemporary Moral Education,” Journal of Philosophy of Education 48, no. 1 (2014): 48–​68; Lorraine Besser-​Jones and Michael Slote, eds., The Routledge Companion to Virtue Ethics (New York: Routledge, 2015); Nancy E. Snow, Cultivating Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and Psychology (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015). 15. The Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues and the Oxford Character Project, Character Education in Universities: A Framework for Flourishing, https://​oxfo​rdch​ arac​ter.org/​ass​ets/​ima​ges/​gene​ral-​uplo​ads/​Charac​ter-​Educat​ion-​in-​Unive​rsit​ies.pdf (accessed May 2, 2021). 16. The Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues and the Oxford Character Project, Character Education in Universities, 2, 6–​7. 17. The Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues and the Oxford Character Project, Character Education in Universities, 7. 18. Christian Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 161–162. 19. See, e.g., Bohlin, “Character Education at the University”; Lynne S. Wolbert, Doret J. de Ruyter, and Anders Schinkel, “Formal Criteria for the Concept of Human Flourishing: The First Steps in Defining Flourishing as an Ideal Aim of Education,” Ethics and Education 10, no. 1 (2015): 118–​129; Kristján Kristjánsson, Flourishing as the Aim of Education: A Neo-​Aristotelian View (Abingdon: Routledge, 2020). 20. Tyler VanderWeele, “On the Promotion of Human Flourishing,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. 31 (2017): 8148–​8156. 21. Dorota Weziak-​ Bialowolska, Piotr Bialowolski, Tyler VanderWeele, and Eileen McNeely, “Character Strengths Involving an Orientation to Promote Good Can Help Your Health and Well-​being: Evidence from Two Longitudinal Studies,” American Journal of Health Promotion 35, no. 3 (2021): 388–​398; Dorota Weziak-​Bialowolska, Piotr Bialowolski, Matthew T. Lee, Ying Chen, Tyler VanderWeele, and Eileen McNeely, “Do Good, Be Well: Evidence on the Role of Character Strengths for Health,” unpublished manuscript (2021). For an overview of recent literature on the relationship between virtue and mental health, which is an important aspect of flourishing in universities, see Michael Wee and Saïk de La Motte de Broöns de Vauvert, “Reshaping Mental Health Through the Virtues: Promises and Challenges,” The Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues Insight Series, 2020, https://​www.jubileecentre.ac.uk/​ userfiles/​jubileecentre/​pdf/​insight-​series/​WeeAndDeLaMotte_​ReshapingMentalHe althThroughTheVirtues.pdf 22. See, e.g., Anne Colby, Thomas Ehrlich, Elizabeth Beaumont, and Jason Stephens, Educating Citizens: Preparing America’s Undergraduates for Lives of Moral and Civic Responsibility (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-​Bass, 2003); Arthur and Bohlin, Citizenship and Higher Education; Wolfgang Althof and Marvin W. Berkowitz, “Moral Education

24  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant and Character Education: Their Relationship and Roles in Citizenship Education,” Journal of Moral Education 35, no. 4 (2006): 495–​518; David Carr, “The Moral Roots of Citizenship: Reconciling Principle and Character in Citizenship Education,” Journal of Moral Education 35, no. 4 (2006): 443–​456; Andrew Peterson, “Character Education, the Individual and the Political,” Journal of Moral Education 49, no. 2 (2020): 143–​157; Bok, Higher Expectations. 23. Brian A, Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). Cf. Bohlin, “Character Education at the University,” 102–​103. 24. Brent W. Roberts and Daniel Mroczek, “Personality Trait Change in Adulthood,” Current Directions in Psychological Science 17, no. 1 (2008): 31–​35; Erik E. Noftle, “Character Across Early Emerging Adulthood: Character Traits, Character Strivings, and Moral Self-​ Attributes,” in Character: New Directions From Philosophy, Psychology, and Theology, ed. Christian B. Miller, R. Michael Furr, Angela Knobel, and William Fleeson (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 490–​521; Michael C. Ashton and Kibeom Lee, “Age Trends in HEXACO-​PI-​R Self Reports,” Journal of Research in Personality 64 (2016): 102–​111; Sonja Heintz and Willbald Ruch, “Cross-​section Age Differences in 24 Character Strengths: Five Meta-​Analyses from Early Adolescence to Late Adulthood,” The Journal of Positive Psychology (2021), doi:10.1080/​17439760.2021.1871938; Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 25. Bok, Higher Expectations, 2. 26. Wellmon, Chapter 3 (this volume). 27. See also Nigel Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume); Kiss and Euben, “Aim High,” 67. 28. Bok, Higher Expectations, 67. 29. Miller, The Character Gap, 127, citing Helen A. Klein, Nancy M. Levenburg, Marie McKendall, and William M. Mothersell, “Cheating during the College Years: How Do Business Students Compare?,” Journal of Business Ethics 72 (2007): 197–​206; Donald L. McCabe, Kenneth B. Butterfield, and Linda Klebe Treviño, “Academic Dishonesty in Graduate Business Programs: Prevalence, Causes, and Proposed Action,” Academy of Management Learning and Education 5 (2006): 294–​305; Carter C. Rakovski and Elliott S. Levy, “Academic Dishonesty: Perceptions of Business Students,” College Student Journal 41 (2007): 466–​481. See also Donald L. McCabe, Kenneth. D. Butterfield, and Linda K. Treviño, Cheating in College: Why Students Do It and What Educators Can Do about It (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), 37–​39, and Bok, Higher Expectations, 66–​68. 30. See J. M. Lang, Cheating Lessons: Learning from Academic Dishonesty (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013), 18–​53. 31. See, e.g., Derek Newton, “Another Problem with Shifting Education Online: Cheating,” The Hechinger Report (August 7, 2020), https://​hech​inge​rrep​ ort.org/​anot​her-​prob​lem-​with-​shift​ing-​educat​ion-​onl​ine-​cheat​ing/​; Samantha Subin, “How College Students Learned New Ways to Cheat during Remote Schooling,” CNBC.com (March 21, 2021), https://​www.cnbc.com/​2021/​03/​21/​ how-​college-​students-​learned-​new-​ways-​to-​cheat-​during-​covid-​.html 32. Bok, Higher Expectations, 66–​68.

Should Universities Cultivate Virtue?  25 33. Christopher Megone, “Formation and Virtue, Academic and Professional,” in Universities, Ethics, and Professions: Debate and Scrutiny, ed. John Strain, Ronald Barnett, and Peter Jarvis (Abingdon: Routledge, 2009), 57–​ 68; Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharpe, Practical Wisdom: The Right Way to Do the Right Thing (New York: Riverhead Books, 2010); Peter Rea, Alan Kolp, Wendy Ritz, and Michelle D. Steward, “Corporate Ethics Can’t Be Reduced to Compliance,” Harvard Business Review (April 29, 2016), https://​hbr.org/​2016/​04/​ corporate-​ethics-​cant-​be-​reduced-​to-​compliance 34. E.g., Justin Oakley and Dean Cocking, Virtue Ethics and Professional Roles (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001); Rebecca L. Walker and Philip J. Ivanhoe, eds., Working Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary Moral Problems (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009); Edwin M. Hartman, Virtue in Business: Conversations with Aristotle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013); Phillip Blond, Elena Antonacopoulou, and Adrian Pabst, In Professions We Trust: Fostering Virtuous Practitioners in Teaching, Law and Medicine (London: ResPublica, 2015); Fred Kiel, Return on Character: The Real Reason Leaders and Their Companies Win (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business Review Press, 2015); Patrick Lee Plaisance, Virtue in Media: The Moral Psychology of Excellence in News and Public Relations (New York: Routledge, 2015); Geoff Moore, Virtue at Work: Ethics for Individuals, Managers and Organizations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017); Deborah L. Rhode, Character: What It Means and Why It Matters (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019); Christopher Cowton, James Dempsey, and Tom Sorell, eds., Business Ethics After the Global Financial Crisis: Lessons from the Crash (Abingdon: Routledge, 2020); J. C. De Swaan, Seeking Virtue in Finance: Contributing to Society in a Conflicted Industry (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2020). See additional examples in Lamb, Brooks, and Brant, Chapter 13 (this volume), 273–274, n36. 35. Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume); Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 155, 161; Kiss and Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” 17. 36. See Bohlin, “Character Education at the University,” 100–​102, 110. 37. See Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 186–187; Kiss and Euben, “Aim High,” 62–​65; Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 155–​162. 38. See Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 186–187,192; Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 123, 128–129. 39. Bok, Higher Expectations. 40. Bok, Higher Expectations, 1. 41. Bok, Higher Expectations, 58–​79. 42. Bok, Higher Expectations, 142. 43. Bok, Higher Expectations, 159. For examples of such an approach, see Jonathan Brant, Michael Lamb, Emily Burdett, and Edward Brooks, “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates: An Empirical Study of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative,” Journal of Moral Education 49, no. 4 (2020): 415–​435; Lamb et al., “Commencing Character”; Edward Brooks, Samson Tse, Jessie Yue Wright, and Emily Burdett, “Character and Leadership Development at a Time of Crisis in Hong Kong: An

26  Edward Brooks, Michael Lamb, and Jonathan Brant Evaluation of a Blended Learning Programme at the University of Hong Kong,” unpublished manuscript (2021). 44. Wellmon, Chapter 3(this volume), 47, citing Lorraine Daston, “Die Akademien und die Einheit der Wissenschaften. Die disziplinierung der Disziplinen,” in Die Königlich Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin im Kaiserreich, ed. Jürgen Kocka, Rainer Hohlfeld, and Peter Walther (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1999), 61–​84. 45. See, for example, Jeffrey J. Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood: A Theory of Development from the Late Teens through the Twenties,” The American Psychologist 55, no. 5 (2000): 469–​480; Jeffrey. J. Arnett, Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens Through the Twenties, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014); Jeffrey. J. Arnett, “Presidential Address: The Emergence of Emerging Adulthood: A Personal History,” Emerging Adulthood 2, no. 3 (2014): 155–​162; Noftle, “Character across Early Emerging Adulthood.” . 46. Religious traditions have been important carriers of virtue across history, particularly since many universities in the West began as training grounds for Christian ministers and religious leaders. Given this history and its ongoing influence as well as limitations of space, the volume considers the possible contribution of Christian theology as a discipline and of Christian practice as it engages positive psychology, but other moral and religious traditions offer valuable resources, too. We hope the chapters in this volume might encourage scholars from other traditions to take up similar questions from their own perspectives. 47. See Edward Brooks, Emma Cohen de Lara, Álvaro Sánchez-​ Ostiz, and José M. Torralba, eds., Literature and Character Education in Universities (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2021).

II

T HE UN IV E R SIT Y AS A C ONT E XT FOR C U LT IVAT ING V I RT U E

2 Virtue and the History of the Modern American University Julie Reuben

The founders of the American republic maintained that the virtue of its citizens was the key to the nation’s survival. In the decades following the establishment of the United States, colleges sought to develop their students’ virtue through explicit instruction and behavioral expectations.1 In their literary and debating societies, students seriously considered what it would mean to live a virtuous life. They wrote essays exploring the meaning of specific virtues, such as honesty, temperance, humility, and self-​sacrifice. They dissected the qualities that made men great and debated among themselves which past heroes most deserved emulation.2 Today, virtue is not a word frequently uttered by American university students. Outside of a few subfields of philosophy, it is not discussed by university faculty. Indeed, the concept feels archaic in the context of contemporary higher education. How did virtue become such a distant ideal on American campuses? The declining focus on virtue was an unintended consequence of reforms instituted in the late nineteenth century. These reforms intended to modernize the university by organizing it according to the core values of science—​open inquiry coupled with rigorous verification. Leaders of modernizing universities glorified science and believed it would become a stronger foundation for morality than sacred texts and tradition. They believed that scientific inquiry would produce answers to age-​old moral questions and would provide a model of upright individual behavior. These expectations were disappointed but not before other benefits of modern higher education were realized. The modern university proved too valuable to dismantle despite its unfulfilled moral promises. Since the early twentieth century, groups of educators have tried to build a basis for moral education within the structure of the modern university. The most sustained and successful attempt involved efforts in the middle decades

​

​

30  Julie Reuben of the twentieth century to use universities to prepare students to become democratic citizens. These efforts exploited an ambiguity in the meaning of neutrality, one of the central ideals of the modern university. Interpreting “neutral” to mean an area of common agreement, university educators were able to forge an educational program around relatively noncontroversial moral ideals and standards of behavior. In the 1960s, activists who no longer accepted the consensus of the previous decades challenged universities to change their values. Instead of adopting programs that embodied the values promoted by activists, universities redefined the meaning of neutrality, equating it with the idea of a free market rather than a community of consensus, and dismantled their programs aimed at shaping students’ values. After a few decades, new efforts to make universities into forms of virtuous communities have emerged, but they face challenging conditions. These efforts have taken place in the context of political conflicts over basic moral values. The negative impact of these conflicts on the possibility for a stronger focus on virtue has been amplified by the increased competition among colleges and universities for students, financial support, and prestige in a period of declining overall support for higher education. It is uncertain whether colleges and universities will be able to defend a strong moral vision for themselves and their students given the structural challenges that they face.

The Unintentional Problem In the late nineteenth century, a group of men came to lead a handful of well-​established colleges and newly created universities in the United States. They shared a frustration with the existing forms of higher education in the nation and an admiration for the accomplishments of European, particularly German, universities. They especially admired how these universities supported new discoveries in all fields of knowledge. They committed themselves to create institutions in the United States capable of similar accomplishments. Their success required many elements. The most basic, and perhaps least difficult to obtain, was material: they needed money to expand their institutions, build libraries and laboratories, and hire new faculty. But they also needed to imagine new organizational forms and articulate new ideological justifications for these forms. Some of these organizational

History of the Modern American University  31 and ideological innovations would prove corrosive to the traditional moral mission of American higher education.3 The builders of the new American research university drew on contemporary conceptions of science as their chief inspiration. They argued that since scientific inquiry was open and free, universities should be organized around these principles as well. Various practices followed: universities broke away from church control because that limited freedom of inquiry, they provided students with the freedom to select their classes, and they ended many restrictions over the behavior of students and faculty. Originally, supporters of university reform expected that this new regime of openness would support new forms of moral education. Scientific inquiry, they confidently predicted, would answer basic moral questions, and students, upon learning these certain moral principles, would naturally want to behave in accordance with them. These grand expectations were, of course, disappointed. By the early twentieth century, it was clear that students were not using their new freedom wisely. They needed moral guidance. But how should they be guided? Open inquiry had not led to agreement about moral principles. Researchers in fields that touched upon moral questions did not come to any more agreement than had philosophers and theologians whom they were supposed to supersede. Not only did researchers in these fields disagree with one another, but some of them advanced ideas that were reprehensible to the people who led and supported the new research-​oriented universities. Some wondered whether universities, having abandoned church authority, had lost the basis for moral influence.4

Interpreting Neutrality as Consensus The failure of scientific methods to yield definitive answers about political and social issues produced discord among social scientists and left those who held unpopular views vulnerable to arbitrary decisions by university leaders. At the turn of the century, a few presidents at leading modern universities dismissed social scientists who promoted views considered radical at the time. The fired faculty and their allies viewed these acts as clear violations of academic freedom. Through the ensuing debates about the cases and the boundaries of academic freedom, the meaning of a key element of the ideology supporting modern research universities—​neutrality—​was clarified.5

32  Julie Reuben In the late nineteenth century, the notion of neutrality was closely tied to the desire for institutional autonomy. In order to promise open inquiry, the creators of the modern university insisted that the new university, as distinguished from the traditional college that they were trying to reform, be free from outside control, that it be autonomous. They were particularly concerned about religious control because colleges at the time were typically associated with a particular religious denomination that could determine who was hired and fired and what was taught. University reformers found this arrangement intolerable because it did not guarantee the intellectual freedom that they believed was essential to the discovery of new knowledge and to the teaching of new, even controversial, ideas. They therefore declared that their institutions should be nonsectarian, outside the control of a particular religious group. They extended this idea to politics, arguing that universities should not be associated with any organization that is committed to particular positions. Thus, they also declared that true universities were nonpartisan, independent of any group that was committed in advance to a set of principles. In order to guarantee freedom for faculty and students, universities needed to be autonomous and neutral. Originally the notion of neutrality simply meant that members of a particular religious or political organization did not control universities’ governing boards and that they did not apply religious or political tests on faculty or students. Neutrality was originally a characteristic of the university, but through the debates over academic freedom cases, the idea of neutrality was extended to individual faculty members. True scholars, according to this thinking, must be willing to question any idea, subject it to rigorous tests before adopting it, and, even then, be open to the possibility that the idea might be proven untrue. By temperament, then, scholars should be skeptics, not advocates. Like the university that employed them, professors should be nonpartisan. Both the individual and the institution should remain neutral. This exposed a tension inherent in university leaders’ expectation that faculty members serve as moral guides for students and the public and also remain neutral: when professors researched controversial topics, they frequently became engaged in partisan debates. In the debates over faculty dismissals, university leaders denied that they fired the faculty for their beliefs, citing instead the professors’ failure of judgment. In discussing academic freedom, they stressed that professors must always express themselves in a scholarly, temperate, and reasoned manner. They did not acknowledge that this might make it nearly impossible for faculty to express opinions that

History of the Modern American University  33 sharply challenged the status quo. Social scientists, for their part, responded to these dismissals by trying to curb substantive disagreements within their ranks. The solution promoted by a generation of rising leaders in the social sciences was to transform their fields into objective sciences by excising value judgments from research. True science, they argued, was strictly limited to questions of what is, not what ought to be.6 This fit nicely with university leaders’ emphasis on scholarly manner of expression because both tended to silence positions that seemed extreme. The emphasis on objectivity and temperate modes of expression favored one interpretation of institutional neutrality over another. The term “neutral” can be understood in different ways. A neutral party in a war, for example, is one that remains uninvolved in the conflict. In an argument, neutral ground is the area about which the various parties can agree. In this sense, neutrality means the avoidance of conflict or existence of agreement. But neutral can also connote disinterestedness or a lack of favoritism. According to this view, neutrality might result in a multiplicity of conflicting positions rather than agreement. In the first meaning, neutrality evokes the notion of consensus; in the second, it entails tolerance. Following the academic freedom cases, the ideal of institutional neutrality definitively took on the connotation of consensus. University leaders wanted their institutions to be involved in society but to avoid areas of conflict. They wanted their faculty to be sound, solid, safe scholars who did not attract controversy or seek to enflame it. Faculty leaders in the early twentieth century largely accepted the consensus view of neutrality and the link between institutional neutrality and individual neutrality. In 1915, a group of professors founded the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) to protect academic freedom and advance the professional interests of faculty. The Association’s defining document was the 1915 “Statement on Academic Freedom.” The document began by affirming the view that nonpartisanship and institutional neutrality constituted the lynchpin of intellectual freedom for faculty. Faculty could not enjoy academic freedom at institutions controlled by outside bodies committed to particular positions. Indeed, they argued that faculty’s research should be independent of all lay opinion; evidence and expert judgment should be all that influenced scientific inquiry. Professorial autonomy, though, demanded corresponding responsibilities. Although they argued that faculty must be able to report the findings of their research no matter “to what extent they come into conflict with accepted opinion,” they adopted norms for faculty conduct that made controversy suspect. According to the

34  Julie Reuben report, university faculty should refrain from anything that might seem to involve their institutions in “party antagonisms.” The report maintained that professors, when teaching controversial topics, should present multiple points of view, refrain from advocacy, and adjust their presentation to account for students’ “immaturity.” Faculty should have the right to engage in public affairs as private citizens, but even then, they should “refrain from intemperate or sensational modes of expression.” Thus, the AAUP promoted professional norms that respected universities’ consensus-​oriented interpretation of neutrality.7

Democratic Citizenship as the Aim of Moral Education This consensus interpretation of neutrality does not necessarily seem like a propitious platform on which to build moral education, but in the middle decades of the twentieth century, external events made it a serviceable base. In the 1930s, the rise of fascism and the continued appeal of communism led many Americans to fear for the future of democracy. This fear created a steady drumbeat of calls for universities to educate their students as democratic citizens. Support for new courses aimed at developing the appropriate knowledge base, attitudes, and habits in college students came from faculty members, university leaders, politicians, journalists, business leaders, and others. By the time the United States joined the war effort, there was agreement that preparing students for democratic citizenship should be a primary aim of American higher education.8 In addition, there was agreement that “general education” was the place in which the core of civic education would take place. General education as a specific term and programmatic idea was introduced in the 1920s, just before the push for citizenship education. General education referred to the part of higher education that all students were required to complete. To justify this requirement, general education was understood as fulfilling fundamental aims of the college. General education programs were also conceived as a counterbalance to disciplinary majors or vocational programs and therefore were supposed to cover knowledge that was viewed as either foundational to more specialized studies or as basic knowledge needed by all.9 While educators agreed on the need for general education designed to prepare students for democratic citizenship, they did not agree on the best form that education should take. Vigorous debates began in the 1930s and

History of the Modern American University  35 continued through the 1950s about social science general education courses, the classes that were viewed as the most important element of all the college’s efforts to help students become good citizens. The biggest source of disagreement was whether courses should focus on contemporary political debates or whether the course should focus on the historical development of democracy in the West. Intertwined with this disagreement were different views about pedagogy appropriate for colleges courses, with some faculty espousing the importance of active learning practices and others arguing for the value of text-​based learning. Some colleges with extensive general education programs embraced both kinds of courses, but most chose between these.10 Dartmouth and Harvard are examples of colleges that took different approaches to citizenship preparation within general education. Dartmouth required all seniors to take “Great Issues,” a course focused on contemporary debates about domestic and international problems. Harvard required an introductory social science course covering the history of Western civilization and taught through classic texts of social theory. The Dartmouth course experimented with new pedagogical practices, such as having a “laboratory” with maps, newspapers, policy reports, and other contemporary sources related to the issues debated in the course. Students were required to read two different newspapers to learn how to identify editorial bias in reporting. The course invited prominent public figures to give lectures on different issues and students then engaged in debates about those issues. The Harvard course, however, consisted of lectures by the professor teaching the course and section meetings led by teaching assistants to discuss the weekly readings. Despite these different teaching methods, reading materials, and content, both courses had a similar aim: ensuring that students appreciated democracy and its superiority over other political systems and would be disposed to be engaged citizens.11 The courses that focused on contemporary political issues were more vulnerable to criticism than the historical courses. Since moral training in colleges and universities at this time rested on the consensus notion of neutrality, the contemporary issues courses, despite designers’ intention to bring students to adopt moderate positions, always ran the risk of stepping out of bounds of consensus and attracting negative attention on campus or from the outside. Dartmouth’s “Great Issues” course, for example, generated much more controversy than Harvard’s general education course in the social sciences. Students at Dartmouth complained about indoctrination in

36  Julie Reuben the course. Faculty questioned the academic rigor of the course. Even more threatening in the oppressive environment of the Cold War, the course became the object of attack from the conservative newspaper, The Chicago Tribune, which claimed the class was a vehicle for pro-​communist propaganda. Harvard’s course, however, was noncontroversial. Whether to avoid criticism or simply because it fit better with academic norms, the Western Civilization course became a standard part of general education in this period, while the contemporary issues courses survived only at colleges with strong commitments to that style of citizenship education.12 Colleges and universities supplemented courses aimed at preparing students for citizenship with extracurricular activities with the same aim. Most colleges sponsored student governments which intended to give students practice with representative government. These typically provided students with some voice in college affairs, particularly extracurricular activities. Student newspapers and other publications also were seen as having value as citizenship education as were clubs in which students took leadership roles. A college administrator oversaw these student organizations in order to ensure that students behaved responsibly. Colleges viewed responsibility as a key democratic virtue and were keen to teach it. Administrators interpreted their supervisory role in different ways, and at some schools, students might enjoy a fair bit of autonomy and at others not much at all.13

Reinterpreting Neutrality as Tolerance By the early 1960s, some college students began to feel a contradiction between their colleges’ rhetoric about the importance of democratic citizenship and the realities of their lives. They were aware that white college students had not been playing a large role in contemporary politics, and they wanted to change that. They were also aware that they were living in momentous times. The civil rights movement had been gaining force for a decade. Black college students had taken a prominent role in the movement when they began the sit-​in movement in 1960 and formed the Student Non-​ Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which took on ambitious voting rights projects. The Cold War had been dragging on for over a decade, and it justified an unprecedented and out-​of-​control arms race. In addition, male students subject to the draft were aware that there was a growing hot war in which they might be expected to fight. Ideas about colonialism and racism

History of the Modern American University  37 connected these historic events and provided students a frame for thinking about political issues in the United States and abroad. Slowly, groups of politically active students found each other and found ways to engage in these political movements. For them, they had finally found a way to act as citizens and fulfill the vision of their education.14 When these small group of activists found ways to connect larger political issues to students’ daily lives, they were able to mobilize a much larger group of their peers. They first connected with a large mass of students over the issue of students’ civil liberties. Activists were also able to connect the war and racial inequality to their campus policies. They showed how universities contributed research to the military; they pointed to Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) programs as proof of colleges’ contribution to the war; they noted that colleges cooperated with the draft broad; they drew attention to racial segregation in campus organizations; they critiqued the curriculum for its white European focus and its implicit racism and sexism; they highlighted the small number of people of color at universities and the unequal treatment of women. These connections mobilized students and thus motivated activists to develop a harsh critique of American higher education and its connections to war and injustice. They attacked the idea that universities were neutral and demanded accountability for universities’ role in society. They also demanded that universities change. They wanted universities to cease supporting the status quo and instead become forces for political and social transformation.15 These demands spawned an intense debate about the meaning of institutional neutrality. It was clear that universities could no longer maintain the view of neutrality as the area of consensus. There was no longer consensus about key aspects of the university’s previous embrace of democratic citizenship as the moral purpose of higher education. Out of these debates surfaced a few possible paths for the university: abandon the ideal of neutrality and forthrightly adopt, defend, and enact a social program; try to build a new consensus that sufficiently addressed activists’ critique; or redefine neutrality to maintain current programs and accept the new programs proposed by activists. Universities chose the last path. They redefined neutrality to mean tolerance of a plural set of political, social, and moral visions. Thus, ROTC and military research could coexist with new programs in peace studies, critiques of colonialism could be taught alongside traditional courses in Western Civilization, and Black Studies and Women’s Studies programs could be added to existing academic disciplines. Much that was not tolerated

38  Julie Reuben in mid-​century higher education, such as Marxist scholarship and harsh critiques of the United States, was now allowed. The new understanding of neutrality expanded faculty members’ and students’ freedom of speech.16 This increased freedom came with a cost. Adopting this new meaning of neutrality, universities also dismantled all of the educational programs associated with citizenship education. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, many institutions abandoned their general education programs to give students freedom over their education. Commitment to the core of liberal arts education deteriorated at many American colleges and universities. In the mid-​1970s, the number of college students majoring in academic disciplines began to decline as many colleges created a host of new vocational programs. The gutting of general education meant that many of the students choosing vocational majors were not necessarily exposed to the humanities at all. In addition, colleges retracted their involvement in student extracurricular activities. Students were given much more personal freedom, and administrators ceased to try to teach “responsibility” as a key characteristic needed of democratic citizens. Interpreting “neutrality” as tolerance led to a hands-​off approach to collegiate education.

Efforts to Educate Student Virtue Since the 1980s By the mid-​1980s, traditional aspirations to shape students’ values once again became a common theme in the speeches and writings of university leaders. After two decades of giving students freedom to select their courses and govern their lives, faculty and administrators began to express concern that college education and experience had become hollow, no longer providing students with a sense of meaning and public purpose.17 At institutions that gave students the opportunity to select from liberal arts and vocational majors, students were moving to vocational programs in droves. Students who once would have majored in English now selected Communications with the hope that it opened greater job opportunities. Even at liberal arts colleges, faculty were concerned that students’ course selection was too specialized and diffuse.18 As a result, some institutions re-​established general education courses. But scholarship in the humanities and social sciences had changed in the previous two decades. Faculty were influenced by the social movements of the 1960s and were studying non-​ Western, non-​ white, and female

History of the Modern American University  39 authors and topics. Some wanted to jettison traditional courses on Western Civilization or complement them with courses that took into consideration the new scholarship. Groups of students supported these changes and, at some campuses, launched protest movements in favor of required courses on race, ethnicity, and gender. They argued that such courses were important to teach students the values of respect for diversity and the importance of equality. They wanted to replace the vision of democratic citizenship taught in Western Civilization courses, which often directly or implicitly associated democratic values, such as rationality and independence, with white males, with a different sort of moral education that acknowledged the ways in “advanced civilizations” were also oppressive and exploitative. They hoped to join some of the traditional values of democracy with greater respect for community, diversity, and equality.19 But this new vision of moral education ran into problems in the divisive political climate of the late 1980s and 1990s. This period, frequently referred to as the “Culture Wars,” was marked by a sharp backlash to movements that challenged racism, colonialism, and sexism. Leaders of the “conservative” side of this conflict often belittled the claims of activists as self-​obsessed procurers of “identity politics” attached to flimsy claims of “victimhood” while at the same time presenting them as serious threats to Christian values and the rights of whites and men. Colleges and universities were thrust into the center of the Culture Wars as numerous critical books were published attacking new scholarship and courses on race, ethnicity, and gender, affirmative action in admissions, and extracurricular activities based on race and gender. American colleges and universities did not back away from these new activities, but they did not embrace them in the way that activists had wished. Higher education leaders affirmed that the tolerance version of neutrality supported the coexistence of many social, political, and moral visions on campus. But they took a cautious approach to curricular reform, preferring programs that provided students with a lot of choices and that aligned general education requirements with traditional academic disciplines or cognitive skills.20 This dynamic played out in the national spotlight at Stanford University. In 1988, Stanford revised its general education requirement in Western civilization. Different academic departments offered several different versions of the required course. Despite having the flexibility to adapt the course to the perspectives of different academic disciplines, all faculty had to teach the same set of texts, all from the Western canon and written by men. Faculty

40  Julie Reuben members chafed at the restrictive nature of the reading list. Some were particularly critical that the list only included works by men of European descent. Students also mobilized to change the requirement to one that reflected and respected diversity. Just as the faculty approved moderate changes to the requirement, shortening the list of common readings to allow faculty greater choice and including a few texts outside the Western canon, William Bennett, US Secretary of Education, arrived on campus and denounced the new program as a capitulation to student demands and a betrayal of the values of Western civilization. Stanford became caught up in the whirl of national political attention, most of it critical. It became an object lesson to other colleges and universities: tread carefully when adopting general education programs in order to avoid political attacks and negative media attention.21 Although the Culture Wars tempered efforts to create new general education programs, student affairs professionals adopted diversity and equality as core values of their profession. Many campuses supported programs aimed to support students of color, international students, and queer students and to promote respect for diversity among all students. Nonetheless, most also supported student programs that ignored and sometimes opposed these values.22 If universities experimented with policies that imposed these values, such as speech codes sanctioning expression of views that were deemed racist, typically political pressures and campus commitment to neutrality as tolerance ensured those experiments were short lived.23 As diversity programs attracted negative attention, colleges sought less controversial means to teach students’ values. The most significant effort was the service-​learning movement that emerged in the 1990s. This movement sought to integrate student “good works” into academic classes. For example, a class on environmental change might require students to work on a local environmental project. These classes were voluntary so only reached students with inclinations to engage in service work, but they did represent a commitment on the part of colleges and universities to the value of community engagement.24 As the Culture Wars temporarily receded at the turn of the century, new pressures reinforced the equation of neutrality with tolerance. In the mid-​ 1990s, competition for students and the influence of rankings intensified. These pressures increased “consumerism” in American higher education.25 Since students had a choice of what college to attend, colleges and universities had to compete for them either to ensure their financial survival or to increase their position in rankings. This attitude spread to students and

History of the Modern American University  41 families who used their position as consumers to push for practices they favored. Decreasing support from state legislatures for public higher education forced public higher education to increase tuition, making those institutions also dependent on attracting students who could afford to pay higher tuition. This spread consumerism beyond private higher education, pressuring all institutions to think of their students as consumers who must be satisfied.26 Consumerism makes it difficult for universities and colleges to sharply define values that they expect students to learn and respect, thus further weakening support for strong general education programs or other requirements that favor liberal arts over vocational programs.

Conclusion Virtue was at the core of the early American college. As colleges developed into universities and embraced new ideas about knowledge and adapted to the conditions of modern industrial society, virtue was pushed to the margins. But it has never been completely abandoned. Indeed, since the modernization of higher education, there have been repeated efforts to restore virtue to the center of American higher education. Consensus politics and the fear for the future of democracy in the middle decades of the twentieth century proved conducive for a revival of moral education in the form of general education for democratic citizenship. The protest movements of the 1960s challenged the ideological orientation of those courses, but subsequent efforts to recast them around the values of equality and diversity have faltered due to political conflict. In addition, structural challenges, such as declining public resources, rising costs, increasing competition, and consumerism, have hurt American higher education more generally. Reducing political polarization and rebuilding public support for colleges and universities to address these structural problems are essential for reviving higher education’s historic commitment to contribute to students’ development as virtuous human beings.

Notes 1. D. H. Meyer, The Instructed Conscience: The Shaping of the American National Ethic (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972); Wilson Smith, Professors and

42  Julie Reuben Public Ethics: Studies of Northern Moral Philosophers before the Civil War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1956); David B. Potts, Liberal Education for a Land of Colleges: Yale’s Reports of 1828 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). 2. James MacLachlan, “The Choice of Hercules: American Student Societies in the Early Nineteenth Century,” in The University in Society, ed. Lawrence Stone (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1974), 2: 449–​494. 3. Laurence R. Vesey, The Emergence of the American University (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1965); Roger L. Geiger, To Advance Knowledge: The Growth of American Research Universities, 1900–​ 1940 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986). 4. Julie A. Reuben, The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996). 5. The following section draws on my essay, “Challenging Neutrality: Sixties Activism and Debates over Political Advocacy in the American University,” in Professors and their Politics, ed. Neil Gross and Salon Simmons (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), 217–​242. 6. Mary O. Furner, Advocacy and Objectivity: A Crisis in the Professionalization of American Social Science, 1865–​1905 (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1975). 7. “General Report of the Committee on Academic Freedom and Academic Tenure: Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association: December 31, 1915,” Bulletin of the American Association of University Professors (1915–​1955) 1, no. 1 (Dec. 1915): 37, 33 and 29; Julie A. Reuben, “Defining ‘True’ Knowledge: Consensus and the Growing Distrust of Faculty Activism, 1880s–​1920s,” in Advocacy in the Classroom, ed. Patricia Meyer Spacks (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996), 127–​133. 8. On the place of the mid-​century general education movement in the history of higher education curricular reform, see Russell Brown Thomas, The Search for Common Learning, 1800–​1960 (New York: McGraw Hill, 1962) and Frederick Rudolph, Curriculum: A History of the Undergraduate Curriculum Since 1636 (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-​Bass, 1977). 9. R. Freeman Butts, The College Charts Its Course: Historical Conceptions and Current Proposals (New York: McGraw Hill, 1939). 10. Malcolm S. MacLean, “Conflicting Theories of General Education,” in The American College, ed. P. F. Valentine (New York: Philosophical Library, 1949), 85–​115. 11. Arthur M. Wilson, “The ‘Great Issues’ Course at Dartmouth College,” American Political Science Review 43, no. 1 (Feb. 1949): 91–​94; Samuel H. Beer, “Social Sciences 2 at Harvard,” in Social Science in General Education, ed. Earl J. McGrath (Dubuque, IA: Wm. C. Brown, 1948), 8–​9. 12. Chicago Tribune published four articles attacking Dartmouth: “New Dealism Forced on Dartmouth,” October 18, 1948; “Carnegie Pays for Dartmouth ‘Smear’ Course,” October 18, 1948; “Most Profs at Dartmouth ‘New Dealish’,” October 19, 1948; and “One Worlder Holding Reins at Dartmouth,” October 20, 1948. Gilbert Allardyce, “The Rise and Fall of the Western Civilization Course,” The American Historical Review 87, no. 3 (1982): 695–​725. 13. Frances E. Falvey, Student Participation in College Administration (New York: Teachers College, 1952); E. G. Williamson, Student Personnel Services in Colleges and

History of the Modern American University  43 Universities (New York: McGraw Hill, 1961); Harry C. McKown, The Student Council (New York: McGraw-​Hill, 1944). 14. W. J. Rorabaugh, Berkeley at War: The 1960s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989); James Miller, Democracy Is in the Streets: From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987); Van Gosse, The Movements of the New Left: 1950–​1975 (Boston: Bedford/​St. Martin’s, 2005). 15. Kenneth J. Heineman, Campus Wars: The Peace Movement at American State Universities in the Vietnam Era (New York: New York University Press, 1993); Mathew Levin, Cold War University: Madison and the New Left in the Sixties (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2013); Donald Alexander Downs, Cornell ’69: Liberalism and the Crisis of the University (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999); Martha Biondi, The Black Revolution on Campus (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014). 16. Reuben, “Challenging Neutrality.” 17. Matthew Hartley, “Reclaiming the Democratic Purposes of American Higher Education: Tracing the Trajectory of the Civic Engagement Movement,” Learning and Teaching 2, no. 3 (2009): 11–​30. 18. W. Norton Grubb and Marvin Lazerson, “Vocationalism in Higher Education: The Triumph of the Education Gospel,” The Journal of Higher Education, 76, no. 1 (2005): 1–​25. 19. Avery Gordan and Christopher Newfield, eds., Mapping Multiculturalism (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996). 20. John Arthur and Amy Shapiro, eds., Campus Wars: Multiculturalism and the Politics of Difference (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1995); John K. Wilson, The Myth of Political Correctness: The Conservative Attack on Higher Education (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1995); David Yamane, Student Movements for Multiculturalism (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001). 21. W. B. Carnochan, The Battleground of the Curriculum: Liberal Education and American Experience (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 1993). 22. Peter Mark Magolda and Marcia B. Baxter Magolda, Contested Issues in Student Affairs: Diverse Perspectives and Respectful Dialogue (Sterling, VA: Stylus, 2011). 23. Timothy C. Shiell, Campus Hate Speech on Trial (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1998). 24. Bruce W. Speck and Sherry L. Hoppe, Service-​learning: History, Theory, and Issues (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004). 25. On consumerism as a barrier to moral education in the United Kingdom, see Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume). 26. David L. Kirp, Shakespeare, Einstein, and the Bottom Line (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003); Goldie Blumenstyk, American Higher Education in Crisis? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014).

3 Virtue, the German University, and the Limits of Critique Chad Wellmon

In 1917, a group of German university students invited the renowned sociologist Max Weber to Munich to participate in a lecture series entitled “Intellectual Work as Vocation” (geistige Arbeit als Beruf). The students met weekly in the backroom of a bookstore as the Bavarian chapter of the National Federation of Independent Student Groups, a loose association of students established around 1900 to make sense of the radical changes German universities had undergone in a matter of decades. Between 1880 and 1910, German university enrollments doubled, state expenditures tripled—​ with most going to new research institutes and labs—​and both teaching and research became more specialized. By 1900, the university’s defenders and detractors referred to the dear alma mater as a Großbetrieb—​an industrial concern that produced knowledge through an increasingly differentiated division of intellectual labor. The students wanted Weber to explain an institution they no longer recognized, an institution that, as one critic put it, had transformed the very idea of an “intellectual vocation” into a “corrupting monstrosity.”1 “Is it possible,” wrote the president of the student group, “to devote oneself completely to this unending task [of intellectual work] and still remain in this world? Is intellectual work still possible as a vocation?”2 In a modern world characterized by the division of labor, constant economic expansion, and unrelenting change, could universities sustain a morally robust and socially distinct way of life? By accepting the invitation, Weber agreed to weigh in on a decades-​long debate about the fate of moral education in the research university and the broader cultural anxiety that Wissenschaft (specialized knowledge) had eclipsed Bildung (moral formation).3 Since the 1870s, faculty members and intellectuals worried that universities encouraged overly specialized or, to

​

​

German University and the Limits of Critique  45 use the term of the day, “micrological,” research; that they overwhelmed students with too much information; and that they provided students with no coherent account of knowledge and, more fundamentally, their lives. Research universities produced human capital for a modern state; they did not form persons for good lives.4 The rapid rise of research universities in the United States—​such as Johns Hopkins and the University of Chicago and the reinvention of Harvard and Michigan—​prompted similar anxieties. But whereas Germans spoke of the increasing difference between Wissenschaft and Bildung, Americans spoke of an increasing gap between universities and colleges. Universities produced specialized research and participated in international disciplinary communities. Colleges formed character and instilled virtue in local communities. By the 1890s, William Rainey Harper, the University of Chicago’s first president, contended that the research university had eclipsed the college in both size and stature.5 And this gap now threatened the integrity of undergraduate education. With the rise of research universities from Berlin to Baltimore, higher education had decoupled the pursuit of knowledge from questions of value and meaning and, thus, abandoned its primary historical purpose—​the moral education of young people.6 In this chapter, I want to challenge this long-​standing premise—​the stark opposition of university and college, knowledge creation and moral formation—​and argue for a different understanding of the place of virtue in the university. The research university, rightly understood, inculcates virtues by maintaining distinct practices oriented toward clear internal goods. And all of these are worth defending, as long as we acknowledge that the goods of the research university are proximate, not ultimate, goods.

Scholarship as a Form of Life When Weber lectured in 1917 on the fate of “intellectual work as vocation,” those present heard a version of what we know today as his famous essay “Science as Vocation.” And so they heard Weber suggest that specialized scholarship (Wissenschaft) had nothing to say about the ultimate meaning or values that drove their lives, that specialized scholarship had nothing to offer on matters of value, that modern knowledge was meaningless.7 Ever since, critics and defenders alike have associated Weber and “Science as Vocation” with the moral agnosticism of a value-​free science and the hopelessness of

46  Chad Wellmon bureaucratic, hyperrationalized modernity. Weber, the German sociologist known, especially in the English-​speaking world, for his accounts of Western rationality, disenchantment, and the iron cage of modernity, would seem an odd model for thinking about virtue and the modern university. And yet Weber deeply impressed some in the audience in Munich in 1917. Weber’s effect on the audience that day, wrote the philosopher Karl Löwith, who was there, “was staggering.”8 Everything Weber said was “summoned directly from deep within and thought through with a critical intellect and violently so. His words were haunted by a human gravity that lent him personality. His refusal to offer easy answers was matched only by the acuity of his questions.” His words “redeemed” us.9 In recalling his experience in Munich, Löwith described not just Max Weber the famed sociologist of Western modernity, but the ideal modern, if very German, scholar: biting, critical, and disciplined but also humane, imaginative, and passionate. Weber embodied, that is, the singular virtue of an institution presumed to have none: what Weber called “intellectual rectitude” (intellektuelle Rechtschaffenheit). The purpose of the university, Weber argued in Munich, was “to cultivate in students one virtue: intellectual rectitude.”10 Like generations of German scholars before him, Weber associated this scholarly virtue with Wissenschaft. One of the first defenders of Wissenschaft as a distinct epistemic and ethical tradition was Wilhelm von Humboldt, the early nineteenth-​century scholar and bureaucrat who helped establish the University of Berlin. He argued that specialized scholarship—​what we know today as university-​based knowledge and research—​formed a particular type of person and was sufficient to fund not only a professional career but also a coherent and self-​sustaining form of life. Wissenschaft was Bildung. Bildung, from the German bilden (to form) and Bild (image or imago), had for most of the eighteenth century referred to a process of moral or ethical formation, the process through which a person formed himself and was formed in accord with exemplary images. But whereas the moral exemplars of the eighteenth century had been either classical figures such as Cicero or Christian ones such as Christ, Humboldt presented the modern, specialized scholar as the most apposite moral exemplar. Wissenschaft, wrote Nietzsche’s teacher and renowned philologist Friedrich Ritschl, was “the greatest means of moral education” because it gave students “truth” and “made [them] good.”11

German University and the Limits of Critique  47

The Ethical Shape of Philology and Epistemic Virtues For the first half of the nineteenth century, German scholars from all disciplines and the cultural elite outside the university regarded philology as the model scholarly discipline or Wissenschaft. Classical philology, not physics, chemistry, or biology, exemplified the virtues of modern, specialized knowledge: “industriousness, attention to the most minute of details, devotion to method, an ethic of responsibility, exactitude, as well as a commitment and facility to open discussion,” and, above all, a critical attitude.12 In a letter recommending a German physician for a position at Heidelberg University in 1864, the famed anthropologist Rudolf Virchow praised the candidate’s research as displaying “nearly philological exactness.”13 That Virchow, one of the founders of modern pathology and physiology, recommended a physician by comparing him to a philologist attests to the exemplary status that philology enjoyed in nineteenth-​century Germany. More than any other discipline or field of academic study, philology embodied the claim that specialized, academic disciplines were in themselves practices with distinct virtues and internal goods. Over the course of the nineteenth century, the ethos and persona of the philologist epitomized the disciplined, university-​based ideal of trustworthy and authoritative knowledge. Philologists owed their broader authority and the legitimacy of their field largely to the fact that they and their predecessors were some of the first scholars to develop and publicly articulate distinct and uniquely philological epistemic and ethical ideals. These ideals served as a model for other disciplines and specialized forms of knowledge that proliferated over the second half of the nineteenth century across German universities. First, philologists argued that philology was autonomous. It had, as Ritschl wrote, freed itself from theology and the state and could “stand on its own two feet.”14 Autonomy meant that philology could articulate and support its own internal goods and practices that made them possible.15 Second, philologists reconceived knowledge as research (Forschung). Unlike the philologists and classicists of fifteenth-​and eighteenth-​century European humanism, the German philologists of the nineteenth century conceived of knowledge not as erudition, the display of knowledge, but as its endless pursuit. Modern, disciplined philologists treated, as Wilhelm von Humboldt wrote in 1809, “the problem of knowledge as one that has not yet been fully solved.”16

48  Chad Wellmon These epistemic ideals had distinct ethical entailments and helped shape the daily pursuit of knowledge and the type of person required to excel in it. German philologists linked epistemic value to epistemic virtue. An essay or book was scholarly because a scholar wrote it and, thus, was the creation of a person of particular virtue. So who was the ideal scholar, the embodiment of Weber’s intellectual rectitude? The ideal scholar was critical. For nineteenth-​ century German philologists, this meant that they recognized critical-​ historical textual methods as a common standard that separated specialized scholars from dilettantes. Philologists employed critical-​historical methods, in the first instance, in order to determine the authenticity of texts. Critical methods were, as one of the founders of modern philology Friedrich August Wolf put it, a “necessary art,” because the “monuments of antiquity” had been tainted. Whether a nun had incorrectly copied a manuscript or a monk had falsely corrected one, those who shared, maintained, and safeguarded texts had also corrupted them and so had “done much harm.”17 The critical methods of German philologists were techniques, developed on the basis of centuries of humanist scholarship, that helped recover a more pristine, less corrupt text. Critique was a search for authenticity and purity. Over the course of the century, critique also became a disposition. In 1869, the historian of ancient Rome and then secretary of the Prussian Academy of the Sciences Theodor Mommsen defined critique as: the so-​called rigorous philological method. That simply means the ruthlessly honest pursuit of the truth (Wahrheitsforschung) that in both big and small things doesn’t shy away from any toil, that doesn’t buckle before any doubt, that doesn’t paint over any gaps in the tradition or its own knowledge, and that gives an account to itself and others. It means carrying this method into other areas which a sloppy and dishonest dilettantism has long predominated and in which buzzwords and quackery have grown wild.18

Critique referred not just to a method but to an ethos. Critique wasn’t simply something you did; it was who you were: ruthless, honest, truth-​seeking, strong, thorough, brave, careful, and single-​minded. A scholar was critical, whereas a dilatant or gentleman scholar was uncritical and, therefore—​hear the moral opprobrium—​lazy, shallow, sloppy, unfocused, and inattentive. The ideal philologist was rigorous and disciplined. Everything had to be repeatedly tested. The ideal philologist was industrious and tireless.

German University and the Limits of Critique  49 Intellectual or scholarly goods were primarily attained not through grace or its secular analog, genius, but through hard work. Modern scholars would thus be denied a period when they could give themselves over to uninterrupted contemplation. They had to work. There was no eschatological future in which to hope; there was only work in the eternal present. But the ideal scholar was also intuitive and imaginative. The philologist’s historical-​critical method required understanding and empathy in order to bridge the gap between the past and the present.19 Rightly practiced philology was a path to a transcendence, but a communion not with the God of Protestant theology but rather with the ancients. To seek knowledge of the past, as the philologist Ulrich von Wilamowitz-​Moellendorf put it while speaking at Oxford in 1908, is to use “our free imagination” to speak with the dead: The tradition yields us only ruins. The more closely we test and examine them, the more clearly we see how ruinous they are; and out of ruins no whole can be built. The tradition is dead; our task is to revivify life that has passed away. We know that ghosts cannot speak until they have drunk blood; and the spirits which we evoke demand the blood of our hearts. We give it to them gladly; but if they then abide our question, something from us has entered into them; something alien, that must be cast out in the name of truth. For Truth is a stern goddess; she knows no respect of persons, and her handmaid Science, strides ever onward, beyond Posidonius and Tacitus, beyond Gibbon and Mommsen, even though, so far as art has ennobled them these men’s works may endure. Because we have over the Greeks the advantage of possessing a science of history, the greatest of us can no longer claim the sort of authority, which belonged for centuries even to a man like Livy. But he who is worthy to serve the immortal goddess resigns himself gladly to the transitory life of his works. And he has also the comfort that in Science there is no defeat, if only his torch is handed on still burning to his successor.20

The philologist could speak with ghosts but only by the mediating means of method and only on behalf of Wissenschaft. The ideal scholar was also faithful to a tradition. These historical-​critical practices required a certain faith in the continuity of historical ideas. Despite the acute awareness of how corrupt and decayed the tradition was, philologists still had to take on faith that the tradition maintained a core that

50  Chad Wellmon was worthy and reliable. They had to believe that texts of the past could be passed on continuously through time and were meaningful for those in the present. But what could support such a faith in a faithless age? In short: scholarly method. As practiced in the seminars of nineteenth-​century German universities, method was a form of catechesis that focused students’ attention not only on texts but on themselves. Method cultivated in students a constant reflection on their own actions, desires, and personality. Philological virtue, Weber’s intellectual rectitude, had to be instilled through a long process of formation or, as Ritschl referred to it, Zucht (breeding or discipline).21 But most importantly method brought philologists together. It instilled in them, as Ritschl put it, a “consciousness” that their capacities and activities were “only a link in a much bigger chain.”22 Scholarly virtue—​intellectual rectitude—​was oriented toward transcendence in the form of a timeless community of scholars, toward a truth always deferred.

Nietzsche and the Limits of Critique Yet critique, method, and intellectual rectitude had limits. In a letter to a university friend and fellow philologist around 1870, Friedrich Nietzsche described his teacher and Doktorvater Friedrich Ritschl as a “wissenschaftliches Gewisssen” (scholarly conscience).23 Nietzsche’s training in the philology seminar under Ritschl had not just given him tools to read ancient texts, but it had also formed who he had become and instilled within him ascetic ideals of self-​control, conscientiousness, discipline, attention to detail, self-​critique, and, as Mommsen put it, a “ruthlessly honest pursuit of the truth.” Before Nietzsche described the bad conscience of Christian morality in The Genealogy of Morality, he described the bad conscience of the critical philologists. “What in us,” Nietzsche asked in Beyond Good and Evil, “actually wants truth?”24 What were the value of intellectual rectitude and philological critique and its unblinking commitment to the truth? As soon as Nietzsche arrived at the University of Basel in 1867 as a twenty-​ four-​year-​old professor of ancient Greek literature, he began to doubt the moral and intellectual value of specialized scholarship and thus the underlying premise of the German research university: that Wissenschaft was

German University and the Limits of Critique  51 Bildung, that specialized scholarship could sustain a distinct form of life. He was not the only scholar to do so. After the founding of the German Reich in 1871, the German university changed dramatically. It became less a scholastic monastery and more what Mommsen and his contemporaries called a Grossbetrieb—​an industrial concern.25 Mommsen worried that the modern university with its specialized scholarship produced alienated “workers” who had no idea of the end for which they labored. And Rudolf Virchow, a German physiologist, warned natural scientists that they were “Halbwisser” with only the faintest idea of the whole. Their lives like their work were incoherent and fragmented. And so Nietzsche, Mommsen, and Virchow argued for a constrained vision of Wissenschaft: a clear acknowledgment of what it could and what it could not do. Weber’s thinking fits squarely in this tradition of thinking about the limits of scholarship and modern knowledge.

Weber on Critique as Virtue and Intellectual Rectitude On a trip to the United States in 1904, Weber toured a number of American universities and colleges. He returned to Germany intrigued in particular by what he called the “ethos” and “culture” of American colleges, especially the emphasis they placed on forming moral character. Weber spent the next thirteen years considering the difference between an education oriented toward moral formation and one oriented toward the professional training needed in advanced industrial societies, a distinction he saw embodied in the difference between universities and American colleges. Despite important differences among them, American universities, wrote Weber once back in Germany, still maintained something of the “old college system with its boarding-​school coercion and its strict discipline.”26 These collegiate elements, he observed, ensured that the primary purpose of American universities was not, as in Germany, the production of specialized scholarship (Wissenschaft), but rather the “development of personality such that students can learn to assert themselves among equals, grown adults, the development of a disposition that serves as the foundation of the American state and social systems.”27 German universities aimed to create scholars and trained professionals, whereas American universities aimed to create hard-​ working gentleman capitalists.

52  Chad Wellmon Weber’s thinking culminated in his response to the student group in Munich, his lecture “Science as Vocation.” By 1917 Weber had concluded that traditional moral education—​be it German Bildung or the American collegiate ideal—​could not be fully reconciled with modern knowledge and the modern university. The unity of humanistic Bildung and Wissenschaft—​ the underlying premise of the German university—​was no longer tenable. “Our aim,” he told those gathered in the lecture hall, “must be to enable students to discover the vantage point from which he can judge the matter in light of his own ultimate ideals”—​ideals that students received not from the university and its myriad and fragmented disciplines but from elsewhere, from institutions and traditions outside the university.28 Specialized scholarship, and thus the university, offered no answers to life’s ultimate questions. Wissenschaft, Weber famously wrote, was “meaningless” because it could not answer the most basic questions: “What should we do?” and “How should we live?” Do not turn to science (modern knowledge), he warned, in search of answers to “the ultimate and deepest personal decisions” about our lives.29 For a century now, critics have seized on what they consider Weber’s account of a diminished and morally impotent Wissenschaft and modern knowledge more generally. As one of his contemporary critics put it in 1919, Weber had separated Wissenschaft from its primary end, “the formation of humanity” (Bildung zur Humanität).30 But in what sense was modern knowledge meaningless? Weber considered Wissenschaft an ethical tradition, the guardian of intellectual rectitude and scholarly practices. He insisted that the university could still “accomplish something” (etwas leisten).31 So what could Wisssenschaft and the university do, and what could they not do? Wissenschaft could not ground itself. It was not “the bearer of ultimate values that lent it authority and legitimacy.”32 The values that motivated a student to devote himself to Wissenschaft were ultimately external to the university. The legitimacy, authority, and flourishing of Wissenschaft required scholars to look for values beyond science and the university. It was burdened by a motivational deficit. It could never adequately answer the question: Why Wissenschaft? And so Wissenschaft was fragile. Many of Weber’s contemporaries, such as those in the orbit of the charismatic poet and cultural critic Stefan George, longed for a new form of knowledge to create values and renew the “whole of man.” “Neither the old rational science (Wissenschaft) nor the old ossified churches,” wrote Erich von Kahler, then a member of the George circle, in 1920:

German University and the Limits of Critique  53 will help us in tomorrow’s world to achieve what is necessary as our daily bread, namely, the definition and conduct of our lives. And nevertheless the new human being that is trying to emerge today has an undeniable part of himself the intellect . . . as well as faith, which having become arid and outdated in its earlier forms, has to return in some different form in every new vision of wholeness and unity; without it the new beginning cannot be made.33

Wissenschaft, argued von Kahler and many of Weber’s critics, had to be renewed, remade, and recovered as the source of ultimate values and meaning in an age desperate for meaning. It was just these types of demands and expectations that Weber sought to counter with his arguments for a more modest Wissenschaft. He feared that Wissenschaft could not bear such weighty moral demands and worried that those who wanted more from a “new science” would undermine whatever integrity, coherence, and goods that it legitimately could offer. Wissenschaft also demanded a certain kind of faith or, at the very least, trust. Modern science, Weber famously wrote, had disenchanted the modern world. Everything could, “at least in principle,” be explained.34 We no longer had to stare in dumb wonder at the movements of the stars or tremble in terrorizing fear of the ocean. Because we could explain nature. Such rationalizing explanations, however, did not extinguish belief and wonder. They merely shifted their object. Not everyone could explain everything, only scientists could. And even then only “in principle.” The de-​ magiced (Ent-​zauberung) world required a belief in expertise and specialized knowledge. This was a wondrous but also a dangerous thing. The limits of science had to be articulated and respected. Weber’s disenchanted science was a warning against prophets posing as scholars, declaiming moral truths in the name of Wissenschaft in lecture halls where their charismatic authority could go unchecked. What do Weber’s arguments mean for universities today? In the United States, at least, universities are currently embroiled in protests, walkouts, and very public condemnations. Part of that has to do with the recent attempts of academic leaders, faculty, and students to recover rather unreflectively older modes of moral education as a way of making the case for the university’s public value. In her commencement address in 2016, Harvard’s president Drew Gilpin Faust spoke bluntly of her fears arising from “the tumultuous state of American politics.” Then she told the class of 2016, “With the rise of

54  Chad Wellmon the research university in the late 19th and early 20th century, moral and ethical purposes came to be seen as at odds with the scientific thinking transforming higher education. But in today’s world I believe it is dangerous for universities not to fully acknowledge and embrace their responsibilities to values and to service, as well as to reason and discovery.”35 As university presidents such as Faust consider how to put this thought into practice, I would suggest that she and all of us would do well to recall Weber’s reflections on moral education in a modern age from which I draw three points in conclusion. First, the research university has its own ethical practices and resources: what I’ve described today as Weber’s intellectual rectitude and the longer tradition of philological critique and Wissenschaft. We need to recognize and defend these traditions as the internal goods, virtues, and practices that they are. Contrary to what Stanley Fish might argue, scholarly values and practices are not simply bureaucratic or professional procedures.36 They are robust epistemic virtues embedded in historical practices. They provide those within and outside the university with essential goods. And yet, and this is my second point, these scholarly practices are insufficient, and the institution that maintains them, the university, has clear moral limitations. Under the conditions of a pluralistic modernity, universities cannot impart comprehensive visions of the good. They cannot provide ultimate moral ends. Their goods are proximate. Finally, universities need to look outside themselves and partner with other moral traditions and resources. Universities may not be able to impart comprehensive visions of the good, but they are uniquely positioned, given their own practices and traditions, to sustain encounters between traditions and help students develop capacities to engage in debates and conversations that take their deepest and oftentimes conflicting values seriously and do not conceal them in the name of a vague liberalism.

Notes 1. Franz Schwab, “Beruf und Jugend,” Die weißen Blätter 4, no. 5 (May 1917): 97–​113, 105. 2. Immanuel Birnbaum, “Nachwort” to Max Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf (Munich: Dunker & Humboldt, 1919), 38, quoted in Max Weber Gesamtausgabe, vol. I/​17, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Politik als Beruf, ed. Wolfgang J. Mommsen and Wolfgang Schluchter (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992), 65.

German University and the Limits of Critique  55 3. On this basic tension, see Chad Wellmon, Organizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Modern Research University (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 2015), esp. Chapter 9. 4. See Anthony Grafton, “Polyhistor into Philolog: Notes on the Transformation of German Classical Scholarship,” History of Universities 3 (1983): 159–​192. 5. See, for example, William Rainey Harper, “The University and Democracy,” in The Rise of the Research University: A Sourcebook, ed. Louis Menand, Paul Reitter, and Chad Wellmon (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017), 215–​228. 6. See Julie Reuben, “The Changing Contours of Moral Education in American Colleges and Universities,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 27–​ 54; and Reuben’s broader study, The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996). 7. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 70–​111. 8. Reinhart Koselleck, Ada Löwith, and Frank-​Rutger Hausmann, eds., Mein Leben in Deutschland vor und Nach 1933 (Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, 2007), 16–​17. 9. Koselleck et al., Mein Leben in Deutschland vor und Nach 1933, 16–​17. 10. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 110. 11. Friedrich Ritschl, “Zur Methode des philologischen Studiums,” in Friedrich Ritschl’s Kleine philologischen Schriften (Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1879), 5:19–​32, 23. 12. Lorraine Daston, “Die Akademien und die Einheit der Wissenschaften. Die disziplinierung der Disziplinen,” in Die Königlich Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin im Kaiserreich, ed. Jürgen Kocka, Rainer Hohlfeld, and Peter Walther (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1999), 61–​84. 13. Virchow quoted in Alexander Busch, Die Geschichte des Privatdozent (New York: Arno Press, 1977), 26n. 14. “Zur Methode des philologischen Studiums,” 5:32. 15. For an earlier attempt to establish the autonomy of philology, see Friedrich August Wolf, Vorlesung über die Encyclopädie der Altherthumswissenschaft, ed. J. D. Gürtler (Leipzig: August Lehnhold, 1831), esp. 1–​46. 16. “On the Internal Structure of the University in Berlin and Its Relationship to Other Organizations,” in Menand, Reitter, and Wellmon, Rise of the Research University, 108–​116, 108. 17. Wolf, Encyclopädie, 180. 18. Theodor Mommsen, Reden und Aufsätze (Berlin: Weidmannsche Buchhandlung, 1905), 458–​461, 459. 19. This was a basic assumption of philologists and historians alike. Consider, for example, the case of Leopold von Ranke, who embraced both the critical-​historical method and intuition as central to knowledge about history. See Frederick C. Beiser, The German Historicist Tradition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 284–​288. 20. Ulrich von Wilamowitz-​Moellendorf, Greek Historical Writing and Apollo: Two Lectures Delivered Before the University of Oxford, June 3 and 4, 1908, trans. Gilbert Murray (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1908), 25–​26.

56  Chad Wellmon 21. Conrad Bursian, Geschichte der classischen Philologie in Deutschland (Berlin: Oldenbourg, 1893), 814. 22. “Zur Methode des philologischen Studiums,” 5:15. 23. Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsches Briefwechsel: Kritische Gesammtausgabe, ed. Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari, 24 volumes, in four parts (Berlin, 1975–​2004). Here, I.2:205. 24. Nietzsche, Nietzsches Briefwechsel, 5:15. 25. Adolf Harnack, Geschichte der Königlich Akaemie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin (Berlin: Berlag von Georg Stilke, 1900), I.2:659.58. 26. Max Weber, Max Weber Gesamtausgabe, ed. Horst Baier et al., Hochschulwesen und Wissenschaftspolitik. I/​13. (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1984), 398. 27. Weber, Max Weber Gesamtausgabe, 398. 28. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 96. 29. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 49. 30. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 65–​66. 31. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 93. 32. See Peter Harrison, The Territories of Science and Religion (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2015). 33. Erich von Kahler, “The Vocation of Science,” in Max Weber’s “Science as Vocation,” ed. Peter Lassman and Irving Velody (London: Unwin Hyman, 1989), 35–​46, 43–​44. 34. Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, 87. 35. Drew Gilpin Faust, “2016 Commencement Speech,” Harvard University, May 26, 2016, http://​www.harv​ard.edu/​presid​ent/​spe​ech/​2016/​2016-​comme​ncem​ent-​spe​ech (accessed August 17, 2020). 36. See, for example, Stanley Fish, Save the World on Your Own Time, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 52–​53.

4 Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults Perspectives from Neuroscience, Psychology, and Sociology Brian A. Williams

The young are not wise. So claims Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics. He also claims that it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, for young people to acquire virtuous practical reason, often called “prudence,” or in Aristotle’s Greek, phronesis. According to Aristotle, phronesis is the intellectual virtue that subtly controls or regulates the application of and relation between the moral virtues. Without it, a person cannot perfectly exercise the moral virtues because he or she will not know how, for example, to be just, merciful, courageous, or generous in the right proportion, at the right time, toward the right persons, and with the right reasons.1 In part, this is because phronesis requires experience, and young people almost by definition have not had time to experience similar types of situations multiple times in order to learn what subtle mixture of virtues particular moments require.2 Moreover, Aristotle observes that the young are inordinately led by their impulses and emotions to make rash or unwise decisions.3 However, Aristotle thinks that young persons can become, for example, skilled mathematicians because mathematics does not require practical wisdom but is a theoretical science acquired through abstract thinking. Hence, seventeen-​year-​olds find it easier to do Euclidean geometry or determine the distance between Alpha Centauri and Wolf Star 359 than to stop playing video games in order to sleep, drive the speed limit, drink alcohol moderately, use birth control, or not jump off a forty-​foot-​cliff into unknown water.4 One could object that perhaps ancient youth were simply uniquely full of vice and that the youth of today are more consistently virtuous and prudent than the youth of fourth century bce Athens and Macedonia—​in other words, Aristotle’s data set may have been skewed. However, most people reading this chapter will likely be able to recall foolish and impulsive

​

​

58  Brian A. Williams moments in their own lives or that of their friends and acquaintances.5 One would also need to explain why over 40 percent of the arrests made in the United States each year are of emerging adults between the ages of seventeen and twenty-​nine, and why many places will not issue a driver’s license to anyone under eighteen, sell alcohol to anyone under twenty-​one, rent a car to anyone under twenty-​three (and will charge an extra fee until twenty-​ five), or allow a person to become president until thirty-​five.6 Presumably the people who set these age limits agree with Aristotle that most people under these ages will not consistently act prudently but rather will more consistently act on their impulses. This chapter explores why this might be the case and why colleges and universities play a significant role not only in guiding the activity of youth but also in helping them cultivate the virtues necessary to move safely into adulthood without becoming encumbered by serious emotional, physical, and moral harm. In order to substantiate the claim that moral education is not an unreasonable ambition for academic institutions of higher education, this chapter reviews recent work on “emerging adults” by neuroscientists, psychologists, and sociologists. It concludes by offering several reasons why colleges and universities should devote some of their considerable resources to helping the “emerging adults” enrolled at their institutions cultivate practical reason and the moral virtues.

The Neuroscience of Emerging Adulthood and Ethics University education comes at a uniquely vulnerable transition in most students’ lives. Psychologists, social scientists, and neuroscientists describe the years during which a person typically attends university as the time of “emerging adulthood.”7 Just like primary school represents a child’s first step away from the relatively uniform confines of her family into the wider community, so a teenager’s transition into university often represents her step from a local community into the wider society within which she will soon be expected to function as an independent adult. This makes the university years especially disruptive. Students often leave behind external support structures—​family, school, neighborhood, religious community—​that have reinforced their beliefs, actions, and daily life. They begin a time during which they must construct internal support structures for the kind of life they want to lead and the kind of person they want to become. It is a time of disruption marked by anxiety, uncertainty, and instability.8

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  59 The transition an emerging adult experiences is not only geographical and social, however. A significant body of research using functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in longitudinal studies and voxel-​based morphometric analysis of adolescent and emerging adult brain development has revealed that certain parts and processes of the human brain related to moral reflection and action are not fully formed until at least the age of twenty-​five.9 These include the frontal lobes, the prefrontal cortex, frontolimbic regions, and the processes of “pruning” and myelination. In general, brain activity moves from being concentrated in the back to the front areas of the cerebral cortex. These parts and processes regulate decision-​making, long-​term planning, risk assessment, self-​evaluation, ethical behavior, empathy, social intelligence, emotion, and self-​control. This frontal area is referred to as “the area of sober second thought.” Anyone who can remember these years in their own life or who works with people of this age will likely acknowledge that these abilities are still developing during this stage of life. As Linda Spear states, “the adolescent brain is a brain in transition, and differs anatomically and neurochemically from that of the adult.”10 This area of the brain is also acutely susceptible to the neuronal-​suppressing effects of alcohol, suggesting some similarity between the functionality of a mildly inebriated adult brain and the sober but still developing functionality of an adolescent or emerging adult brain.11 The differences between the emerging adult brain and the adult brain are often overlooked by colleges and universities that claim, against the neurological data, that they bear no responsibility for the moral character education of their students because students arrive on campus as fully formed adults. However, this is to confuse legal adulthood, bestowed at age eighteen, with neurochemical and cultural adulthood, which is a gradual process that continues into one’s mid-​to late twenties. This means that car rental companies appear more attuned to the neurochemical development than many colleges and universities. Until the frontal lobes are fully developed, adolescents and emerging adults rely more often on a part of the limbic system, the amygdala, which is responsible for processing socially salient stimuli and expressing emotions, especially fear.12 According to a 2008 report by the National Institutes of Health, “the limbic subcortical systems appear to be developed by adolescence in contrast to control systems that show a protracted and linear developmental course into young adulthood. The prefrontal cortical control systems are necessary for overriding inappropriate choices and actions in favor of goal-​directed ones.”13 This means that while adolescents and

60  Brian A. Williams emerging adults are often capable of moral reasoning in hypothetical situations, they “do not yet have full capacity to override impulses in emotionally charged situations that require decisions in the heat of the moment.”14 This is often described as their “hot cognition” trumping their “cold cognition,” which comports well with Aristotle’s observations earlier.15 Adolescents and emerging adults often “know better” and want to choose other than they do, but “the combination of heightened responsiveness to rewards and immaturity in behavioral control areas may bias adolescents to seek immediate rather than long-​term gains, perhaps explaining their increase in risky decision making and emotional reactivity.”16 In other words, they may be anatomically prejudiced against choosing the behavioral option they know to be better and actually desire. The problem is exacerbated because emerging adults are more influenced by peers than by anyone else, but their peers are undergoing the same kinds of anatomical maturation as they are.17 If nothing else, this should encourage adults to be more patient with adolescents and emerging adults who act against their own best interest and intentions. From an evolutionary point of view, some researchers suggest the adolescent brain’s propensity to accept risk and novelty and to increase its “emotional reactivity” to perceived threats may have developed to enable adolescents to successfully separate from the protective environment of the family, find a mate, and establish themselves as equal and independent members of the tribe. Though necessary at one time in human evolution, it may represent a “biologically driven imbalance” due to an immature “self-​regulatory competence” that results, as one set of researchers note, in behaviors that “may be deemed inappropriate,” dangerous, or at least unnecessary in today’s society.18 The evidence therefore suggests that adolescent and emerging adult brains are less equipped than they will be to consistently align behavior choices with stable moral reflection and deliberation. The prefrontal cortex of the average eighteen-​or twenty-​year-​old does not have the functional capacity it will when the person is thirty or older. Though they may appear mature and may be legally permitted to drive, vote, drink, and marry, their anatomical changes and transitional time in life mean that their moral formation is unstable and still very much in development. These studies have also found that environmental and genetic factors influence the brain development under consideration. Biology is not destiny. Instead, adolescent and emerging adult moral dispositions and behaviors are

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  61 influenced by a host of factors. As one scholar notes, “There are likely to be complex multidirectional influences among environmental context, behavior, hormones and brain function during the transitions of adolescence.”19 Another study cautions that, along with neurobiological development, “behavior in adolescence, and across the lifespan, is a function of multiple interactive influences including experience, parenting, socioeconomic status, individual agency and self-​efficacy, nutrition, culture, psychological well-​ being, the physical and built environments, and social relationships and interactions.”20 These include the implicit and explicit moral influences, practices, cultures, and instruction of the academic institutions in which they are often deeply immersed. Both the internal nature and external environment matter.

The Evolution of the Moral Sense and Human Flourishing Another field of research, that of evolutionary ethics, also considers how brain development and moral formation are related, but instead of focusing on the eight to ten years of emerging adulthood, it looks at human brain development over millions of years. This research not only explains why ethical formation and behavior are good for us but could also offer direction to pluralist institutions that fear privileging any one philosophical, religious, or moral tradition over others. It suggests that the years of emerging adulthood are especially formative ethically and that ethical formation is essential to long-​term flourishing, given the evolutionary development of the human species. In The Evolution of Ethics: Human Sociality and the Emergence of Ethical Mindedness, Blaine Fowers connects Aristotle’s concepts of “function” (ergon) with human flourishing (eudaimonia), the social virtues, and evolutionary development. Fowers’s goal is to hold together biological and ethical accounts of human nature. “By understanding what kind of beings we are, we can better understand what is good for us and in what excellence consists for us.”21 Fowers concentrates on the social nature of humans and identifies seven “domains” that evolved to foster individual and communal survival and reproduction: attachment, identity formation, imitation, cooperation, social normativity, social identity, and social hierarchy. Within each of these domains, he further identifies goods to be pursued for the sake of eudaimonia: friendship, identity coherence, knowledge, justice, belonging,

62  Brian A. Williams shared identity, and status. This list is further extended to include moral virtues or character traits that foster these goods. The basic argument is that because social exclusion was literally deadly, humans had to consciously determine how best to live together. Therefore, humans evolved as “hypersocial,” self-​reflective, ethically minded creatures, who not only survive physically but come to thrive psychologically and emotionally in community.22 “Whether we look at this question phylogenetically or ontogenetically, human beings do not start out as independent individuals who must find ways to work together. We start out as participants in relationship and groups within which we discover the possibility of individual identity and relatively independent activity.”23 What Darwin calls the “moral sense,” therefore, developed to enable individuals in community to know how to act for their individual and common well-​being, and how to evaluate others accordingly, given the kinds of species-​typical characteristics they possessed. Hence, our “moral sense,” Fowers argues, is an “organic outgrowth of the specific adaptations that have made our species so profoundly social.”24 Through this process of adaptation, “evolution . . . finely tuned us to foster cooperative, fair, and orderly relations with others because those relationships are also central to each person’s well-​being and reproductive success.”25 This became the “function” (ergon) toward which humans evolved. Concern for ethical behavior is thus hardwired into human biological nature and its cognitive neural circuitry in such a way that it is fulfilled through the development, maintenance, and excellent instantiation of certain relations, actions, and dispositions, independent of individual subjective valuing. That is the point of identifying an objective “human nature,” whether by Aristotle or evolutionary biologists. Certain things are good for humans whether a given human person recognizes them or not. However, because humans also needed to respond to changing circumstances and environments, the moral sense had to remain somewhat adaptable. So rather than a biologically compulsory ethics, human evolution bequeathed us the opportunity to “project into the future and choose our course of action accordingly.” This relative indeterminacy of how to fulfil an objectively given nature has several implications, including the freedom to “perform” that nature poorly or excellently, the diverse array of individual and cultural expressions of that nature, and the ongoing and ineradicable ethical ambiguity and debate about how best to fulfil that nature and pursue human flourishing.26

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  63 Given his nonreductive understanding of ethics’ role in human development and flourishing, Fowers rejects an exclusively “means–​ends” framework that would reduce all “virtuous” action to “means” that help the individual achieve other “ends” (for example, in the way that hunting is a means to food which is a means to survival, and survival to knowledge or reproduction). Instead, Fowers argues that some goods are constitutive of human flourishing. Constitutive goods are those in which mere participation constitutes a human good, in contrast to instrumental goods whose ends are enjoyed only as a result of and separate from them.27 For instance, a trait like fairness is not exclusively a means to cooperation, which is exclusively a means to justice, which is exclusively a means to protect one’s power or property. That reasoning would reduce all moral virtues to crass self-​interest. Instead, Fowers argues that fairness is constitutive of cooperation, friendship, harmony, and justice, which we experience as good regardless of other ends that might be accomplished through them.28 Furthermore, many constitutive goods can only be experienced in common with others, thus erasing the distinction commonly made in evolutionary ethics between “self-​benefitting” and “other-​benefitting” action. This implies that eudaimonia requires the full actualization of humans’ social nature.29 Fowers adopts Aristotle’s suggestions that the good life, eudaimonia, is achieved by integrating a variety of constitutive human goods, and that to do this consistently through time requires the cultivation of virtue. Virtues are understood as habituated dispositions of thought, affect, and action that best or most excellently enable a person to pursue and enjoy the constitutive goods that enable human nature as it has evolved to flourish. According to Fowers, “the key to virtue, then, is to cultivate the capacity to love what is good,” that is, what is good for humans given the natures they have. “When this is accomplished, acting virtuously becomes second nature because one is drawn naturally to what is worthwhile because ‘each man derives pleasure from what he is said to love.’ ”30 Virtues enable the person not just to live, but to live well and “perform” excellently the human rational and social nature as it has evolved. To that end, virtuous practical reason—​Aristotle’s phronesis—​ evolved as a kind of executive virtue that enables the individual to make prudential judgments about how best to act in complex and novel situations. The attempt to synthesize evolutionary biology with Aristotelian ethics by Fowers and others is complex, so a complete analysis is beyond the scope of this chapter.31 But like the research describing the brain formation of emerging adults, Fowers, Arnhart, and others trace the connections between

64  Brian A. Williams neurophysiological research, phylogenetic analysis, neuropsychology, anthropology, and ethics to explain how and why certain actions, dispositions, affections, and relationships are good for human persons and constitute their flourishing, given the nature we all share. The argument is that human nature has evolved in such a way that it flourishes physically, emotionally, and intellectually as a result of participating in certain constitutive goods, performing certain ethical actions, and developing certain socially supportive dispositions or virtues, including the virtue of practical reason or phronesis. If Fowers et al. are right, evolutionary ethics offers us another reason why the formation of practical reason and virtuous character are important pursuits for anyone who cares about their own well-​being, and for colleges or universities that care about the integrated well-​being of their students and the campus culture those students create. Many emerging adults spend a significant amount of time immersed in the formal and informal environments of academic institutions. As the research from earlier suggests, their brains are in transition at this time, developing anatomically and neurochemically. The research we have just considered also suggests, however, that though human nature has evolved to flourish in certain ways, it is not a given that people will recognize how they have evolved to flourish nor that they will automatically develop dispositions or habituate actions and practices that are conducive to their flourishing. Ethical reflection, practical reason, and virtuous habituation are not biologically compulsory even if they are biologically, socially, and emotionally beneficial. They must be learned and developed. To think that students might be helped to learn and develop these skills and dispositions by their academic institutions during the years their brains are developing seems a reasonable proposition.

The Psychology and Sociology of Emerging Adulthood The case for thinking it reasonable that academic institutions would attend to the moral education and character formation of their students strengthens even more when we turn to psychology and sociology. In the early 2000s, Jeffrey Jensen Arnett began using the now widely accepted term “emerging adults” to describe young people roughly between the ages of eighteen and twenty-​nine, which includes the overwhelming majority of students embedded in residential colleges and universities. Arnett and others argue that in the mid-​to late twentieth century, several macrosocial changes have

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  65 altered the way in which individuals move through this phase of their lives. For example, higher education in the United States has become socially normative in ways unimaginable before the postwar G.I. Bill, and partly related to that, the median age for marriage and first childbirth has steadily risen.32 In addition, effective birth control disconnected sexual intercourse from conception and marriage, partially contributing to a rise in the average number of romantic partners and “hook-​up culture,” a facet of emerging adult life also increasingly normed by pornography.33 Furthermore, lifelong careers with one company are largely a relic of the past, increasingly replaced by the prevalent gig economy. As a result, emerging adults frequently change jobs, residences, and towns.34 Postponing marriage, parenthood, a long-​ term job, and a settled home until one’s late twenties or early thirties (and sometimes beyond) has delayed entry into identity-​conferring and “adult-​ making” institutions and roles, opening up a span of time during which a person self-​identifies neither as an adolescent nor an adult. For many people, colleges and universities are the only remaining formal institution they experience during these years. Therefore, emerging adults are left socially and culturally, as well as neurologically, “in-​between.” Arnett identifies five distinct features that characterize the stage of emerging adulthood: • “Identity exploration,” particularly as it relates to a person’s romantic partners, education, career, moral values, and religious beliefs. • “Instability,” since emerging adults change residences and jobs more frequently than any other age group. • “Self-​focus,” because they are freer to focus on their own desires than they will be at any other time and they spend more time alone than any group besides the elderly. • “Feeling in-​between,” having left adolescence but not yet fully entered into social, economic, or emotional adulthood. • “Possibilities,” because of the perceived opportunity to leave family and town in order to fulfill dreams, forge a new identity, attain economic independence, and choose one’s location.35 Arnett concludes that as the entry into adulthood has become “deinstitutionalized” and “individualization has increased,” young people are “required to rely on their own resources and their own sense of agency, for better or worse.”36

66  Brian A. Williams It is this “for better or worse” that naturally troubles some people, including many who work with college and university students. Given the neurological and evolutionary data, one could argue that the traditionally normative social structures that today’s emerging adults delay entering once served to mitigate the adverse effects of their “hot” cognitive processes and still-​developing emotional and mental resources. Social institutions like marriage, children, career, and home tend to have stabilizing effects on people’s lives.37 In an era when emerging adults delay entry into these institutions, spend more time with their peers than with adults, and often live together by the thousands on college and university campuses, it is unsurprising that sociologists have also found a “dark side” to the new era of emerging adulthood,38 and that many authors in this volume think that emerging adults in universities would benefit from some kind of mentored character formation or training in virtue. Built into the social roles and institutions mentioned earlier was a structure of accountability, consequences, and motivations represented by a person’s spouse, children, employer, family, neighbor, and banker or mortgage lender. This multifaceted external structure can be a salutary, stabilizing, and thus maturing force that is difficult to replicate in its absence. Think of high school athletes trying to maintain their fitness and diet without the presence of coaches, trainers, practices, and competition. Unless these athletes have cultivated an internal framework comprised of discipline, habits, and goals, their fitness will almost certainly plummet after they graduate from the team. Recognizing the difficulty of independently maintaining a desired fitness level drives many people to hire personal trainers or register for exercise programs. Lacking an internal supporting structure, we recruit an external one. With respect to emerging adults, if the external supporting structures of past generations are either removed or their construction delayed for a decade, the question becomes how someone might construct an internal supporting structure that can serve comparable salutary ends like stability, responsibility, character, and a disciplined commitment to long-​term goals. This question remains even if we acknowledge that some traditional institutions and roles restricted rather than supported individual flourishing, especially for women. In their book, Lost in Transition: The Dark Side of Emerging Adulthood, Christian Smith, Kari Christoffersen, Hilary Davidson, and Patricia Snell Herzog explore some of the “worse” side effects of emerging adults being forced to “rely on their own resources and their own sense of agency.”39 Published in 2011, the work is based on multiple in-​depth longitudinal

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  67 interviews with 230 adolescents and emerging adults between 2001 and 2008. Their research agrees with Arnett that emerging adults are facing a transition to adulthood that is increasingly more complex, confusing, and disjointed than it has ever been, and that they must do so with decreasing cultural, institutional, and parental guidance. Like Arnett, Smith and his colleagues also find that this stage is characterized by intense identity exploration, hope, opportunity, and transience, as well as by feelings of limbo, instability, uncertainty, anxiety, self-​obsession, conflict, disappointment, and increased susceptibility to emotional and physical harm.40 Lost in Transition identifies five goods that are constitutive of human flourishing in mature adulthood and explores the multidimensional harms that occur when these goods are underdeveloped or abandoned. Their development in contemporary emerging adults appears truncated in part due to the cultural changes mentioned earlier as well as the absence of institutional guidance, personal mentoring, and supportive social structures and roles. The book avoids dire predictions and pedantic scolding of “kids these days,” but it does raise sobering questions that emerging adults themselves and the institutions they populate should consider. According to the authors, the human goods that emerging adults often fail to appreciate or develop include the following: • The good of practical, moral reasoning, referred to earlier as prudence or phronesis. This is the good of being able to “think coherently about moral beliefs and problems,” to explain one’s beliefs, recognize moral assumptions, deliberate from moral principles to action, and recognize the moral implications of different theoretical positions. Included in this good is the ability to engage articulately in civil dialogue with disagreeing interlocutors—​a trait especially important in religiously, culturally, and philosophically plural societies, colleges, and universities. The authors conclude that most of their interviewees could not think beyond the question “Will this or that action make me happy?”41 • The good of finding meaning in and directing one’s energies toward goods beyond the cultural values of acquisitive consumerism.42 As examples, Smith and his colleagues identify goods like relationships, community, spiritual values, “contentment and generosity,” and service to the well-​being of others. They found that “many emerging adults are oblivious to these other kinds of human goods . . . focusing almost

68  Brian A. Williams exclusively on materialistic consumption and financial security as the guiding stars of their lives.”43 • The good of enjoying active social relationships and recreation without recourse to routine intoxication through alcohol or drugs. Such intoxication frequently results in ancillary adverse effects on one’s personal and professional life or those of others.44 Though a majority of emerging adults are not binge drinkers and drug users, Smith correctly points out that a substantial minority are and that even those who are not “have to negotiate a cultural world among their peers in which” drug and alcohol abuse is frequent and pervasive.45 • The good of sexual experiences within holistic “relationships of trust and commitment” that share other aspects of life. Smith and his colleagues “think it is good for people to protect their physical, mental, and emotional health in intimate relationships.” By contrast, they assert that the “majority of American emerging adults seem to have little awareness of those understandings of sex and the good.”46 • The good of investing in “the larger social, cultural, institutional, and political world around them,” of caring about “neighbors, fellow citizens, strangers, maybe even enemies,” and of sustaining hope “that the greater public, institutional world has some future worth investing in.” Summarizing their interviews, Smith and his colleagues suggest that “most emerging adults today . . . have little care about, investment in, or hope for the larger world around them.”47 Along with the loss or decline of these goods, Lost in Transition also identifies the decreasing guidance emerging adults receive from mature adults, including teachers, professors, and parents. On this point, we should recall that many emerging adults will spend a large portion of this life stage with their peers deeply embedded in academic institutions that function as their primary moral culture and community. Here they will be socially, morally, emotionally, and intellectually formed one way or another, regardless of whether the institution explicitly teaches ethics or attempts to form their characters.48 This is because formation is unavoidable any time someone is deeply immersed, especially during several formative years, in cultures that are “thickly webbed” with normative assumptions, exemplars, narratives, beliefs, practices, and obligations. These norms are absorbed by persons within these cultures and manifest themselves in those persons’ beliefs, desires, and actions.

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  69 In Moral, Believing Animals: Human Personhood and Culture, published almost a decade before Lost in Transition, Christian Smith explains: “These morally constituted and permeated worlds exist outside of people, in structured social practices and relationships within which people’s lives are embedded. They also exist ‘inside’ of people, in their assumptions, expectations, beliefs, aspirations, thoughts, judgments, and feelings.”49 Charles Taylor refers to these morally constituted worlds, concretized in practices, institutions, and popular ideas as the “social imaginary.”50 Regardless of the term, the suggestion is that thickly webbed cultures implicitly and explicitly shape what a person considers to be a good, what he desires, and how he acts in both the present and the future.51 People often live within more than one morally ordered culture, and some people are capable of integrating elements from each one. However, Alasdair MacIntyre worries that immersive cultures and institutions like the military, corporations, or colleges and universities can make this more difficult. Instead of encouraging synthetic integration, these frequently condition the moral self to maintain multiple compartmentalized and often conflicting moral identities and obligations—​ a trait Smith already identifies in large swaths of emerging adults.52 In sum, colleges and universities, professors and classrooms, cannot help but foster morally formative cultures, despite their best attempts to do otherwise, and often become culprits in the dark consequences of emerging adulthood. A school that consciously attempts to take no active role in the moral formation of its students already communicates to students that moral formation is a private, voluntarist, disjunctive affair that either is not or should not be the concern of the community within which he or she is embedded. The result is often morally incoherent, compartmentalized persons who find it difficult to integrate their moral convictions and practices into a coherent whole. In turn, this compartmentalization disables them from recognizing or caring about discrepancies between their convictions and their actions. The questions college and university personnel should ask include the following: • Does our academic institution inhibit our students from seeing themselves as moral agents? • Does it make integration between their moral convictions and their private and professional lives more or less difficult? • Does our campus culture and our programs help our students learn to manage the emerging adult years, or do we leave them, in Arnett’s

70  Brian A. Williams words, to “rely on their own resources and their own sense of agency, for better or worse”?53 To the extent that the culture of any particular academic institution represents one of these types of morally inhibiting social structures, the students thickly webbed within it have reason to be concerned. Smith’s assessment from the chapter on sexual liberation could apply to any of the goods emerging adults struggle to embrace: “Each emerging adult who faces the darker side of liberation does so within a dominant culture and social structures that set up expectations, offer promises, reinforce identities, and encourage scripted behaviors that often lead to . . . predictably problematic outcomes.” Not only, therefore, will individuals “have to learn to make better choices,” but also “we as a society have some hard thinking to do about our institutionally reinforced expectations, values, and scripted ways of life.”54 Though Smith’s reference to “we as a society” is rather vague, university presidents, deans, professors, and administrative personnel may well be moved to consider how they and the academic institutions they animate contribute to the general well-​being and long-​term formation of their students—​students who will not only become alumni but also peers, fellow citizens, neighbors, business leaders, politicians, and teachers of the next generation.

Moral Formation in Academic Institutions: A Not Unreasonable Suggestion Given the findings considered earlier, it seems reasonable, or not unreasonable, for colleges and universities to attend to the integrated formation of their students, or at least for emerging adult students themselves to become aware of how their academic institutions either help or hinder their personal formation during this important stage of their life. We should recall that academic institutions, including colleges and universities, are cultural creations, so there is no transcendent blueprint for how they must or must not operate. Even the research university, which has developed in certain identifiable ways in the last two hundred years, does not somehow inherently violate its identity or undermine its mission if it attends to more than the intellectual and academic advancement of its

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  71 students.55 There is simply no transcendent essence to violate.56 Academic institutions throughout history and at all levels have been (and many still are) concerned to educate students as whole persons, nurturing their personal, moral, and intellectual development, with a view to helping them flourish as human persons both while they are present on campus and beyond. In many ways, that was always one goal of a “liberal” education in the arts and sciences, to “liberate” students from ignorance and convention in order to think and live well. As Aristotle recognizes, people want to live well, and a liberal education, which includes serious reflection on and commitment to “the life well lived,” is an integral part of that endeavor. Though knowledge and intellectual formation are primary, they have not been, and need not be, the exclusive aim of academic institutions. When we combine the neurological, evolutionary, psychological, and sociological research described earlier with the fact that colleges and universities are historical creations, we arrive at several reasonable conclusions. First, though a university may not know what to do regarding its students’ moral formation, it ought not claim nor pretend that students arrive as fully formed, morally established adults. That would be to confuse legal adulthood with physiological, neurochemical, social, and moral adulthood, which appears to arrive, in many cases, over a decade after legal adulthood is conferred on one’s eighteenth birthday. Therefore, second, adolescents and young adults may need more institutional guidance or moral mentoring than they often receive in contemporary colleges and universities. Institutional attempts to steward student behavior and offer moral formation may help students better navigate this transitional period and develop into the kinds of adults they would like to become. We might say that moral guidance of the emerging adult enables the moral autonomy of the emerged adult. Such support could help students avoid making significantly adverse decisions during the time when they are anatomically inclined to risky conduct or “suboptimal choice behavior.” This is especially important in situations when hundreds or thousands of emerging adults live together, as they do on most college and university campuses. Though the idea of academic institutions, professors, or coaches functioning in loco parentis, “in place of the parents,” as they were once charged to do, may sound quaint or archaic, the need for some limited kind of quasi-​ parental care or moral mentorship appears to be supported both by the research and the empirical evidence of adolescent and emerging adult behavior

72  Brian A. Williams at many institutions. To refer to another classical text, this was precisely the reason Odysseus, when he sailed for Troy, left his friend Mentor on Ithaca. In Odysseus’s absence, Mentor’s charge was to help Odysseus’s son, Telemachus, become an adult. He was, in the contemporary word borrowed from his name, expected to mentor him. Along with Odysseus’s other friends, Nestor and Menelaus, Mentor functioned in loco parentis for Telemachus, who needed encouragement, exemplars, and the occasionally strong challenge in order to navigate his years of emerging adulthood successfully.57 The third implication of these studies is that because the parts and processes of the emerging adult brain that regulate generally moral behavior are still developing, the habits and patterns students establish during these years are more likely to solidify and be more difficult to change once their brains reach full maturity in their late twenties and early thirties. They may live off the moral and emotional capital—​or bankruptcy—​of these years in much the same way they will live off their acquired intellectual capital. This, too, suggests that universities should carefully consider what obligations they have for helping their students’ moral development and helping them avoid long-​term emotional or moral damage, either through their own suboptimal behavioral choices or those of their peers who are in a similar state. University students are not children, but both children and emerging adults are dependent on mature adults and institutions to help them develop and flourish morally, intellectually, and emotionally. Because emerging adults are not yet fully formed adults, universities and colleges—​as well as the students themselves—​could be considered responsible for and answerable to the adults those students will eventually become. Fourth, emerging adults themselves might reasonably request character education and training in practical reasoning and virtue from their academic institutions. That possibility is not as fantastic as it might at first appear because emerging adults, who care about their own well-​being, often know the dangers and difficulties of these years better than the adults around them. If emerging adults accept the idea that character formation is good for them, their future families, careers, or society, then they can ill afford to be cavalier about their formation and should resist passively accepting whatever implicit formation inevitably occurs during their emerging adult years. This recognition, for instance, seemed to drive more than a quarter of Yale University’s 2017–​2018 undergraduates to enroll in a course called “Psychology and Happiness.” The course, which combines positive psychology with practices for behavioral change, ranks as the most popular class Yale has ever offered.58

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  73 And Yale is not alone. Harvard University’s Human Flourishing Project offers courses and seminars like “The Art and Science of a Meaningful Life” and “Virtues, Vices, and Situations: The Importance of Character for the Good Life.” Similarly, the University of Oklahoma’s Institute for the Study of Human Flourishing instructs nearly 1,600 students a year in virtue-​related ideas and practices focused on well-​being in college and beyond. Similarly popular courses and programs can be found at numerous colleges and universities, suggesting that students themselves recognize their need for character formation and instruction. Fifth, students’ moral formation may determine how they use the knowledge and intellectual formation they are acquiring at university. A rehearsal of recent political, financial, sexual, or military scandals easily reminds us that knowledge and intellectual skills can be put to ill use and that a good intellectual education does not necessarily include a good moral one. Sixth and finally, academic institutions might reasonably consider how moral formation and the cultivation of the virtues contribute to the advancement of learning and the intellectual virtues they rightly identify as their primary mission. Vices such as sloth, self-​indulgence, intemperance, pride, envy, toxic competitiveness, irritability, dishonesty, and self-​deprecation undermine the pursuit of knowledge and the flourishing of the academic community any college or university hopes to foster.59 While emerging adults of the twenty-​first century ce may not appear that dissimilar from the emerging adults of the fourth century bce when Aristotle made his observations, contemporary emerging adults appear to receive less personal and institutional guidance for navigating these years than their historical counterparts. Therefore, colleges and universities could perform a great service to their students and the communities, cultures, and institutions their students will create by helping them cultivate virtuous practical reason and the moral virtues.

Notes 1. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Joe Sachs (Indianapolis: Focus Publishing, 2002), 1144b–​1145a. See also Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 2nd, rev. ed., trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (New Advent, 1920), I–​II.65.1, http://​www.newadv​ent.org/​summa/​2001.htm. 2. Nicomachean Ethics, 1141b; 1142a; 1143b; 1144a; see also Aristotle, Metaphysics, trans. C. D. C. Reeve (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2016), 980–​981.

74  Brian A. Williams 3. Nicomachean Ethics, 1.3.1095a: “The young are inexperienced in the actions of life . . . are apt to follow their impulses . . . living in accord with feelings”; 1156a: the young “live in accord with feeling, and pursue especially what is pleasant to themselves and present at hand”; 1179b: “living temperately and with endurance is not pleasant to most people, and especially not to the young.” 4. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1142a. On the importance of experience for prudence, see also Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II–​II.47.16; 48.1; 49.1; 53.3. 5. See also Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), on “mixed traits.” 6. For arrest figures, see U.S. Department of Justice & Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in the United States. 2016, Table 20: Arrests by Age, 2016, https://​ucr.fbi.gov/​ crime-​in-​the-​u.s/​2016/​crime-​in-​the-​u.s.-​2016/​topic-​pages/​tab​les/​table-​20 (accessed August 16, 2020). 7. Neuroscientists often use the term to describe persons between seventeen and twenty-​five, whereas sociologists typically extend the upper age to twenty-​nine. 8. See Christian Smith et al., Lost in Transition: The Dark Side of Emerging Adulthood (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011); Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, “Presidential Address: The Emergence of Emerging Adulthood: A Personal History,” Emerging Adulthood 2, no. 3 (2014): 155–​162; Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens through the Twenties, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014); Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood: A Theory of Development from the Late Teens through the Twenties,” American Psychology 55, no. 5 (May 2000): 469–​480. 9. Jay Giedd et al., “Brain Development during Childhood and Adolescence: A Longitudinal MRI Study,” Nature Neuroscience 2, no. 10 (1999): 861–​863; Craig M. Bennett and Abigail A. Baird, “Anatomical Changes in the Emerging Adult Brain: A Voxel-​Based Morphometry Study,” Human Brain Mapping 27 (2006): 766–​777. 10. L. P. Spear, “The Adolescent Brain and Age-​Related Behavioral Manifestations,” Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews 24, no. 4 (2000): 446. The reference to “adolescent” here includes the category of emerging adults. 11. The doubly adverse effects of alcohol on the behavior-​regulating function of the still-​ developing prefrontal cortex should be obvious. This is significant because national surveys in the United States regularly indicate that rates of alcohol use disorders and binge drinking are highest in people ages eighteen to twenty-​five. See Michael Windle and Robert A. Zucker, “Reducing Underage and Young Adult Drinking: How to Address Critical Drinking Problems During This Developmental Period,” Alcohol Research & Health 33, no. 1–​2 (2010): 29–​44; Jonathan R. Gates, William R. Corbin, and Kim Fromme, “Emerging Adult Identity Development, Alcohol Use, and Alcohol-​related Problems During the Transition out of College,” Psychology of Addictive Behaviors 30, no. 3 (May 2016): 345–​355. See also Kenneth Abernathy, L. Judson Chandler, and John J. Woodward, “Alcohol and the Prefrontal Cortex,” International Review of Neurobiology 91 (December 2010): 289–​320; Helene Raskin White and Kristina Jackson, “Social and Psychological Influences on Emerging Adult Drinking Behavior,” Alcohol Research & Health 28, no. 4 (2004): 182–​190; Lindsay M. Squeglia, Joanna Jacobus, and Susan F. Tapert, “The Effect of Alcohol Use on

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  75 Human Adolescent Brain Structures and Systems,” Handbook of Clinical Neurology 125 (2014): 501–​510. 12. David Skuse, John Morris, and Kate Lawrence, “The Amygdala and Development of the Social Brain,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1008, no. 1 (2003): 91–​101. 13. B. J. Casey, Rebecca M. Jones, and Todd A. Hare, “The Adolescent Brain,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1124, no. 1 (2008): 112. 14. Casey et al., “The Adolescent Brain,” 122. See also Mariam Arain et al., “Maturation of the Adolescent Brain,” Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment 9 (April 2013): 449–​461. 15. Laurence Steinberg, “Cognitive and Affective Development in Adolescence,” Trends in Cognitive Science 9, no. 2 (February 2005): 72–​73. 16. Casey et al., “The Adolescent Brain,” 117. 17. See Laurence Steinberg, “A Social Neuroscience Perspective on Adolescent Risk-​ Taking,” Developmental Review 28, no. 1 (April 2008): 78–​106. 18. Steinberg, “A Social Neuroscience Perspective,” 118–​119. 19. Spear, “The Adolescent Brain and Age-​Related Behavioral Manifestations,” 447. 20. Sara B. Johnson, Robert W. Blum, and Jay N. Giedd, “Adolescent Maturity and the Brain: The Promise and Pitfalls of Neuroscience Research in Adolescent Health Policy,” Journal of Adolescent Health 45, no. 3 (September 2009): 219. 21. Blaine J. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics: Human Sociality and the Emergence of Ethical Mindedness (London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015), 32. 22. See Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics; Christopher Boehm, Moral Origins: The Evolution of Virtue, Altruism, and Shame (New York: Basic Books, 2008); Marilyn B. Brewer and Linda R. Caporael, “An Evolutionary Perspective on Social Identity: Revisiting Groups,” in Evolution and Social Psychology, ed. Mark Schaller, Jeffrey A. Simpson, and Douglas T. Kendrick (Ann Arbor, MI: Psychology Press, 2006), 143–​161. 23. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 21. See also Michael Tomasello, “The Ultra-​Social Animal,” European Journal of Social Psychology 44, no. 3 (2014): 187–​194; Michael Tomasello and Amraisha Vaish, “Origins of Human Cooperation and Morality,” Annual Review of Psychology 64 (2013): 231–​255. 24. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 9. 25. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 6. 26. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 33, 309. 27. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 25; see also 19–​42, 307–​344. For other thinkers on “constitutive,” “penultimate,” or “basic” goods, see Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1097b; Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I–​ II.1.6; 94.2; Commentary on Aristotle’s De Anima I.1.3; Questiones Disputatae de Veritate 11.3; Summa Contra Gentiles III.37; Commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics VII.13; Robert Adams, Finite and Infinite Goods: A Framework for Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 14–​20, 62, 83, 94; John Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 23, 34, 61–​69, 84, 105–​106; Mark Murphy, Natural Law and Practical Rationality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 100–​135.

76  Brian A. Williams 28. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 25, 162–​197. 29. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 195–​197. See also Nancy E. Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence: An Empirically Grounded Theory (New York: Routledge, 2010). 30. Fowers, The Evolution of Ethics, 37, citing Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics I.8, 1099a and II.3, 1104b. 31. See Phillip Kitcher, “Four Ways of ‘Biologicizing’ Ethics,” in Conceptual Issues in Evolutionary Biology, ed. Elliot Sober (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1994), 475–​486; Larry Arnhart, Darwinian Natural Right: The Biological Ethics of Human Nature (Albany: SUNY Press, 1998), 1–​15; Geoff MacDonald and Mark Leary, “Why Does Social Exclusion Hurt? The Relationship Between Social and Somatic Pain,” Psychological Bulletin 131, no. 2 (2005): 203; Uche S. Odozor and Christopher O. Agulanna, “Biology and Ethics: A Case for Aristotle’s Theory of Moral Habituation,” Canadian Social Science 8, no. 5 (2012): 154–​162. 32. On the comparable expansion of postwar higher education in the United Kingdom, see Lord Robbins, C.B., Report of the Committee on Higher Education (London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1963), 11–​21, 48–​74. The report both describes and includes measures to further the significant growth of higher education student populations and institutions. See also Claus Moser, “The Robbins Report 25 Years After—​and the Future of the Universities,” Oxford Review of Education 14, no. 1 (1988): 5–​20. 33. See Scott R. Braithwaite et al., “The Influence of Pornography on Sexual Scripts and Hooking Up Among Emerging Adults in College,” Archives of Sexual Behavior 44, no. 1 (2015): 111–​123. 34. Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood: Understanding the New Way of Coming of Age,” in Emerging Adults in America: Coming of Age in the 21st Century, ed. Jeffrey Jensen Arnett and Jennifer Lynn Tanner (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2006), 5–​7; Jeffrey Jensen Arnett et al., Debating Emerging Adulthood: Stage or Process? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 4–​5, 13–​30. See also Christian Smith et al., Lost in Transition: The Dark Side of Emerging Adulthood (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 13–​15. 35. Arnett, Emerging Adults, 8–​14. 36. Arnett, Emerging Adults, 4. 37. See Jonathan R. Gates, William R. Corbin, and Kim Fromme, “Emerging Adult Identity Development, Alcohol Use, and Alcohol-​related Problems,” Psychology of Addictive Behaviors 30, no. 3 (2016): 345–​348. 38. Smith et al., Lost in Transition. 39. Gates, Corbin, and Fromme, “Emerging Adult Identity Development,” 345–​348. 40. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 20. See also Arnett, “Presidential Address,” 158; Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood,” 469–​470, 473–​474; Erik E. Notfle, “Character across Early Emerging Adulthood,” in Character: New Directions from Philosophy, Psychology, and Theology, ed. Christian B. Miller et al. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 490–​ 517; “Millennials in Adulthood: Detached from Institutions, Networked with Friends” (Washington, DC: Pew Research Center, 2014), https://​www.pews​ ocia​ltre​nds.org/​2014/​03/​07/​mill​enni​als-​in-​adulth​ood/​; James Côté, Arrested

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  77 Adulthood: The Changing Nature of Maturity and Identity (New York: New York University Press, 2000). 41. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 8–​9. 42. On consumerism in relation to moral education, see Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), and Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume). 43. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 9. One could reasonably wonder if attitudes have shifted on this point since the 2008 financial crisis and the increasing concern with corporate social impact, but even if attitudes have shifted for some, they likely remain a minority. 44. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 9. 45. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 113. As the sources in n10 suggest, alcohol is especially detrimental to the behavior-​regulating function of the emerging adult brain. And even though recent studies indicate a decrease in the average alcohol consumption by adolescents and emerging adults, the 2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reports that in the month before the survey 52.5 percent of full-​time college students aged eighteen to twenty-​two reported drinking alcohol, 33 percent reported binge drinking, and 8.2 percent reported persistent heavy drinking. These numbers are consistently higher than non-​college persons of the same age. SAMHSA, Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, 2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Table 2.32B—​Alcohol Use in Lifetime, Past Year, and Past Month and Binge and Heavy Alcohol Use in Past Month among Persons Aged 12 to 20, by Demographic Characteristics: Percentages, 2018 and 2019. https://​w ww.sam​hsa.gov/​data/​sites/​defa​ult/​f iles/​repo​r ts/​r pt29​394/​NSDUHD​ etai​ledT​abs2​019/​NSDU​HDet​Tabs​Sect​2pe2​019.htm#tab2-​32b (accessed March 14, 2021). See also Dominic Conroy and Fiona Measham, eds., Young Adult Drinking Styles: Current Perspectives on Research, Policy and Practice (London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2019), especially Chapter 2, 21–​ 46: Michael Livingston and Fakhi Vashishtha, “Have Recent Declines in Adolescent Drinking Continued into Young Adulthood?” 46. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 10. See also Kate Julian, “The Sex Recession: Why Young People Are Retreating from Intimacy and What This Means for Society,” The Atlantic, December 2018, https://​www.thea​tlan​tic.com/​magaz​ine/​arch​ive/​2018/​12/​ the-​sex-​recess​ion/​573​949/​ (accessed November 20, 2018). 47. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 10. The indifference Smith describes may be due in part to the delay of several activities that often invest persons in the well-​being of the “larger world”: leaving home, completing college, entering a profession, getting married, and having children. For research that supports the connection between sociopolitical engagement and well-​being, see Parissa J. Ballard, Lindsay T. Hoyt, and Mark C. Pachucki, “Impacts of Adolescent and Young Adult Civic Engagement on Health and Socioeconomic Status in Adulthood,” Child Development 90, no. 4 (2019): 1138–​1154; Jennifer Núñez and Constance Flanagan, “Political Beliefs and Civic Engagement in Emerging Adulthood,” in The Oxford Handbook of Emerging Adulthood, ed. Jeffrey Jensen Arnett (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015). For studies that confirm the description of emerging adults as politically and socially disengaged, see Patricia

78  Brian A. Williams Snell Herzog, “Emerging Adult Civic and Political Disengagement: A Longitudinal Analysis of Lack of Involvement With Politics,” Journal of Adolescent Research 25, no. 2 (2010): 258–​287. For research that suggest emerging adults are more sociopolitically engaged than Smith et al, indicate, see Xenia Chryssochoou and Martyn Barrett, “Civic and Political Engagement in Youth: Findings and Prospects,” Zeitschrift für Psychologie 225: 291–​301. For an overview of recent research in this area, especially in Europe, see Julia Weiss, “What Is Youth Political Participation? Literature Review on Youth Political Participation and Political Attitudes,” Frontiers in Political Science 2, no. 1 (2020): 1–​13. 48. For universities as “expressive incarnations of certain moral narratives, traditions and commitments concerning the good, the right and the true,” see Christian Smith, Moral, Believing Animals: Human Personhood and Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 22. Miller makes a similar point in Chapter 8 (this volume). 49. Smith, Moral, Believing Animals, 8. See also James Davison Hunter, Death of Character: Moral Education in An Age Without Good or Evil (New York: Basic Books, 2000), 16. 50. On the “social imaginary,” see Charles Taylor, Modern Social Imaginaries (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2004), 23–​30; John B. Thompson, Studies in the Theory of Ideology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 16–​ 41; Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society, trans. Kathleen Blamey (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997), 165–​220. 51. Hunter, Death of Character, 25–​26. MacIntyre defines this idea of a “practice” in After Virtue (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1981), 175. 52. Alasdair MacIntyre, “Social Structures and Their Threats to Moral Agency,” Philosophy 74, no. 3 (1999): 314, 324. 53. Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood,” 4. 54. Smith et al., Lost in Transition, 194. 55. See Julie A. Reuben, The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996); Chad Wellmon, “Knowledge, Virtue, and the Research University,” The Hedgehog Review 15, no. 2 (Summer 2013): 79–​91; Chad Wellmon, Organizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Modern Research University (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016); James Axtel, Wisdom’s Workshop: The Rise of the Modern University (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016); William Clark, Academic Charisma and the Origins of the Research University (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2006). 56. Besides considering the general history of the university as a developing institution, for reflections on the past, present, and future of the university, see Ronald Barnett, Being a University (London: Routledge, 2011). 57. See Homer, The Odyssey, trans. Allen Mandelbaum (New York: Bantam Dell, 2003), especially books I–​IV, which are usually referred to as the “Telemachy.”

Developing Virtue in Emerging Adults  79 58. David Shimer, “Yale’s Most Popular Class Ever: Happiness,” New York Times, January 26, 2018, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2018/​01/​26/​nyreg​ion/​at-​yale-​class-​on-​happin​ ess-​draws-​huge-​crowd-​lau​rie-​san​tos.html. 59. Thomas Aquinas, among others, agrees: “the exercising of the moral virtues . . . is of great value in acquiring knowledge.” See Commentary on Aristotle’s Physic, trans. Richard Blackwell, Richard Spath, and W. Edmund Thirlkel (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1963), VII.vi.925.

III

I N ST IT U T IONA L A ND CU LT U R A L BA R R I E R S TO C U LT IVAT ING V I RT U E

5 The Eclipse of Virtue in the University and Wider Society Onora O’Neill

Two Hypotheses There are two ranges of reasons why the role of universities in fostering or teaching virtue may seem diminished and elusive, and indeed may be so. It may be due to changes in contemporary universities, or it may be due to changes in the ways we now think about virtue. Both hypotheses are plausible, but I think the second offers a more systematic and deeper account of the difficulty of fostering virtue in (and beyond) universities. So I shall begin with a few comments on changes in universities and then turn to changes in the ways we now think about ethics and justice before returning very briefly to university issues.

Changing Universities Across recent decades, changes in universities, and in the laws and regulation under which they operate, have made it harder for them to foster virtue in their students. Most fundamentally—​and this is not a recent change—​nearly all university students are now legally adults because the age of majority has been lowered in many jurisdictions (for example, in the United Kingdom from twenty-​one down to eighteen in 1970). In addition, many universities now admit larger numbers of older or mature students than they once did. As a result, claims that universities should or can contribute to the moral education of their students, or enforce norms of behavior or inculcate specific virtues, may now seem less plausible than they used to when many students were minors. Many would see such aims and activities as unacceptable or inappropriate in dealing with adult students.

​

​

84  Onora O’Neill Secondly, universities have been subjected to regulatory and funding systems that use intrusive and laborious research and teaching metrics, many of them designed to create strong incentives for more or (supposedly) better research and teaching. Compliance with these requirements has been reinforced by measures for demonstrating accountability, which are also frequently intrusive and time-​consuming. These changes have been introduced throughout the university world, but in the United Kingdom both the metrics themselves and the procedures for holding universities and their staff accountable are particularly onerous and became more so as the emphasis on teaching metrics was extended with the implementation of the Higher Education and Research Act of 2017. These proliferating demands have inevitably altered relations between academics and students and diverted time and energies that were once available for less structured activities in which both participated. Some of these changes may damage, even preclude, universities from seeking to cultivate specific virtues in their students. Virtue is not likely to be fostered by imposing strong incentives to demonstrate achievement on the very specific measures of comparative success that the new metrics favor. Academics and others are likely to be left with less time for teaching, let alone for undertaking or fostering the wider aspects of education that can shape character and inculcate virtue, and with less confidence that moral education is any of their business. In this context, many who work in universities may feel that they neither should nor can aspire to inculcate or foster virtue in their students.

Marginalizing Virtue The diminished role that efforts to foster virtue now play in university life are part of wider and deeper social, cultural, and philosophical changes. Contemporary life, including university life, is shaped by a wider culture in which ethics itself has been reconfigured in ways that undermine the cultivation of virtue. Damage to the cultural, intellectual, and philosophical underpinnings of ethics has affected—​perhaps we should say infected—​the ethics of both the public and the private domain and has marginalized virtue. I shall offer some very sketchy intellectual history and some fragmentary arguments to indicate how the wider context for cultivating the virtues has changed.

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  85 For nearly a century, ethical discussions in Western traditions have questioned, and quite often jettisoned, ideas that had previously been central to European views of ethics. Since antiquity, both philosophical and everyday discussions of ethical issues had centered on the classical agent’s question: “What ought I to do?” Philosophical answers given to that question typically discussed duties and virtues and their implications for action and for changing the world. Despite numerous differences in views about ethical justification and about the tally of duties and virtues, there was wide agreement that an account of what ought to be done should set out a view of duties for both public and nonpublic domains. Many older discussions of ethics distinguished between perfect (meaning complete) duties and imperfect (meaning incomplete) duties. Perfect duties were seen as duties to which there were no exceptions and so included both exceptionless duties of justice whose performance could be claimed by others as a matter of right (e.g., duties not to coerce or not to torture) and other exceptionless duties that are not owed to specific others (e.g., duties not to commit suicide or broader duties of fairness that are not owed directly to individuals). Imperfect duties were seen as duties that were not exceptionless, both because there were many ways of honoring them (among which agents had to choose) and because they could not be met for all others or on all occasions (e.g., duties of beneficence or kindness to others or duties to cultivate skills or talents). Many imperfect duties were traditionally seen as virtues, or as duties of virtue, thereby emphasizing the fact that their enactment required a certain sort of character and culture rather than enforcement. Accounts of duty that relied on versions of these distinctions have a long history, running from Cicero to Aquinas, from the early moderns to Kant, and indeed to John Stuart Mill.1 Philosophers have long disagreed about the justification of ethical claims about duty and virtue, but there is little dispute that not very long ago accounts of both duty and virtue were deeply entrenched in daily life, in the life of religious communities, in discussions of public affairs, in literature,2 as well as in philosophical writing on ethics and justice.

Duty in Decline In the early and mid-​ twentieth century, a number of deeply disruptive changes marginalized these widely accepted views and unsettled the

86  Onora O’Neill traditional assumption that ethics addresses a spectrum of questions about what we ought to do. Although there had been earlier expressions of skepticism about duty—​for example, by Nietzsche3—​both popular and philosophical discussions of ethics still centered on conceptions of duty and virtue at the start of the twentieth century. This changed in the face of widespread revulsion against the exaggerated emphasis given to some duties, and in particular to conceptions of patriotic duty, before and during World War I. Claims that duty was preeminently shown by readiness to serve, to die, and to kill for King and country—​or for Kaiser and country, or for cause and country—​reached a pinnacle during World War I and fueled antipathy to the very notion of duty. This revulsion is vividly expressed in Wilfrid Owen’s bitter appropriation of Horace’s phrase, “dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” in writing of soldiers choking to death in a gas attack.4 Enthusiasm about duty was undermined as the full brutality of the war became evident, and criticism was increasingly turned not merely against patriotic duty, but against all duties. Nietzsche, it turned out, had been prophetic. In place of duty, many leading writers during and after the first war suggested that its now-​suspect claims should be replaced by more personal or subjective standards. For example, Yeats wrote of an Irish airman who flies and fights not for King and country, but for subjective reasons: Nor law, nor duty bade me fight, Nor public men, nor cheering crowds, A lonely impulse of delight Drove to this tumult in the clouds; I balanced all, brought all to mind, The years to come seemed waste of breath, A waste of breath the years behind In balance with this life, this death.5

And E. M. Forster, writing on the brink of World War II, made the previously unthinkable comment that “If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.”6 The thought that personal loyalties or preferences should trump patriotic duty resonated and spread into wider questioning and criticism of all duties. Indeed, it is little exaggeration to say that duty became a dirty word.

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  87 A second and rather later change was wider in scope, although more narrowly philosophical in its origins. It rejected not merely duty, but the possibility of ethical claims of any sort. From the 1930s, logical positivists sought to undermine not merely ethics (and thereby duty and virtue), but also theology, metaphysics, and aesthetics, all of them to be dismissed as “literally meaningless.” Their arguments for this arresting conclusion were minimal and amounted mainly to an assertion that ethical claims were not empirically verifiable—​hardly a novel or a decisive consideration since ethical standards are intended to guide action rather than to describe the world and so are not matters for verification. In effect, the positivists claimed that there were no justifiable ethical standards, no duties, and no virtues. Their claims might have faded and been seen as no more than an obscure episode in the history of philosophy but gained wider influence when many of their exponents fled Vienna and Berlin in the late 1930s. Their dispersal had the unforeseen effect that some lousy philosophical arguments spread and gained wider influence.

Reversing Perspectives All too soon after this ostensible rout of ethics, the horrors of World War II brought home to many what the real costs of seeking to do without ethical standards in this wholesale way could amount to, and emergency repairs were undertaken. The best-​known repairs took the form of Declarations of Rights, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) of 1948 and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) of 1950. Declarations of rights do not propose a full account of duty but rather focus on claims to others’ action. In effect, they reverse the perspective and address the recipient’s question, “What ought I—​and others—​receive?” rather than the classical agent’s question, “What ought I—​or we—​do?” Reversals of perspective can reveal matters that were formerly hidden but can also hide matters that were formerly apparent. In this case much that had been previously been apparent and widely accepted was no longer visible. Most obviously, declarations of rights are inevitably silent about those duties that lack counterpart rights and in particular about imperfect duties and the various virtues they require. What had once been considered imperfect duties could not count as duties (of any sort) and were frequently seen as matters of individual choice or preference. A veneer of ethical concern was typically retained by referring to those choices or preferences as

88  Onora O’Neill “values,” but for the most part without any effort to show why they are valuable. This is deeply problematic: if individuals’ choices and preferences automatically count as their “values,” we will have to conclude that those who choose self-​enrichment or sadism merely have different values from some of the rest of us.

Human Rights Claims Theories of rights therefore support some, but only some, of the claims about what ought to be done that had formerly been supported by accounts of duties. However, while a shift to the perspective of rights and claimants rather than that of duties and agents is unavoidably blind to imperfect duties and to virtue, it was seen as having advantages of two sorts. First, it focused on a core of claims that could be enforced, and linking rights claims to state action specified from where enforcement was to come. Secondly, the perspective of rights took the claims of all human beings seriously. The human rights declarations of the mid-​twentieth century have since been augmented—​indeed, in large part reiterated—​by innumerable further human rights instruments. The ostensible aim has been a focused reassertion of some of the most basic principles of justice, which (some hoped) would resolve the difficulty of providing justifying arguments by anchoring rights in instruments that were agreed, declared, ratified, and guaranteed by states. This strategy turned out to have advantages and disadvantages. The main advantage was that it seemingly provided a clear basis for individuals to claim their rights: by giving priority to the perspective of the claimant and by requiring (or at least advocating) effective ways of seeking redress for breaches of rights. However, this reliance on the perspective of the claimant also has major drawbacks, mainly because theories of rights (liberty rights apart) do not show who should do what for whom in order to secure the claimed rights.

Ignoring Agency Seventy-​ five years after the drafting of the canonical human rights documents, there are still fierce debates whether human rights should be seen as moral rights (perhaps not natural rights, but at any rate supported by

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  89 deep justifications) or as political rights that are anchored in requirements imposed by states (and rely on institutional, conventional, or positive justifications).7 In theory it should be possible to combine moral justification and political backing for right claims, but in practice many discussions of rights emphasize only one of these objectives. The costs can be high. Theories that relegate or ignore the agent’s question, “What ought I (or we) to do?” do not specify who ought to do what for whom. This lack arises not mainly because theories of rights are silent about imperfect duties that lack counterpart rights (and thereby silent about virtues), but because they fail to specify who should shoulder a wide range of duties that are needed to make a reality of rights. They can show who should act to support traditional liberty rights, which require all others—​and all institutions—​to refrain from the types of action those rights proscribe. But other rights, as well as measures to institutionalize and secure liberty rights, require action by specified and competent duty-​bearers to whom the duties are allocated. And on this many human rights instruments say little or nothing. These points are easily illustrated. Liberty rights (such as rights to freedom of expression or rights not to be tortured) demand exceptionless restraint by all others: in these cases, human rights claims provide an unambiguous answer to the question, “Who ought to do what for whom?,” and we can infer an account of the counterpart (negative) duties from an account of the right. But those canonical human rights that are not liberty rights are different. For example, the right to food and the right to health require that counterpart duties be allocated not to all others, but to specified and competent agents, without which they will be indeterminate and unenforceable. Moreover, realizing liberty rights, such as the right to freedom of expression or the right not to be tortured, requires that specific duties of detection and enforcement be allocated to specified and competent agents. Silence about the allocation of counterpart duties blurs and undermines human rights claims. In the early days of the human rights movement, there were complaints that human rights were only “manifesto rights” or were “merely aspirational.” This deficiency was supposedly addressed by the two 1966 UN Covenants—​ the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR)—​which explicitly assigned certain duties to those states that ratified human rights instruments and aimed to address questions of enforcement.8 However, the two Covenants do not in fact assign the duties that would secure the UDHR rights to those states. Rather, they assign them

90  Onora O’Neill second-​order duties to allocate and enforce some configuration of duties that will ensure respect for the rights in ICCPR and that will support the realization of the rights in ICESCR to those states. For example, Article 2 of ICESCR runs: Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps, individually and through international assistance and co-​operation, especially economic and technical, to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of legislative measures.9

“Achieving progressively the full realization of . . . rights . . . by all appropriate means” is a matter of ensuring that unspecified others—​individuals who are not (yet) identified and institutions that may not (yet) exist—​discharge the complex range of duties needed to secure those rights. Article 2 requires states to construct institutions and to delegate and allocate tasks in order to secure some effective allocation of the counterpart duties. So whereas traditional discussions of duties of justice had focused on a broad range of human duties to others, the discourse of human rights was doubly reticent about duties. It said nothing about imperfect duties and a limited amount about perfect duties. Liberty rights apart, it pointed only to second-​order duties to bring about some allocation of first-​order duties that would, if observed, secure the human rights that had been declared. Despite this limitation, the Covenants of 1966—​now past their fiftieth year—​were an advance on the even more indeterminate claims of the UDHR and went some way to address the accusation that human rights were merely manifesto rights. Those human rights that are liberty rights require compliance by all individuals and all institutions and can in principle be enforced by states. Other human rights that do not require compliance by all individuals and institutions can be furthered only by first building institutions that allocate duties to specified and competent others. The twentieth century has therefore seen a double narrowing of ethical perspectives. The eclipse of duty has not merely made imperfect duties (and thereby many virtues) invisible, but it has also opened the way to a subjective view of ethics, while leaving unclarity about the allocation of perfect duties, other than those that correspond to liberty rights. However, other work on normative questions since this double narrowing of perspectives that I have

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  91 described may answer some of the practical questions which accounts of duty used to address. I shall comment briefly on some of the suggestions offered by writing in political philosophy and in virtue ethics.

Political Philosophy Political philosophy focuses principally on questions of justice and seemingly ought to be able to offer some account of the allocation of those duties that human rights require of some, but not of all, others. These duties were often ignored during the early years of the human rights movement when wider discussions of justice were set aside. The slogan “Political philosophy is dead” gained traction in the 1940s and 1950s,10 and only with the re-​emergence of serious work in political philosophy during the 1960s were attempts to offer a systematic account of principles of justice renewed. Yet this welcome revival also provides only an incomplete and selective view of the requirements of justice, or of the allocation of duties. Here, I offer no more than reminders referring to some leading theorists of justice.

Political Liberalism In his well-​known A Theory of Justice, John Rawls had allowed for ethical duties as well as duties of justice,11 but in his later work, in particular Political Liberalism, he explicitly set aside claims that go beyond questions of justice.12 Although both works take a broader view of justice than human rights theories provide, in that they deal with issues of just distribution as well as with individual liberty rights, both face difficulties in justifying the principles of justice they identify. In A Theory of Justice, Rawls had appealed to standards which (he then hoped) would be agreed to by reasonable persons in a hypothetical position in which they were taken to be ignorant of their own social position and so would not be biased. The approach was intended to model “justice as fairness.”13 At that point, Rawls argued that principles of justice were justified because they were in “reflective equilibrium” with “our considered moral judgments.”14 However, from the 1980s, he revised this view, having come to the view that there are no generally agreed “considered moral judgements” to be in reflective equilibrium with claims about justice.

92  Onora O’Neill He then proposed a revised “political” justification of the same principles of justice, arguing that they were principles that would be agreed to by fellow citizens in bounded, liberal, democratic societies.15 In effect, his revised position substituted an overtly political justification of principles of justice, which left questions of moral justification aside. So while “political liberalism” differs from theories of rights in that it does not prioritize rights over duties, its approach to justice runs parallel to human rights thinking by allowing only for the claims of justice and saying nothing about wider ethical concerns. Rawls’s account of justice goes beyond that of human rights instruments by offering an account of just distribution, but it is at one with them in ignoring wider ethical concerns, including those that were traditionally thought of as virtues. In his later writings, Rawls derives the justification of principles of justice, including rights claims, from claims about idealized democratic political structures. Broadly similar approaches have been taken by several other leading political philosophers of the last half century, including Jürgen Habermas and Amartya Sen. Each has suggested that we can appeal to idealized versions of democratic agreement to justify principles of justice. But is it plausible to invoke democratic agreement as justifying principles of justice, including human rights standards? The sorts of democracy that we admire, and that many see as models for human societies, combine democracy with measures that protect individual human beings inter alia by securing at least some individual rights. Democracy is seen as admirable and appealing provided it is combined with order, with the rule of law, and with (at least) the elementary rights of the person. Democracy shorn of these requirements may, as Plato pointed out long ago, be far from admirable and may offer no model for justice. Without order, the very possibility of a well-​functioning society would fail, and democracy would be no more than mob rule. Without the rule of law—​ that is, order that is reasonably regular and predictable rather than arbitrary or despotic—​any society that emerged would be deeply unjust, harsh, and unpredictable; its democracy vulnerable; and the rights of its citizens unprotected. Even with order and the rule of law but without the elementary rights of the person, a democratic regime would still be risky and would not provide enough for a stable democratic society. There are many examples of regimes that deliver order and the rule of law but impose harsh or unjust laws that do not respect even the most elementary rights of the person. So any democracy

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  93 worth having will need to secure respect for at least the elementary rights of the person. Without these three prerequisites, democracy may be sham or dangerous, and democratic agreement will offer no model for justice. For these reasons alone, it seems to me, the strategy of deriving an account of justice from an account of democracy or democratic agreement is unconvincing. There are, of course, many other approaches to justice at work in political philosophy, but the major bodies of work that treat democracy or democratic agreement as the basis of justice offer only circular justifications of principles of justice (as well as remaining silent about imperfect duties and about virtue).

Virtue Ethics and Supererogation The limitations of political liberalism might matter less if we could combine it with a robust account of the wider ethical demands that it explicitly sets aside. Could a supplementary account of the virtues offer a way of engaging with issues that go beyond justice? This has been one of the hopes of work in virtue ethics, which has taken many forms during the last half century. The most robustly Aristotelian versions have aimed to anchor accounts of virtue in substantive accounts of the good for human beings: metaphysically demanding, to be sure, but up to the job if it can be done. But most versions of virtue ethics are less ambitious. The many communitarian contributions to virtue ethics have aimed to anchor virtues in the specific traditions, standards, or cultures of actual social groups and communities. This approach to justifying virtues leaves it unclear what justification can be offered to “outsiders” and whether justifications offered only to “insiders” will have adequate weight. Some have suggested that this does not matter because the boundaries of traditions and cultures are in any case always open to revision, renewal, and change. This may be true, but not all changes will be enlarging or improving. If ethical claims and their justification are to be anchored in actual cultures, they may have difficulty addressing the fact that some cultures and subcultures are wedded to traditions that others think narrow, prejudiced, cruel, corrupt, or ethically defective in other major ways. It is simply not clear how far communitarian justification can reach and, in my view, not sufficient to point out that each tradition might be “taken forward” or modified by those who live within it.

94  Onora O’Neill Indeed, the idea of “taking a tradition forward” seemingly gestures to some more fundamental justification that it does not articulate.16

Individual “Values” At present, however, the most common and the most popular way of thinking about what used to be accounted virtuous action sees it as reflecting individuals’ commitments or individuals’ “values.” On such views, values are to be seen as subjective and thus not as required, so it makes sense to speak of “my values” or “her values.” This leaves it wholly unclear whether values conceived of in this way are susceptible to justification. Why should we see the happenstantial preferences of individuals or decisions of institutions as their values? Does not this sleight of hand make it hard to work out whether such ethical claims are proposing a revaluation of values—​or a devaluation of values? Perhaps what is on offer is a mixture of the two. Few are as bold as to claim that their central “value” (or the central “value” of their institution, their country, or their tradition) is self-​enrichment or doing others down—​even where this is indeed what they prefer and seek. It may be understandable that people want to hang onto the idea that their commitments and aims are valuable, but this is not compatible with seeing them as merely subjective. Nor are libertarian versions of liberalism that treat individual preferences and choices as the source of value plausible. On libertarian views, the only choices that should be criticized, sanctioned, or forbidden will be those that breach a requirement of justice by violating someone’s rights, yet it seems highly implausible to think that a convincing account of justice can be indifferent to everything that does not violate a right. If choices are valuable, it must be for some deeper reason than the mere happenstantial fact that they have been chosen by someone.

Back to Universities Universities, like other major social institutions, are exposed to the full spectrum of cultural tendencies and arguments that have flourished since duties, and with them virtues, have been marginalized. So it is hardly surprising if universities and those who work in them are now unsure whether they should seek to foster or inculcate virtues. What are they to inculcate in

The Eclipse of Virtue in the University  95 their students if they find themselves in a society that has little to say about what we ought to do and is uncomfortable with the very notions of duty and virtue? How are they to combine the cultivation of virtues with compliance with the complex regulation to which they are subjected? The difficulties that universities have in fostering and nurturing virtue may, I believe, mainly arise from the limitations of contemporary approaches to justice and to virtue. The ways in which we now think about the ethics both of the public and of the nonpublic domain, both about justice and about virtue, have changed profoundly. The consequences of this shift are not something that universities alone can resolve without engaging with wider approaches that do not reduce matters of justice to respect for individual rights, or ethical questions to the satisfaction of subjective preferences.

Notes 1. Some may be surprised to find Mill on this list. But consider the following passage from John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (London: Electric Book Company, 2000), 73: “Now it is known that ethical writers divide moral duties into two classes, denoted by the ill-​ chosen expressions, duties of perfect and of imperfect obligation; the latter being those in which, though the act is obligatory, the particular occasions of performing it are left to our choice, as in the case of charity or beneficence, which we are indeed bound to practice, but not towards any definite person, nor at any prescribed time. In the more precise language of philosophic jurists, duties of perfect obligation are those duties in virtue of which a correlative right resides in some person or persons; duties of imperfect obligation are those moral obligations which do not give birth to any right. I think it will be found that this distinction exactly coincides with that which exists between justice and the other obligations of morality.” 2. See, for example, Wordsworth’s Ode to Duty; written 1805 and published 1807, in William Wordsworth, Selected Poems, ed. Stephen Gill (London: Penguin, 2004), 155–​ 157. Wordsworth had questioned duty at an earlier stage of his life. 3. “What destroys a man more quickly,” Nietzsche asks, “than to work, think, and feel without inner necessity, without any deep personal desire, without pleasure—​as a mere automaton of duty?” See Friedrich Nietzsche, The Anti-​Christ, trans. H. L. Mencken (New York: Cosimo, 2005), 55. 4. Wilfred Owen, “Dulce Et Decorum Est,” in The New Oxford Book of War Poetry, ed. Jon Stallworthy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 204–​205. 5. W. B. Yeats, “An Irishman Foresees His Death,” The Poetry Ireland Review, no. 116 (2015): 106, originally written in 1918 but not published until after the war. 6. E. M. Forster, “What I Believe,” in Two Cheers for Democracy (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1951), 68.

96  Onora O’Neill 7. See, for example, Noel Malcolm, Human Rights and Political Wrongs (London: Policy Exchange, 2017), 18–​37; Adam Etinson, Human Rights: Moral or Political (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018); Nigel Biggar, What’s Wrong with Rights? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020). 8. The United Nations General Assembly, “International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,” Treaty Series 999 (December 1966); The United Nations General Assembly, “International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights,” Treaty Series 999(December 1966). 9. “International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights,” Article 2, https://​ www.ohchr.org/​en/​profe​ssio​nali​nter​est/​pages/​cescr.aspx. 10. Peter Laslett, introduction to Philosophy, Politics, and Society (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1956), vii. 11. John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971). 12. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993). 13. Rawls, A Theory of Justice. 14. Rawls, A Theory of Justice. 15. Rawls, Political Liberalism. 16. Nor, I suspect, will anything be added by suggesting that some virtues aim “beyond duty” and so are supererogatory. Alan Gewirth and John O’Connor have both characterized philanthropy as supererogatory, which may be appealing, but it presupposes an account of duty, which is often lacking. Nor in any case is it clear that all virtuous action can plausibly be thought of as supererogatory. Those who think virtue is a matter of imperfect duty indeed see virtuous action not as something to which others are entitled as a matter of right, but as duty nonetheless, and required of agents, rather than going beyond duty. See Alan Gewirth, “Private Philanthropy and Positive Rights,” Social Philosophy and Policy 4, no. 2 (1987): 55–​78: “let us briefly consider the philanthropic relation. This relation is one of supererogation.” And John O’Connor, “Philanthropy and Selfishness,” Social Philosophy and Policy 4, no. 2 (1987): 113–​127: “Philanthropic acts are similar to supererogatory acts in that they are beyond duty.”

6 Can Theology Help? Nigel Biggar

Comrade Musicians, permit me a few opening remarks on the role of the creative artist in society. In the West, the artist is a mere ornament, victim to market forces. He can be made, or broken, by the vogues of a narrow intellectual elite. Whether he lives or starves depends on how fashionable he is. Freedom is a struggle to survive. We—​we value our artist. We recognise the gift he brings. As any science—​any technology—​poetry, art are vital to our humanity. Our institutions, therefore, accord the artist proper status. In our society he enjoys his rightful place. But with that status comes responsibility. In the West, yes, the artist is free to dabble in abstractions, in sentimental nihilism, in meaninglessness itself. We, the People, demand that you touch us, that you reach into us, that your creations be of meaning to us. In a word, that you speak. Have we, in our Soviet music, the beginnings of a failure to speak?

Thus spoke Andrei Zhdanov, Stalin’s cultural enforcer, at the Moscow Congress of Composers in 1948. And down there in the audience, about to be denounced for the “hooligan squawkings” of his Ninth Symphony, Dmitri Shostakovich leaned over to his neighbor and muttered, “The trouble with Zhdanov is that he’s so often right.”1 Well, half right. Right, that the artist has a public responsibility; wrong, that the responsible artist is always harmonious and upbeat. Like Zhdanov, today’s Western governments are also half right. Right that universities have a public responsibility; wrong that this responsibility amounts to little more than economic responsiveness. Actually, in his less-​shrunken, fuller conception of public responsibility—​if only in that—​ Comrade Zhdanov was rather wiser than many of our own rulers. The first occasion on which I unburdened myself in public on the subject of the raison d’être of universities was in 2004 when I was teaching at Trinity College in Dublin. I had been asked to preach in the College Chapel at a service to mark the beginning of the academic year.2 A few months earlier the

​

​

98  Nigel Biggar university had buckled under pressure from the government and embarked on a wholesale reorganization in the direction of an allegedly business model of corporate structure. It had done this in the vain hope of appeasing its political masters into reversing the 18 percent cut in core funding that they had suddenly imposed. (And this was while the Celtic Tiger was still purring along very happily before it crashed into the financial crisis of 2007–​2008.) Shortly afterward, the Organisation of Economic Co-​ operation and Development (OECD) published a report on higher education in Ireland.3 Given the nature of the OECD and the fact that it compiled its report at the request of Irish government, its recommendations failed to surprise: universities should serve a national economic strategy; they should work harder at the commercial exploitation of scientific and technological research; and they should train students in the intellectual and social skills necessary to meet the needs and opportunities of the labor market. Against that background I decided to devote my October sermon to reflecting on what universities are for. When I came to deliver it, I might have been expected—​as a member of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, as a theological ethicist, and as a clergyman—​to wax indignant in moral complaint against government materialism and philistinism. But I resolved not to live down to my stereotype and to distance myself from any whiff of ivory-​tower snobbery. After all, Ireland had only very recently emerged out of centuries of relative and humiliating poverty, and the Irish knew better than many Westerners that, whether or not poverty is good for the soul, it really is not a lot of fun. Without the wealth that economic success brings, lots of good and worthwhile things simply cannot get done. So, no, I did not think then—​and I do not think now—​that it is inappropriate that governments should ask universities to serve economic goals and to prepare their students for the labor market—​that is, for the non-​academic work that the vast majority of them will spend most of the rest of their lives doing. I do think that economic responsiveness belongs to universities’ public responsibility. We should not idealize or overmoralize universities. Right from their medieval beginnings, they have served private purposes and practical public purposes as well as the sheer amor scientiae. For example, the founding of the University of Bologna, which lays dubious claim to be the earliest, was led by market demand. It began with ambitious students appointing professors and monitoring their performance by threatening fines, against which the hapless professors had to put down a deposit!4 The notion that university education should be consumer led is not a new one.

Can Theology Help?  99 Moreover, prominent among the original, classic university disciplines was, of course, law, in which both private individuals and public institutions had strong interests. Then as now, individuals wanted to build careers. As Peter of Blois, the twelfth-​century poet, former law student, and future royal courtier, put it: “There are two things that drive men hard to the study of jurisprudence; these are the pursuit of offices and the vain passion for fame.”5 No doubt personal ambition can be distorted by a lust for status and the limelight. There is nothing wrong as such, however, with individuals wanting to find a social role in which to exercise their talents—​and that natural, grassroots desire was undoubtedly one of the inspirations behind the founding of the earliest universities. But then, as now, there was also top-​down inspiration. Popes and bishops needed educated pastors, and they and kings needed educated administrators and lawyers capable of developing and embedding nationwide systems. It is a bit of a puzzle as to why a provincial market town such as Oxford ever came to grow a university in the twelfth century. But one answer is that by the 1180s Oxford had become a seat of the royal administration and of the ecclesiastical courts.6 Universities have played a public role from the beginning, and they have continued to do so. Since the nineteenth century, university professors in many European countries have been part of the civil service. After 1848, students in Tsarist universities were kitted out in quasi-​military uniform.7 So universities were never simply the child of an ivory-​tower love of knowledge for knowledge’s sake. They were always partly fueled by practical concerns, whether the concerns of private individuals or of those with public responsibility. But practical concerns as such are not mean and grubby or intellectually undemanding. Law is a very important social institution, which, theologians claim, mirrors the constitution of the cosmos, and on its practice depend important human goods such as social peace, the support of public and private virtue, and justice. The practice of medicine, of course, serves the good of physical health. And the practice of theology serves the good of spiritual and moral health. So there we have three of the four faculties of a typical medieval university—​Theology, Law, and Medicine—​each of them ordered to educate students in the principles of a practice designed to serve one or more human goods. (As for the fourth, the faculty of Arts, its concern was with developing the verbal, logical, mathematical—​and later, general philosophical—​understanding basic to studies in the other, higher faculties.)

100  Nigel Biggar So our earliest universities were considerably fueled by practical concerns for certain human and public goods. With the sole exception of medicine, however, they tended to fight shy of technical, or what they called “mechanical,” concerns. So no medieval university sported a Faculty of Architecture or a Faculty of Agriculture. Why? I speculate that this reflects the infection of medieval Christendom by an Aristotelian disdain for the servile arts—​ the merely technical skills that slaves, rather than citizens, have to exercise. I say “infection” here because Christianity’s earthy Jewish matrix and its own socially humble origins should have immunized it against such class snobbery. Contrast Aristotle with this passage from the Wisdom literature of the Jewish, and then Christian, Scriptures: [The workman and craftsman, the blacksmith and potter:] [a]‌ll these rely on their hands, and all are skillful in their own work. Without them no city can be inhabited, and wherever they live, they will not go hungry. Yet they are not sought out for the council of the people, nor do they attain eminence in the public assembly. They do not sit in the judge’s seat, nor do they understand the decisions of the courts; they cannot expound discipline or judgment, and they are not found among the rulers. But they maintain the fabric of the world.8

Except in the case of doctors, the medieval university seems to have forgotten this piece of biblical wisdom. And it was only in the post-​Reformation, Lutheranized, modern period that the technical sciences began to find a proper home in higher education. So in the mid-​nineteenth century the industrialized cities of northern England began to sprout university colleges with close links to local industries. For example, the University of Leeds was heavily oriented to the research and training needs of the textile industry until the latter was decimated in the 1980s. And even a university with an impeccable medieval pedigree such as Glasgow was pleased in 1889 to accept the endowment of a chair of shipbuilding (or “naval architecture,” to give it its upwardly mobile title). Universities have never been simply ivory towers. They have never simply sought knowledge for knowledge’s sake. And they have no need to apologize for that. Indeed, I myself harbor doubts about the academic’s typical defensive gambit of asserting the intrinsic value of knowledge. It is not that I doubt the intrinsic good of knowledge of the truth. After all, the notion of human beings losing sleep, missing meals, even risking their lives in pursuit of the

Can Theology Help?  101 truth, or in defense of it, is a perfectly familiar one. But some truths are surely rather less valuable than others. There is a truth about the number of times that the surname Biggar appears in the Mexico City telephone directory, and not even I can muster a whole lot of interest in that. It is a truth, of course, but it hardly matters. I am with Comrade Zhdanov on this: as from artists, so from academics, an account is needed of why what they do matters—​and how it matters, how it speaks, beyond the realm of their own private fancy. One very important part of this account, I propose, is that academics and the universities they inhabit have a responsibility to form their students in intellectual and civic virtue. Since such a proposal would be widely regarded as eccentric, it requires an explanation. Let me embark upon it by way of the London suicide bombings of July 7, 2005. What the 7/​7 bombers did was appalling. What they did was wrong, very wrong. But some of their motives, while mixed, are also morally intelligible. Among them was moral disgust—​disgust at the obsession with the consumption of material goods, which, they felt, characterized the culture enveloping them. In the videotape that he left behind, their leader, Mohammed Sidique Khan, was scathing about British materialism, and he asserted that “our driving motivation doesn’t come from tangible commodities that this world has to offer.”9 Moreover, maybe it was no coincidence that, before he turned politically radical, Khan was involved in helping young Asian drug addicts kick their habit; maybe the road to supposedly cathartic violence went through his direct experience of the humanly degrading symptoms of a popular culture that much prefers being out of one’s mind to being in it. Now, in case such a dismal reading of certain reaches of popular culture sounds like the predictable expression of the conservatism of middle age, let me refer you to a remarkable article published in 2006 in The Guardian. There the card-​carrying liberal, Timothy Garton Ash, wrote as follows: Britain now has one of the most libertine societies in Europe. Particularly among younger Brits in urban areas, which is where most British Muslims live, we drink more alcohol faster, sleep around more, live less in long-​ lasting, two parent families, and worship less, than almost anyone in the world. It’s clear from what young British Muslims themselves say that part of their reaction is against this kind of secular, hedonistic, anomic lifestyle. . . . The idea that these young British Muslims might actually be putting their fingers on some things that are wrong with our modern, progressive,

102  Nigel Biggar liberal, secular society . . . hardly feature[s]‌in everyday progressive discourse. But [it] should.10

Garton Ash is one of several prominent children of the 1960s, who has recently shown signs of having second thoughts about the course of the liberal revolution over the past forty-​five years. He has not given us an exact diagnosis of what is wrong with the kind of liberal society we have developed, possibly because its implications are too troubling to excavate. So let me venture where he has declined to tread. The social problems that Garton Ash identified back in 2006 are all symptoms of an exaggerated regard for the freedom of the individual. Certain kinds of such freedom are very important, of course. Freedom from arbitrary interference by the state is one example, and freedom of conscience to discern what moral norms require in particular circumstances is another. However, a major problem arises when the individual’s freedom is asserted over and against any given moral order, any created or natural set of values. For then, as the Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor has observed, individuality or individual authenticity or individual self-​expression becomes completely meaningless.11 Choice in a moral vacuum is a choice without significance. Instead of being a unique incarnation of what is really valuable, it is merely a random assertion of blind will. The freedom of the individual is important, but only if we know what it is worth being free for. In our culture today, there are many different moral currents, and this radical moral individualism certainly is not the only one. But it is a major one, and when combined with relativist forms of multiculturalist ideology, it tends to make institutions morally tongue-​tied. If the individual is properly free to choose according to personal whim, and if all cultures are morally equal, then who has the authority to decide which norms will govern an institution and its many individual, and culturally various, members? Three recent instances of moral inarticulacy on the part of British educational institutions have come to my attention. The first occurred in Tower Hamlets College in east London. There in 1993 the then-​radical Islamist, Ed Husain, was spearheading a campaign to “Islamize” public space—​by holding public prayers, plastering the walls with Islamist posters, and encouraging women to wear the hijab. The college authorities grew alarmed and considered how best to combat the growing influence of Muslim radicalism. According to their best lights, they decided to try and divert students by holding raves and discos. The result was telling. As Husain recounts it:

Can Theology Help?  103 In early 1993, a thirty-​minute video was handed in to me about the war in Bosnia, the ethnic cleansing of Muslims in the Balkans. I watched it in horror and then decided that it must be shown to our students to raise money for Bosnian Muslims. On Wednesday afternoon we booked a lecture theatre under the title of “The Killing Fields of Bosnia” . . . That same Wednesday afternoon the youth workers at college organized their second disco . . . The Islamic society offered a video on the killing of Muslims by Christians. The youth workers offered dance, drugs, and delight. To our astonishment the lecture theatre was packed. The students had voted with their feet.12

Radical Islamism had dignified the students with a high moral seriousness. It had addressed them as moral agents with a responsibility for justice. The college authorities, however, had nothing morally serious to offer as an alternative—​or if they had, they were not able to give it voice. As a consequence, their ability to counter the growing appeal of a political radicalism was hamstrung. Six years later, Damian McBride became the “spin doctor” of Gordon Brown, then Chancellor in the UK Government. He continued to play that role for the next ten years and into Brown’s tenure as Prime Minister. Because of the unscrupulous ruthlessness with which he served his master, McBride was fondly known as “Mad Dog” or “McPoison.” In 2009, overreaching himself, he precipitated a scandal that propelled him out of Downing Street, onto the front pages of the press, and into public disgrace. Four years later, a somewhat chastened McBride published his own account of what had happened, and, more confessionally, of how his life had come to such a pass. The subtitle of his book was prosaic: “A Decade of Policy, Plots, and Spin.” The title was more revealing: “Power Trip.”13 Chapter 2 is entitled “Warning Signs,” and it begins, “I wasn’t always a nasty bastard, but you could argue the signs were there.”14 One of the signs came to light during his student career at Peterhouse in Cambridge. Frequently the source of physical violence, and indirectly responsible for setting fire to one of the college’s thirteenth century buildings, McBride succeeded in pulling the wool over the dons’ eyes with a combination of avoidance, obfuscation, and diversion. As he sums it up: “I left university hooked on the intricacies of power and policy-​making, with a talent for avoiding the truth . . . a win-​ or-​die competitive streak, a penchant for negative, thuggish tactics, and a reckless disregard for the consequences of my actions. There was only one possible career choice”—​politics.15

104  Nigel Biggar McBride’s first step into a political career was an application to enter the elite “Fast Stream” of the Civil Service. Upon reaching the Final Selection Board, he found himself confronted with the question, “What considerations do you think the government makes when formulating its policies on shipping?” By dint of native cunning, he managed to bluff his way through. But his caustic reflection on the whole process is telling: “So there it was. At no point in that whole Fast Stream recruitment process were my violent competitive streak, excess drinking, [or] duplicitous instincts . . . exposed as potentially good reasons not to appoint me. But, by God, they nearly found me out for my ignorance on shipping.”16 McBride was a product of Cambridge in the 1990s. During most of that decade, I was chaplain of Oriel College in Oxford, where I observed droves of graduates flocking into the City of London, seduced by the prospect of eye-​ watering remuneration in the financial services industry. Ten years later, after the 2007–​2008 financial crisis had broken, I wondered whether our graduates had behaved any more responsibly than their colleagues who through greed, ruthlessness, recklessness, or negligence had helped to bring the global financial system to the edge of the abyss, indirectly causing millions to lose their livelihoods and even their homes. Did they have a conception of what it means to be a good banker, as distinct from being a clever and successful one? Had anyone at university—​had any professor—​drawn their attention to the distinction and urged them to contemplate it? Not within my hearing. These three stories are merely anecdotes, of course, not hard empirical evidence. Nevertheless, I do think that they are symptomatic of a general problem: namely, the moral inarticulacy of universities—​that is, the inability of universities, their leadership and their professors, to own up to, to confess their responsibility for the moral formation of students. And this is a problem, because it incurs social costs, often unjust and sometimes very grave. My conclusion is that we cannot afford institutions—​especially educational institutions—​ that are morally tongue-​ tied. We cannot afford institutions that are silent about what is really valuable and about what kinds of behavior promote and detract from it. We cannot afford institutions that are eloquent about skills but speechless about virtues. Now, of course, anyone who has had a part in running an institution knows full well that it simply cannot function without common moral norms that its members take seriously. Nevertheless, the individualist and multiculturalist currents in contemporary culture have made it much more difficult for institutions to own, articulate, and promote the common moral norms

Can Theology Help?  105 upon which their healthy functioning depends. And without ownership, articulation, and promotion, the grip of those tacit norms will be so much the weaker. The problem, as I see it, is twofold. Sometimes, university authorities are silent, because they genuinely believe that it is none of their liberal business to tell students how to behave within the bounds of the law—​whether in the form of statutes, regulations, or the norms of political correctness. So regarding greed, intemperance, meanness, ruthlessness, arrogance, and the lust to dominate within the law, they assume a stance of indifference. After all, they are not their student sisters’ or brothers’ paternalist keeper, are they? The second problem, however, is that universities actually do form their students morally, but cannot say so. Take the arts and humanities, which is my own academic province. Here professors commonly introduce students to foreign worlds—​worlds made strange by the passage of time; present worlds structured by the peculiar grip of unfamiliar languages; worlds alien to us in their social organization and manners, their religious and philosophical convictions. Introduction to these foreign worlds confers a substantial benefit: the benefit of distance from our own world and thereby the freedom to ask questions of it that we could never otherwise have conceived. In foreign worlds, past and present, they see and love and do things differently. In reflecting upon that difference, it might occur to us from time to time that they see and love and do things better. However, the arts and humanities not only introduce us to foreign worlds; at their best they teach us to treat them well. They teach us to read strange and intractable texts with patience and care; to meet alien ideas and practices with humility, docility, and charity; to draw alongside foreign worlds before we set about—​as we must—​judging them. They train us in the practice of honest dialogue which respects those distant from us in time or place as potential prophets who might yet speak a new word about what is true and good and beautiful—​about what makes for human flourishing. A commitment to the truth, humility, a readiness to be taught, patience, carefulness, charity: all of these are moral virtues that inform the intellectual discipline into which the arts and humanities commonly induct their students. And they are moral virtues that, even if first acquired in the classroom, have wider social application. Someone who has learned, for example, to treat with scrupulous care and generous charity the text of a long dead author will surely be disposed to treat the speech of a living interlocutor in the same way. The classroom virtues do not suffer confinement to the classroom.

106  Nigel Biggar And it is of great social importance that they should not, because decisions made in banks or businesses or hospitals or government or on the battlefield that are careless with the truth, arrogant, unteachable, impatient, and uncharitable, will be bad decisions—​and they will cause real damage to social institutions and to the human individuals who inhabit or depend upon them. University teachers often do promote moral virtues in the classroom: that is clear to me. But in thirty years of teaching in three universities, I have never heard a single colleague speak of what they do in those moral terms. Why is that a problem? Why is it not enough to promote virtue, without talking about it? The reason that public silence is a problem, I think, is that it results in haphazard success at best and outright negligence at worst. Insofar as the promotion of virtue is not a confessed, articulated, publicly owned aim of university education, professors will not go about it self-​consciously and deliberately. When they do it, it will be inadvertent and, being inadvertent, it will be weaker, less systematic, and more invisible. One professor might tacitly reward courage in the face of alien ideas, but not justice, far less charity, toward them; another might care little for fidelity to logic and evidence, and much more for rhetorical flourish and ideological compliance. And students, observing that no one ever talks about virtue in the classroom, might reasonably infer that it is a matter of no importance. The obvious objection to my complaint is the obvious justification of public silence about virtue promotion, namely, that an educational institution in a liberal, multicultural society cannot commit itself to any particular vision of the good life and its particular selection of virtues and vices. Instead, in order to be fair to a diverse citizenry, it has to adopt a stance of studied neutrality.17 I think that this is mistaken for several reasons. First, neutrality is not what actually happens on the ground. What happens on the ground is the tacit promotion of virtue and vice, first intellectual, then social. This professor implicitly rewards care and charity; that professor implicitly models arrogance and the lust to dominate. Second, no liberal university adopts an official posture of simple moral neutrality. It will, for example, actively promote the typical liberal virtues of respect and tolerance, nowadays probably specifying respect by the object of equal diversity—​although it will avoid giving these “virtues” their generic title. But if the liberal university officially promotes some virtues—​as it must—​that surely invites reasonable questions about what respect and tolerance should involve and about their proper limits. It also inspires the thought that if these virtues, then why not others? Why not also temperance,

Can Theology Help?  107 prudence, and courage? Or even humility, docility, and charity? Are respect and tolerance really enough to sustain civic friendship under the actual, sinful conditions of human communication—​the dishonest evasion, the ad hominem provocation, the distracting insult, the calculated humiliation, the brazen lie? Does not a moment’s reflection suffice to show that we need more? But what we do not talk about, we hardly reflect upon. The moral neutrality of the university is commonly recommended on the ground of fairness to the diversity of equally valid visions of the good life which characterizes a liberal, multicultural society. My third objection is that this exaggerates the radical nature of moral diversity. It is true that different times and places occasion different experiences, which recommend different virtues—​or at least different priorities among virtues. The contemporary West with its early modern experience of monarchical absolutism and twentieth-​century experience of totalitarianism is naturally inclined to emphasize the Christian prophetic virtue of skepticism toward authority. Contemporary China, however, with its experience of the Cultural Revolution’s quasi-​civil war, and of an imperial state too weak to resist humiliating foreign incursions in the nineteenth century, can be forgiven, I think, for talking up the Confucian virtue of piety toward social and institutional authority. Different experiences, different virtues—​or rather, different priorities in virtue. For even liberal Westerners, if they stop to think, can appreciate that social and political life cannot survive without some deference to authority, and even patriotic Chinese people can decry the arbitrary use of state power for private purposes when they see it. Whatever their cultural differences, human beings are all subject to the natural requirements of flourishing social life, and our diverse histories are replete with common lessons about the social costs of arrogance and the refusal to learn, of greed and the lust for power, of impatience and cowardice. So moral diversity is not as radical as it is often assumed to be. If we did dare to talk about our preferred lists of virtues and vices, we would discover, I suggest, a considerable consensus. Nonetheless, it will not be absolute. It will involve decisions. And it will also contain differences. Thus, we might decide to go with the Hebrew prophets against Nietzsche and Ayn Rand and agree that care for the poor is a virtue, but still disagree about the definition of poverty; and we might decide to go with Jesus against Aristotle and agree that humility is a virtue, but still disagree about when it should express itself in deference. Whatever our consensus, it will be tense and limited; difference will persist, and so will conflict. Still, if there are any confessing Hobbesians

108  Nigel Biggar propagating the virtue of radical egoism in their lectures, and if there are any confessing Nietzscheans propagating the virtue of contempt for the weak in their seminars, then let it become the subject of open discussion and critical reflection. Far better that than covert promotion and unwitting absorption. Universities and their members need to own the moral commitments they already make, name the putative virtues they already promote—​officially and tacitly—​and make the critical public discussion of such things a normal part of academic life. Can the discipline of theology help with this? My answer is first “No,” but then “Yes.” By “theology,” I mean Christian studies as distinct from more general religious studies: that is, the study of Christian sacred scriptures, church history, theological doctrines, and ethics. This is generally what “theology” means in much of the Western world. I also mean Christian studies within a multidisciplinary, properly secular university. By “properly secular,” I mean openly plural, not especially exclusive of religious confession. Since theology grew up in confessedly Christian universities, since genuinely “scientific” research and teaching is often supposed to transcend all normative commitments, and since secular institutions are often supposed to exclude specifically any religious confession, theology sometimes feels that its academic bona fides is considered suspect. Accordingly, it is anxious to distance itself from any hint of Christian commitment. This I perceive to be especially true in a US context, where the constitutional doctrine of the separation of church and state is commonly thought to require the exclusion of religious confession from public universities—​and where it even shapes the ethos of private ones. In the 1980s, I undertook doctoral studies at the University of Chicago, a private institution whose Divinity School has Baptist origins. I observe that all the courses I took there delivered theology either in the form of intellectual history or of the thought of a particular individual—​Barth, Tillich, Niebuhr. No course dealt with the logical structure or coherence, or the truth-​claims, of particular Christian beliefs. I emerged with no idea about the different theories of the atonement, for example, or their theological, logical, or ethical strengths and weaknesses. Even though I concentrated on ethics, I do not recall ever being required to analyze a practical issue and arrive at a normative judgement. Sometimes theology, anxious about its status, is extraordinarily shy of owning religious convictions or ethical commitments. And that is not just in the United States. It was in Ireland at Trinity College Dublin about ten years ago that my draft of some publicity material was vetoed by a colleague, because its reference to

Can Theology Help?  109 the virtue of intellectual charity was deemed too “spiritual.” In this diffident, defensive, normative-​shy mode, theology is unlikely to help loosen the moral tongue of universities. However, theology is not always on the defensive. It does not always operate in an academic environment where rigorous intellectual endeavor is assumed to require the bracketing of metaphysical or moral commitments. Nor in a political environment where it is assumed to require the specific exclusion of religious confession. Sometimes theology operates in a fully liberal, openly plural ethos, where it is understood that all intellectual endeavor presupposes metaphysical and moral commitments of some kind, and where the confession of those commitments, religious and otherwise, is expected, so that they can become the subject of responsible, critical, public discussion. My perception is that such an ethos often obtains in a British context, where theology and religious studies usually inhabit the same university department, respecting each other’s different methodologies, rather than calling into question their academic good faith. I suspect that this is one of the fruits of a liberal religious establishment, which first normalizes the public confession of a certain religious orthodoxy, but then opens the door to competing confessions. Whatever its causes, this confession-​friendly ethos liberates theology to help universities recover their moral articulacy. This is because the substance of Christian theology is morally realist: it views human beings as existing within a given moral order, and it is that order which graces their choices, for good or ill, with meaning. According to this high vision, human beings are not merely the random result of the blind operation of physical forces, nor their activity simply determined by genes or chemistry, nor their asserted significance just so much desperate whistling in the enveloping cosmic dark. No, in Christian eyes, humans are the creatures of a benevolent divine intelligence, which has striven through natural evolution to bring about individuals who flourish in freely investing themselves in what is really valuable. That is why, for Christians, human life has the basic form of a moral adventure. This is reflected in the epic, narrative structure of the Bible: starting with the creation of humankind, followed by our fall from grace, and then the long road back with Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees, with Moses out of Egypt, with Jesus to Golgotha and Emmaus, and then on to the New Jerusalem. Within this moral adventure, much can be lost, because there is so much to be gained. Life is a serious business, but only because it is heavy with moral significance and possibility. For Christian theologians, therefore, talking

110  Nigel Biggar about what is valuable and virtuous is a perfectly natural thing to do. And where they feel free to talk in public, to confess their moral commitments before their colleagues and their students, they encourage others to follow suit, inspiring them with the confidence to set their moral tongues free. I have no doubt that university teachers sometimes do form their students in virtue. A good teacher will exemplify and encourage a student to be honest in reporting evidence, careful in drawing inferences from it, patient in coaxing good sense from difficult texts, fair and charitable in treating uncongenial viewpoints, courageous in facing threatening ideas, humble in admitting the limits of knowledge, and resilient in pursuit of elusive truths. Honesty, carefulness, patience, fairness, charity, courage, humility, and resilience—​all of these are intellectual virtues, but they are also broader, social ones that have important application in the home, in the workplace, and in the public forum. Teachers sometimes do foster them, but in my experience they are highly unlikely to admit it. Theology can help to give voice to these unspoken moral commitments, and it is very important that it should. For when moral silence prevails in universities, not only is the promotion of virtue patchy and the unchallenged promotion of vice possible, but adolescent students receive the general impression that real adults do not care about values and virtues, and many of them resolve to grow up accordingly. So when they leave the womb of their alma mater for the Big Wide World, they embark, not at all upon a moral adventure, but on a power trip.

Notes 1. Parts of this chapter first appeared in “What Are Universities for?” Standpoint, July/​August 2010; “Damian McBride: A Cautionary Tale,” Standpoint, November 2013; and “What Are Universities for? A Christian View,” in Theology and Human Flourishing: Essays in Honor of Timothy J. Gorringe (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2011). I am grateful to Standpoint and Wipf & Stock for permission to reprint that material here. Testimony: The Story of Shostakovich, directed by Tony Palmer, written by David Rudkin (Digital Classics DVD, 1988). 2. On October 28, 2004. 3. OECD, Review of National Policies for Education: Review of Higher Education in Ireland (Examiners’ Report, EDU/​EC, 2004), 14. http://​www.grad.hr/​tem​pus3​luc/​limer​ick/​ doc/​oec​d_​re​view​_​nat​iona​l_​po​lici​es_​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​education.doc (accessed August 18, 2020).

Can Theology Help?  111 4. Walter Rüegg, “Theme,” in A History of the University in Europe, ed. Walter Rüegg, vol. I, Universities in the Middle Ages, ed. Hilde de Ridder-​ Symoens (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 21. 5. Quoted by Rüegg, “Themes,” 10. 6. Rüegg, “Themes,” 13. 7. Rüegg, ed., A History of the University in Europe, vol. III, Universities in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, ed. Walter Rüegg (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 10. 8. Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 38:31–​4 NRSV, emphasis added. 9. Alan Cowell, “Al Jazeera Video Links London Bombings to Al Qaeda,” New York Times, September 2, 2005, emphasis added. https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2005/​09/​02/​ world/​eur​ope/​al-​jaze​era-​video-​links-​lon​don-​bombi​ngs-​to-​al-​qaeda.html (accessed August 18, 2020). 10. Timothy Garton Ash, “What Young British Muslims Say Can Be Shocking—​Some of It Is Also True,” Guardian, August 10, 2006. https://​www.theg​uard​ian.com/​commen​ tisf​ree/​2006/​aug/​10/​comm​ent.race (accessed August 18, 2020). 11. Charles Taylor, The Ethics of Authenticity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1991), 39: “Even the sense that the significance of my life comes from its being chosen—​ the case where authenticity is actually grounded on self-​ determining freedom—​depends on the understanding that independent of my will there is something noble, courageous, and hence significant in giving shape to my own life. There is a picture here of what human beings are like, placed between this option for self-​ creation, and easier modes of copping out, going with the flow, conforming with the masses, and so on, which picture is seen as true, not decided. Horizons are given. . . . [U]‌nless some options are more significant than others, the very idea of self-​choice falls into triviality and hence incoherence.” 12. Ed Husain, The Islamist (London: Penguin, 2007), 63, 74. 13. Damian McBride, Power Trip: A Decade of Policy, Plots, and Spin (London: Biteback, 2013). 14. McBride, Power Trip, 5. 15. McBride, Power Trip, 9. 16. McBride, Power Trip, 13. 17. On different meanings of neutrality, see Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume). On the moral purposes implicit in the university, see also Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume) and Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume).

IV

HOW TO C U LT IVAT E V I RT U E IN T HE U N IV E R SI T Y

7 Seven Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in the University Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks

Despite renewed academic interest in virtue ethics and character development, institutions of higher education have largely avoided intentional efforts to form the character of university students.1 Most character education programs focus on primary and secondary students, leaving university students without sufficient support to negotiate a crucial time in their moral development. This chapter seeks to address this gap by focusing on the character education of postgraduate students pursuing advanced academic or professional degrees. For many students, postgraduate education marks a time when they are beginning careers, learning new skills, and facing unexpected challenges in integrating their personal values with the values and expectations of their professions. These challenges are all the more significant during “emerging adulthood,” the stage of life between adolescence and adulthood—​usually between ages eighteen and twenty-​nine—​when many postgraduates typically begin advanced degrees.2 Psychologists have identified emerging adulthood as “a time of great instability,” perhaps even “the most unstable stage of the life span.”3 Because emerging adults are marrying and having children later, holding a higher number of jobs, changing residences more frequently, and pursuing higher education and professional training over a longer period of time, this developmental stage has become a time of intense “identity explorations” as emerging adults experiment with new ideas, roles, and relationships and consider the kind of person they hope to become.4 For these reasons, emerging adulthood is a “transformative period of self-​development,” when “character traits,” “character strivings,” and “character prospection” are important features.5 While more empirical research is needed to analyze these aspects of emerging adulthood, existing scholarship suggests that this developmental stage is an important time for

​

​

116  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks character formation, which makes the absence of postgraduate character education programs all the more concerning.6 This chapter seeks to make two contributions to the theory and practice of character education in the university. First, we provide an accessible synthesis of recent research in education, philosophy, and psychology on seven Aristotelian strategies of character development: (1) habituation through practice, (2) reflection on personal experience, (3) engagement with virtuous exemplars, (4) dialogue that increases virtue literacy, (5) awareness of situational variables, (6) moral reminders, and (7) friendships of mutual accountability. While scholars have begun to direct more attention to each of these strategies, few examine how multiple strategies fit within a holistic program for character development. Second, in the discussion of these strategies, we show how each can be effectively integrated and applied in a practical program for character development. Although we apply these strategies in a postgraduate context, they can also be used to engage other students within the university. In explaining each strategy, we move beyond recent work that offers theoretical and empirical support for individual strategies, and beyond the task of summarizing promising strategies that practitioners might employ, to supply practical examples from a three-​year case study (2014–​2017) of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative (GLI). An initiative of the Oxford Character Project, the GLI is a voluntary, extracurricular program for character development, comprised of select groups of University of Oxford postgraduates from a range of disciplines, professions, and backgrounds. The GLI has continued to grow since 2017, but our focus here is restricted to the first three years of the program.7 By providing both a theoretical framework and practical examples of how to integrate each strategy, we hope to offer guidance for educators who aspire to design character education programs informed by educational theory and practice.

Seven Strategies of Character Development: An Aristotelian Framework The theoretical framework that informs our approach to character development is supported by a long tradition that dates back to Aristotle and continues in contemporary philosophy and psychology.8 On this broadly Aristotelian account, “character” is conceived as the collection of stable, deep,

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  117 and enduring dispositions that define who we are and shape how we characteristically think, feel, and act.9 This Aristotelian tradition distinguishes moral and intellectual dispositions of character and typically identifies positive dispositions as “virtues”—​traits that dispose us to think, feel, or act “at the right times, about the right things, toward the right people, for the right end, and in the right way”—​and negative dispositions as “vices”—​traits that dispose us to think, feel, or act at the wrong times, about the wrong things, toward the wrong people, for the wrong end, or in the wrong way.10 Between these two poles are dispositions that cannot be classified as either virtues or vices.11 These intermediate states include “continence” (i.e., when we know and do the right thing, but lack the firm and settled character to do it reliably and consistently) and “incontinence” (i.e., when we know the right thing to do but fail to do it).12 The aim of character education is to encourage people to develop more stable and enduring virtues of character in the face of temptations and difficulties.13 Given this developmental and aspirational conception of virtue,14 the GLI has directed its efforts toward helping postgraduates cultivate relevant virtues and resist corresponding vices. Since it would be difficult to develop and measure an entire suite of virtues within the span of one year, during the three years of this case study (2014–​2017), the GLI focused on four specific virtues: (1) a sense of vocation, (2) a commitment to service, (3) gratitude, and (4) humility.15 Although an entire suite of virtues is necessary to promote individual and communal flourishing, this more focused approach aligns with recommendations to address a select number of virtues rather than trying to develop all of them within a short time.16 Based on the experience of educators leading the program, the GLI chose its focal virtues for four reasons. First, all four virtues are generally recognized as morally admirable by a wide range of philosophical, moral, and religious traditions, including the traditions with which most GLI’s participants identify.17 Addressing these four virtues provides a substantive focus for the program while also supplying sufficient scope for diversity. Second, these four virtues are widely seen as essential for wise and effective leadership,18 particularly for individuals expected to progress to the positions of authority and influence for which their postgraduate education trains them. Yet these four virtues tend to be neglected in most postgraduate programs. Unlike virtues such as resilience or persistence, they cannot be assumed to develop naturally through rigorous selection, intellectual study, or professional training. A practical program focused on these virtues thus

118  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks meets an important developmental need for students who voluntarily join the program. Third, all four virtues help to shift attention away from narrow self-​interest toward the common good and the character required for significant impact in a pluralistic society.19 This shift is especially important for universities and postgraduate programs that identify social impact and public service among their explicit educational aims. Finally, all four virtues respond to specific challenges that accompany emerging adulthood. Most emerging adults, for example, are involved in intense exploration of their identity and vocation. In one poll of eighteen-​ to twenty-​nine-​year-​olds, 77 percent agreed that “This is a time of life for finding out who I really am.”20 A program that encourages postgraduates to develop a sense of vocation can help them achieve this objective. Similarly, cultivating a commitment to service may help to direct their activities and aspirations toward others during a period that psychologists have identified as a “self-​focused age.”21 In one survey, 71 percent of emerging adults affirmed that “This is a time of my life for focusing on myself.”22 Whether such self-​focus reflects the narcissism of “Generation Me”23 or a temporary developmental stage that shifts once emerging adults enter more stable jobs and relationships,24 cultivating a deeper commitment to service can help to prevent an age-​appropriate self-​focus from hardening into a vice. The same applies for gratitude and humility. Philosophers have long held that gratitude disposes us to recognize our dependence on others, which, in turn, discourages us from seeing achievements as simply our own and thereby encourages humility.25 Humility, in turn, disposes us to recognize our limitations and the need for others’ assistance, which encourages gratitude. Recent work in social psychology confirms this mutually reinforcing dynamic, showing that gratitude and humility contribute to an “upward spiral” that decreases self-​focus, increases positive affect, and encourages other-​ regarding behavior.26 If increased self-​focus is a defining feature of emerging adulthood, then the four focal virtues may be effective antidotes. The GLI intentionally structured its efforts to cultivate these virtues within a leadership-​based program for several reasons. First, many universities, including Oxford, aspire to educate global leaders in diverse fields, but with the exception of programs in some professional schools, most do not provide specific leadership training within their postgraduate curricula. A voluntary leadership and character development program can supplement curricular offerings and is easier to implement than programs that consume class time

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  119 or require formal departmental approval across multiple faculties. Second, most postgraduate leadership training focuses on cultivating leadership skills rather than virtues, so a character-​based initiative helps postgraduates consider the ends, purposes, and manner in which their leadership skills might be used. Finally, many postgraduates aspire to become “leaders” in their fields and thus seek opportunities that will help them find meaningful work or secure positions of authority or influence. The GLI tapped into this existing motivation to recruit students who might not be as attracted to an initiative focused solely on character. This approach fits with research suggesting that indirect forms of moral education that engage student motivation, tap into social influence, and embed efforts within an existing culture are often the most effective.27 It also aligns with one approach to virtue development that suggests that participants who cultivate virtues with instrumental value for a particular role (such as “good leader”) may come to recognize the constitutive and intrinsic value of acting virtuously, regardless of its instrumental value for any particular role.28 To cultivate such leaders of character, the GLI employed seven Aristotelian strategies of character development grounded in theoretical and empirical research in education, philosophy, and psychology. A brief explanation of each strategy and the GLI’s application of it highlights how academic research can inform practical programs for character development.

1.  Habituation through Practice In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle differentiates “virtues of thought” from “virtues of character” by how they are acquired: virtues of thought arise “mostly from teaching,” while virtues of character emerge through “habit.”29 Since Aristotle conceives virtues by considering how they are acquired, an Aristotelian account is “essentially developmental.”30 Aristotle’s distinction between teaching and practice is important for character development. Students cannot learn how to improve their character simply by reading a book or applying an abstract formula they learn in class.31 Rather, they must learn virtues of character, in part, by doing virtuous actions. For a good disposition to become a stable and enduring virtue, it must become a kind of habit—​a deep, reliable, and entrenched disposition of thought, feeling, or action.32 On an Aristotelian account, we acquire such habits through practice—​by repeating or regulating appropriate thoughts,

120  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks feelings, and actions over and over again until we gradually become disposed to think, feel, and act in the right ways in the right places at the right times, as if by second nature.33 Aristotle compares this process to that of acquiring skills: “we become builders, for instance, by building, and we become harpists by playing the harp. Similarly, then, we become just by doing just actions, temperate by doing temperate actions, brave by doing brave actions.”34 Just as a musician becomes a “virtuoso” by practicing an instrument, repeating certain movements, and playing pieces over and over again until they become second nature, so, too, people become morally virtuous by repeating or perfecting good actions, thoughts, and feelings until they develop stable and enduring dispositions of character.35 Recently, scholars have shown how this Aristotelian account of habituation has empirical grounding. Drawing on work in cognitive and social psychology, Nancy Snow has highlighted how habitual actions align with what psychologists call “goal-​dependent automaticity,” a form of cognitive processing that enables us to act intelligently yet automatically toward particular goals, even when we do not have those goals consciously in mind.36 On this account, certain roles, activities, or situations activate representations of virtue-​relevant goals that prompt particular thoughts, feelings, and actions, and the repeated activation of these thoughts, feelings, and actions cultivates habits that dispose us to think, feel, or act accordingly, even without conscious deliberation.37 This process parallels Aristotelian habituation. As Julia Annas and others emphasize, however, mere automaticity is not sufficient for virtue. Virtues and skills are not routine habits—​mindless or unthinking responses to stimuli—​but intelligent habits, capacities that involve dynamic, higher-​order judgments about the salient features of a particular situation and how to act appropriately within it.38 While such judgments need not always be consciously front of mind, both virtues and skills depend on the exercise of practical wisdom and reflect underlying reasons for action.39 Yet Aristotle is careful to distinguish virtues and skills in several ways.40 First, a virtuous person deliberates toward morally good ends, whereas a skilled person can employ skills toward any end, whether moral or immoral.41 A virtue, by contrast, is directed toward morally good ends and thus “makes a human being good and makes him perform his function well.”42 Second, a virtuous person acts from a “firm and unchangeable state,” not just from a fleeting feeling or inclination.43 In other words, they act “in the way in which just or temperate people do,” namely, out of a settled disposition of

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  121 character.44 A skilled person, by contrast, does not necessarily have to be in the “right state” of character to perform an act or skill well.45 These differences are particularly important for postgraduate character development. Most postgraduate programs focus primarily on cultivating leadership skills, from developing a strategy and communicating effectively to delegating responsibility and managing an institutional hierarchy. While skills are undoubtedly important for effective leadership, they do not necessarily contribute to ethical leadership. Ethical leaders must not only act with knowledge of what they are doing but direct their actions toward morally good ends and develop the settled dispositions of character to perform virtuous actions consistently in diverse circumstances. A leadership program that focuses only on skills without attention to virtues ignores the importance of character for ethical leadership. If students become virtuous in part by performing virtuous actions—​by leading well—​then a character development program should ideally provide opportunities for them to practice leading in various contexts. Service-​ learning courses, group projects, and cocurricular activities can provide such occasions. However, coordinating these opportunities can often be time-​ consuming and labor-​intensive, especially for programs such as the GLI that have a small staff. Moreover, the GLI and other voluntary programs cannot demand too much of postgraduate students who are simultaneously enrolled in full-​time study. Even with such constraints, however, the GLI applied Aristotelian insights about habituation in four ways. First, it encouraged particular practices of habituation in relation to some of the focal virtues. For example, to prepare for the discussion of gratitude, the GLI asked participants to keep a gratitude journal, a practice that has been shown to help to cultivate the virtue.46 As an empirical assessment of the GLI program revealed, participants were more likely to report increases on focal virtues when conceptual analysis was paired with practical exercises to cultivate virtue, which might help to explain why participants reported quantitative increases on gratitude and service but not on vocation and humility.47 Given this finding, recent iterations of the GLI have done more to encourage habituation of the other focal virtues, for example, by asking participants to identify a virtue they are eager to cultivate and commit to adopting correlate practices over the course of several weeks.48 Benjamin Franklin’s attempt to habituate one virtue per week provides an example of a historical leader who adapted a similar strategy.49

122  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks Second, the GLI challenged the “heroic” myth of leadership that identifies paradigmatic leaders as those who occupy positions of institutional power or authority.50 Instead, it highlighted the complex and often blurry relationships between “leaders” and “followers” and introduced participants to more collaborative models of leadership that do not require a leader to occupy an institutional role.51 If individuals can practice leadership in more informal settings, then conversations that programs like the GLI organize can themselves provide occasions for leadership, opportunities for students to discern when to speak up or step back, when to challenge an opinion or raise an alternative view, and when to collaborate with diverse colleagues to pursue common objectives. In this way, the GLI supplied informal opportunities to practice leadership, even if not in an institutional setting. Third, the GLI sought to introduce participants to particular practices relevant for good leadership. The GLI, for example, structured its program with readings and discussions centered on practices of reflection, friendship, and accountability, with the aim of helping participants adopt these practices in their daily lives. Moreover, facilitators intentionally modeled practices central to social cooperation, such as active listening and respectful engagement, which are especially important for a global leadership initiative that seeks cross-​cultural cooperation. By encouraging and repeating these practices throughout the program, the GLI helped participants habituate certain ways of acting, thinking, and feeling. Finally, the GLI offered opportunities for participants to reflect on the leadership they have practiced in other contexts. This is one advantage of working with postgraduate students: many pursuing advanced degrees already have significant leadership experience from their undergraduate education or prior work experience, and many maintain leadership roles while pursuing postgraduate degrees. These experiences provide participants with raw material on which to reflect and apply the conceptual and imaginative practices developed through the GLI. By recruiting and selecting applicants who have previous experience in significant positions of leadership or are currently occupying leadership roles, the GLI parlayed prior practice to encourage reflection on personal experience, which points to a second strategy.

2.  Reflection on Personal Experience If, as Aristotle argues, virtue requires knowledge of why and how we act in particular circumstances, and if this knowledge comes through reflection on

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  123 repeated actions, then reflection on experience will be central to character development. In particular, reflection on experience can help us develop the virtue of “practical wisdom” (phronesis), the capacity to discern morally salient features of situations and deliberate about how best to act.52 The relationship between experience and practical wisdom is one reason why Aristotle describes the “wise” or “prudent person” as someone who is usually of advanced age or maturity: the “young person” lacks the experience to make good judgments, while the wise “see correctly because experience has given them their eye.”53 Empirical research supports the importance of reflection in developing practical wisdom. Several psychological models and measures include a “reflective” capacity as a fundamental dimension of wisdom,54 while many scholars and practitioners have made “reflective practice” an essential component of personal and professional development,55 even using an Aristotelian conception of practical wisdom to conceptualize it.56 Educators, for example, have advocated integrating reflection and practical wisdom into law,57 medicine,58 and education.59 An academic journal, Reflective Practice, now exists to explore different conceptualizations and applications in various fields. The GLI sought to prompt structured reflection on personal experience in several ways. In its recruiting events and application, the GLI asked applicants to reflect on their own experiences to identify virtues that are essential for good leadership and leaders who exemplify them. This reflection on personal experience continued in the first set of formal discussions, where participants spend several minutes identifying and sharing personal examples of good or bad leaders, the character traits that define those leaders, and how they felt interacting with them. Throughout its programming, the GLI repeated such exercises—​both through written reflection and structured discussion60—​to prompt reflection on personal experiences where participants have exercised, or failed to exercise, specific virtues, or where they have experienced the effects of others’ virtues or vices. This repetition, in turn, helped to foster a reflective practice that will inform their leadership and character beyond their time in the program.61 Reflective exercises have several pedagogical benefits.62 First, they build on Aristotle’s suggestion that “we ought to begin from things known to us,” including the “experience of the actions in life.”63 Only when we have experience of what is virtuous and vicious can we discern how and why to act. Research shows that starting from what is “familiar” is especially important

124  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks for adult learners who tend to process information and make connections more readily when they can draw on prior experience and connect what they are learning to real-​life situations.64 Second, intentionally setting aside time for reflection before the substantive conversation begins helps to ground more abstract conversations in concrete, lived experiences. This approach aligns with research suggesting that engaging experiences that are more “realistic,” “relevant,” and “salient” is more effective than analyzing abstract issues or hypothetical dilemmas.65 Thus, the GLI provides readings, exercises, and discussions that encourage participants to integrate ideas about virtue, character, and leadership with their own values, experiences, and aspirations. To use Aristotle’s words, the primary purpose of the GLI is not “to know what virtue is, but to become good.”66 Finally, sharing personal reflections helps to build community, which, as we argue later, is a constitutive component of character formation. Sharing personal experiences gives participants a chance to know each other and develop bonds of trust, which is essential in a community where peers learn from each other and more experienced exemplars.

3.  Engagement with Virtuous Exemplars In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle elevates the “wise” or “prudent person” (phronimos) as the model and standard of virtue, an exemplar whose character enables others to determine which action is virtuous and how to perform it.67 Philosophers from multiple traditions have affirmed this emphasis on exemplarity. Recently, Linda Zagzebski has even developed an entire moral theory that places exemplars at the center.68 Exemplars can serve several pedagogical functions. First, by embodying particular virtues, values, and ideals, exemplars offer role models to admire and emulate, which, as research shows, can elevate our moral vision, increase our motivation, and inspire us to emulate the actions, attitudes, or characters of those we admire.69 Second, exemplars can serve as “counterfactual models” that prompt us to imagine how an exemplary person would act in a similar situation, which can help us discern how we should act.70 Third, exemplars can deepen our cognitive understanding of how particular virtues, values, or ideals can be instantiated or realized in particular contexts, helping us understand what the virtue is and how it can

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  125 be practiced.71 Fourth, exemplars can supply moral reminders that make norms salient and offer concrete, living proof that abstract ideals or virtues are actually possible to embody or attain.72 Seeing an exemplar exercise moral courage in the face of great obstacles, or make significant sacrifices to show compassion in the midst of suffering, proves that such acts are not only admirable but possible. Finally, exemplars can even “reshape our moral imagination,”73 helping us see situations in new ways, encouraging us to challenge an unjust status quo or offering “new insight into the ethical demands of ideals and how they can motivate people to do the right thing.”74 Exemplars, of course, can take many forms. Those living in our immediate context—​parents, peers, teachers, coaches, and community leaders—​ are perhaps the most direct examples, but news reports and mass media also supply access to exemplars whom we can learn from and critically emulate, discerning what to emulate or avoid as we reflect on our own conduct and character.75 Moreover, exemplars need not be living. There is a long tradition of elevating examples from history, politics, science, literature, and the arts to encourage audiences to enact specific thoughts, actions, or virtues or develop a more ethical way of life.76 Empirical studies have affirmed the importance of exemplars for moral development. Psychologists, for example, have shown that admiration of another’s virtue is a “profoundly motivating” emotion, fostering a “desire to be virtuous and to accomplish meaningful actions despite difficult obstacles.”77 Other studies have demonstrated that moral exemplars elicit feelings of “elevation” that increase motivations to “do good things for other people, become a better person oneself, and emulate the virtuous role model more generally.”78 Studies on helping have shown that subjects exposed to examples of helping behavior are more likely to contribute or cooperate in follow-​up scenarios than those in control groups.79 In particular, researchers have demonstrated that “relevant” and “attainable” exemplars—​those who are perceived to share similarity or proximity in age, stage, gender, culture, values, interests, or profession—​are particularly effective at increasing moral motivation and emulation.80 Although scholars are still trying to determine precisely how exemplars inspire followers to habituate good character—​ whether through cognitive processing mechanisms or emotions of “elevation” or “admiration”81—​there is a widespread consensus that emulating a good role model—​actual or fictional, living or dead—​is an effective way to inculcate good character.

126  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks The GLI provided access to exemplars in six ways. First, the GLI elicited reflection and conversation on personal exemplars, which aligns with research that recommends engaging participants with relevant and attainable exemplars before presenting stories from more extreme or distant exemplars.82 As mentioned earlier, the GLI’s recruiting conversations and application, along with the first substantive discussion, invited participants to reflect on exemplars of good and bad leadership from their own lives. Similar questions helped to ground discussions of the four focal virtues in light of personal exemplars. Second, GLI combined a focus on personal exemplars with readings from or about historic exemplars, including biographies, narratives, and letters that elevate specific leaders as examples of good or bad leadership. Readings, for example, included an excerpt from a biography of Nelson Mandela; analyses of historical or contemporary leaders in politics, business, law, and medicine; and letters and personal narratives from influential thinkers and leaders. On another occasion, the GLI provided admission to the Churchill War Rooms and asked participants to reflect on examples of leadership and character in the museum and imagine how they would respond if they were in Churchill’s shoes, utilizing the exemplar as a counterfactual model. The GLI also assigned readings that highlight exemplars of the four focal virtues, deliberately selecting readings from a diversity of fields, backgrounds, and traditions to encourage relevance and attainability while facilitating discussions that honestly acknowledge leaders’ flaws, which prevents exemplary stories from being deflating or dispiriting. For vocation and service, for example, readings included a letter from the poet Rainer Maria Rilke,83 an essay on vocation by the writer Annie Dillard,84 a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye,85 and an excerpt of a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr.86 For gratitude and humility, participants read “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley,87 a letter from Nelson Mandela on practices to cultivate humility, generosity, and service,88 and a reflection from Albert Einstein with insights relevant to all four focal virtues.89 By illuminating the larger context of exemplars’ lives, highlighting how practices, institutions, and communities influenced their moral development, and evaluating how they responded to particular challenges, these readings provided examples of virtues to emulate and challenged participants to reflect on how they might respond in similar situations. Third, in line with Aristotelian insights on the importance of literature and the arts in moral formation,90 the GLI provided access to exemplars through

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  127 the arts. During a day retreat in London, the GLI organized a guided tour of the National Portrait Gallery with a former director who led participants through various “portraits of leadership” to explore what we can learn from careful attention to how artists portray diverse leaders from politics, science, sports, the military, and popular culture. The GLI also used exemplars from the stage and page to provoke reflection and conversation. For example, it organized a role-​playing workshop on “King Lear and Leadership” with a Shakespeare scholar before watching a live performance and discussing moral lessons from the play. It designed an optional “Ethics through Fiction and Film” reading group to explore how characters in various novels and films grapple with moral complexity and engage our moral imaginations. And it organized an interactive workshop on “Leadership and the Wisdom of Jazz” to consider what we can learn from watching members of a jazz quartet lead and follow, improvising and collaborating to achieve a collective goal they could not envision in advance.91 Fourth, the GLI invited speakers whose leadership might be relevant and attainable for postgraduate participants.92 GLI speakers included a nonprofit leader, an economist, a lawyer, a novelist, a former member of Parliament, a senior business executive, university leaders, and professors in various fields. Since its students are so diverse, the GLI intentionally invited speakers from a diversity of countries, cultures, professions, ages, races, and genders to increase relevance and attainability, and it hosted speaker dinners in someone’s home to make the environment more intimate, private, and conducive to personal storytelling. In its invitations, the GLI explicitly asked speakers to share challenges and struggles to make their examples more relevant and attainable for students.93 The Q&A that followed often had the same features as the in vivo, “assisted autobiography” that Anne Colby and William Damon use to analyze exemplars.94 Fifth, the GLI connected participants with mentors in their respective professional fields who met two to three times over seven months to discuss their work, share challenges, and offer relevant guidance. The GLI ensured relevance by working directly with each student to identify potential mentors whom they admired or wanted to learn from based on their background, age, profession, or personal story.95 Mentors included members of Parliament, former cabinet ministers, professors, philosophers, journalists, peace builders, and a former Archbishop of Canterbury. To focus mentoring conversations on character and the four focal virtues, the GLI supplied mentors and participants with a list of questions to guide their conversations.

128  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks These questions made expectations explicit and encouraged both parties to focus on morally relevant issues rather than simply on professional development.96 Along with professional mentors, the GLI also paired each postgraduate with a mentor from its staff, who met regularly with participants to discuss the program and reflect on values and vocation. Staff mentors, usually in their thirties and forties, provided different forms of relevance and attainability, including similar educational backgrounds and greater proximity in age and stage of life.97 This two-​tier mentoring structure enabled the GLI to address the various needs of participants while ensuring their mentoring conversations focus on character and the focal virtues. It also ensured continuity and depth of connection if professional mentors became busy and were unable to meet regularly.98 Finally, GLI leaders sought to model the virtues they desired to cultivate in participants. The GLI specifically trained facilitators to model the behavior they hoped to elicit, such as respectful engagement, personal storytelling, vulnerability, and the four focal virtues.99 Such modeling increases relevance and attainability and aligns with research on how peer role models can actively encourage prosocial behavior.100 Combined, these efforts provided various opportunities for participants to critically engage various kinds of exemplars.

4.  Dialogue That Increases Virtue Literacy A fourth strategy involves discussions of particular virtues and how they can be practiced in concrete circumstances. Dialogue is among the most common ways that contemporary people engage moral issues,101 and Kristján Kristjánsson has shown how it is central to the Aristotelian tradition.102 Open-​ended dialogue provides opportunities to discuss complex moral issues, share practical experiences, test theoretical ideas, and learn from others’ perspectives. In particular, dialogue can help us understand why specific virtues are important and how they can be developed, practiced, or applied in diverse contexts. It can increase our cognitive understanding of character, deepen our emotional awareness and practical wisdom, and provide occasions to practice specific virtues in conversation with others.103 Empirical research supports the role of dialogue in moral formation.104 Influenced by Lawrence Kohlberg’s model of ethical reasoning

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  129 about complex cases, educators have long used discussions of difficult ethical dilemmas to improve moral judgment and development.105 Dilemma discussions can be helpful for illuminating moral complexity, identifying general principles, and considering the implications of various ethical issues, but reasoning about rare, abstract, and often hypothetical dilemmas tends to overemphasize the cognitive aspects of moral development and obscure the more ordinary ways that everyday relationships, contexts, and communities shape our character.106 In recent years, character educators have directed discussions away from analyzing ethical dilemmas to increasing “virtue literacy,” the “capacity to know and understand the necessary language and virtue concepts required to evaluate morally salient situations.”107 This emphasis fits with Aristotle’s approach to analyzing specific virtues in the Nicomachean Ethics. “For if we discuss particular aspects of character one at a time,” he writes, “we will acquire a better knowledge of them.”108 Helping participants understand the “moral and conceptual grammar” of a particular virtue such as gratitude, for example, can highlight how the virtue differs from the simple emotion, attitude, or act of gratitude and reveal how the virtue can be practiced appropriately and discriminately in diverse circumstances.109 Such discussions are particularly important within an Aristotelian approach that requires doing the right action in the right way for the right reason at the right time and place.110 The GLI incorporated such dialogue in various ways. First, it structured engagement with visiting speakers not as one-​sided lectures but as open-​ ended conversations where speakers could share personal experiences in a safe and intimate setting and where participants could ask questions that elicit discussion about how they have exercised particular virtues in particular contexts. Second, the GLI structured one-​on-​one mentor meetings as dialogues where both mentors and participants dialectically explored how they have responded to challenges and exercised leadership and character in their respective roles. Finally, and most significantly, the GLI organized its program around face-​to-​face, structured dialogues about leadership and the four focal virtues. Since research indicates that “the most productive discussions (whether peer or teacher-​led) are structured, focused, [and] occur when students hold the floor for extended periods of time, when students are prompted to discuss texts through open-​ended or authentic questions, and when discussion incorporates a high degree of uptake,”111 the GLI selected a number of short readings to

130  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks structure small group discussions on the virtues. Often, these readings served different functions, such as deepening moral and conceptual understanding, generating an affective connection, highlighting a relevant exemplar, or providing a critical analysis that helped participants make judgments about when a particular virtue is appropriate. In line with the recommendations of Blaire Morgan, Liz Gulliford, and David Carr regarding gratitude,112 for example, the GLI assigned poems by Mary Oliver and Rumi that foster self-​awareness and affective connections, along with a more critical article by Barbara Ehrenreich that highlights the potential dangers and limits of gratitude and its relation to other concepts.113 With these texts as prompts, facilitators engaged participants dialectically rather than didactically, providing an opening question or exercise to prompt conversation but otherwise encouraging students to share their experiences and perspectives. While facilitators occasionally followed up by asking an open-​ended question, making a connection, or offering insights on a conceptual aspect of a particular virtue, they positioned themselves not as teachers but as co-​participants in a shared learning community, and they tried to create conditions where participants felt safe and empowered to share their own personal experiences, ideas, or disagreements. This dialogical approach allowed participants to deepen their understanding of the relevant focal virtue, make connections to their personal experiences, and co-​construct meaning, understanding, and community with others in the conversation. One way to expand this dialogical approach would be to actually teach participants how to facilitate constructive dialogues about virtues. Between 2014 and 2017, the GLI primarily focused on either facilitating or modeling constructive dialogue, but more explicit instruction on how participants can facilitate dialogue themselves could help them develop a crucial practice of leadership and increase their knowledge of particular virtues. For example, the GLI could introduce participants to a particular model of dialogue—​ such as “deliberative dialogue,”114 “sustained dialogue,”115 or “transactive discussion”116—​that illuminates various stages and modes of effective discussion. Then the GLI could invite each participant to facilitate at least one dialogue with their friends or classmates on a particular virtue to gain practice of how to lead dialogues and deepen their knowledge of the virtue. As educators know from experience, being required to teach or lead a discussion about a topic increases knowledge and familiarity, which, in this case, could aid virtue literacy.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  131

5.  Awareness of Situational Variables A fifth strategy for cultivating good character involves fostering awareness of how situational variables, cultural influences, and institutional incentives shape character and behavior. Around the turn of the century, a number of philosophers and psychologists began drawing on empirical studies to suggest that global character traits may not even exist. According to these “situationists,” our moral thoughts, feelings, and actions do not reflect stable global traits of character, but the influence of specific and often subconscious situational variables and biases that condition our behavior more than any underlying disposition.117 Over the last decade, scholars have provided convincing replies to situationism, showing various ways in which the empirical studies that underwrite situationism do not preclude the existence of stable dispositions of character.118 While these scholars resist situationism as a global critique of virtue, they often affirm its cautionary lessons. Even if situational variables and biases are not the sole determinants of moral emotions, attitudes, and actions, they are one such determinant, and recognizing their influence encourages us to take more care in attributing particular virtues or vices to individuals and recognizing the impact that situational factors can have on our character.119 As Christian Miller argues, “If there are a number of psychological processes which (i) often operate subconsciously or outside our conscious awareness, (ii) have important implications for moral behavior, and (iii) can prevent that behavior from having moral worth or can even lead to the performance of morally forbidden actions, then a natural strategy to use in trying to become a more virtuous person is to first become better aware of and familiar with these processes.”120 According to Miller, awareness of these psychological processes can enable us to “be more attuned to situations in which they might be activated, and work to compensate for, correct, or counterbalance them.”121 Such a strategy goes back to ancient Athens. To become virtuous, Aristotle argues, “We must also examine what we ourselves drift into easily. For different people have different natural tendencies toward different goals, and we shall come to know our own tendencies from the pleasure or pain that arises in us. We must drag ourselves off in the contrary direction; for if we pull far away from error, as they do in straightening bent wood, we shall reach the intermediate condition.”122 Implicit in Aristotle’s advice are two strategies supported by empirical studies. The first is what Miller describes as “getting the word out,” which

132  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks involves informing participants about how particular psychological tendencies or situational variables—​such as the tendency to overestimate our abilities or be influenced by the behavior of those around us—​might encourage or inhibit ethical action without our conscious awareness.123 One study, for example, shows that college students who heard a lecture on the “bystander effect”—​the tendency to avoid helping someone when others are present—​ were significantly more likely to help someone in a staged emergency later that day (67 percent) than those who did not hear the lecture (only 27 percent).124 A follow-​up study showed that the difference (42.5 percent compared to 25 percent) persisted when the staged emergency was two weeks after the lecture.125 These and other studies suggest that getting the word out can alert individuals to situational variables and biases that they can correct or resist.126 A second and related Aristotelian strategy is “selecting our situations,” where we “actively seek out those situations which are going to inspire us to act well, while actively avoiding those situations that are fraught with temptation and other pitfalls.”127 This strategy is implicit in Aristotle’s advice to “steer clear” of vices or situations that might be most dangerous for us.128 Citing a number of philosophers and psychologists who endorse this strategy, Miller suggests that we can, for example, actively seek out friends, role models, and communities that might have a positive influence on us, while avoiding those whose example and influence might be harmful. Since we possess various biases and encounter endless numbers of situational variables every day, character education programs must be selective about how they tailor these strategies to the developmental stages and situations of participants. Since the GLI worked with postgraduates training to be leaders in their respective professions, it focused on professional expectations and incentives embedded in different occupations and institutional cultures. To begin the conversation, the GLI showed participants a TED talk by a social psychologist who uses a rigged Monopoly game to reveal how positional inequalities of wealth, power, and privilege—​even when determined by random chance—​change how participants behave within a particular setting.129 Participants then discussed readings that analyze how particular institutional incentives, cultures, and situations shape individual character, including an analysis of the “occupational hazards of working on Wall Street,”130 a summary of research showing that political leaders become less empathetic and more “coldhearted” as they become more powerful,131 and an analysis of “demoralizing institutions” in medicine, law, and banking.132

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  133 Afterward, the GLI divided participants into groups according to their profession to discuss the “occupational hazards” that accompany their chosen field. By “getting the word out” about how situational variables and institutional incentives condition their character, either positively or negatively, the GLI sought to help participants correct or counteract them and become more intentional about selecting their situations. Immediately following this discussion, the GLI explored particular practices that can enable participants to reflect on their tendencies, hold themselves and others accountable, and develop the habits needed to resist or reform their institutional cultures. For practices of solitude and reflection, participants read a poem on the “art of disappearing,”133 a lecture on “solitude and leadership,”134 and a letter from Nelson Mandela explaining how fifteen minutes of daily meditation was crucial to his personal development.135 For practices of self-​development and self-​accountability, participants reflected on a poem from Portia Nelson about the stages of self-​knowledge necessary to overcome bad habits,136 a letter from Kurt Vonnegut on the power of art, music, and poetry to “make your soul grow,”137 and an excerpt from Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography that charts his efforts to cultivate thirteen virtues of character.138 With these examples as inspiration, participants then discussed the practices they have used in the past to gain critical distance, resist or reform their institutional cultures, or make difficult decisions in morally fraught situations. Here, conversations about situational variables incorporated other character development strategies such as habituation through practice, reflection on personal experience, engagement with exemplars, and moral reminders. The GLI could build on these conversations by drawing on Mary Gentile’s action-​oriented approach in Giving Voice to Values, which suggests students can develop the confidence and “moral muscle” to overcome situational pressures by framing their “self-​story as individuals who want to voice their values” and constructing and practicing personal “scripts” that function as appropriate responses to questionable practices in their professional fields.139 Finally, to connect “getting the word out” and “selecting situations” with an emphasis on exemplars, the GLI arranged a lunch conversation with a former member of Parliament who rose to power as a cabinet minister but later committed perjury to save face during a scandal and served seven months in prison. He spoke candidly about his original motivations for entering politics, how the trappings of power deformed his character, and how his time in prison enabled him to see the potentially distorting effects of political power.

134  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks This wide-​ranging, personal engagement enabled participants to connect the morning’s discussions of institutional incentives and personal practices with the practical experience of a relevant and attainable exemplar. Throughout the program, the GLI also discussed how other implicit biases and assumptions—​such as those related to gender, race, religion, and culture—​influence views about leadership or the focal virtues. By including readings, speakers, and exemplars from diverse perspectives and traditions, the GLI sought to highlight how leadership and character can be understood and enacted from various points of view. In this way, the diversity reflected in GLI programming helped to prompt increased awareness about how biases and assumptions might affect the understanding and practice of leadership and character in contemporary society.

6.  Moral Reminders Another effective way to challenge the effects of situational variables and cultivate good character is by providing moral reminders that make particular norms salient.140 By increasing the salience of norms and recalling commitments to maintain particular values as members of specific communities, moral reminders can, as Christian Miller suggests, alert us to the morally salient features of situations, “call our attention to our moral commitments,” and “make it much more difficult in our own mind to justify doing the wrong thing.”141 In other words, moral reminders create psychological barriers to self-​justification and self-​deception. Because we want to see ourselves as virtuous people, being reminded of our values, standards, and commitments makes it psychologically difficult to violate them without updating our “self-​concept,” recategorizing the situation, or rationalizing the behavior to avoid cognitive dissonance.142 For this reason, moral reminders help to counteract temptations that might arise from situational variables and reinforce a commitment to acting in accordance with our internal standards. Indeed, one of the values of professional codes of conduct is that they provide moral reminders that encourage professionals to act in accordance with widely shared ethical norms. Miller synthesizes empirical research on academic cheating to highlight the effectiveness of moral reminders.143 In one study, seating students directly in front of a mirror and playing a recording of their own voice (in contrast to a random voice) reduced cheating on an intelligence test by

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  135 reminding students of who they see themselves to be.144 Other studies show that students who were asked to recall the Ten Commandments or sign an honor pledge before taking a test were significantly less likely to cheat when given the opportunity than those not provided with such reminders.145 The importance of making norms salient highlights one important function of honor codes at universities: honor codes not only provide enforceable rules to live by but remind students of their values and commitments to live up to them.146 The GLI promoted self-​awareness and made norms salient from the time students applied to the program. Most significantly, the GLI’s extended schedule of readings, reflections, discussions, and speakers every week or two provided regular and consistent reminders to participants about the importance of character and the four focal virtues, increasing participants’ self-​ awareness and making it more likely that participants aspire to be leaders of character and less likely that they act unethically when situational variables arise. The value of making norms salient provides an important reason to extend a character development program over several months rather than condense it into a weekend retreat. Regular readings, discussions, and speakers provide consistent moral reminders that help participants strengthen their moral commitments, resist temptations, and internalize norms around character. The GLI could further incorporate moral reminders by offering more extensive discussions of relevant professional codes of conduct and by encouraging students to adopt moral reminders in their efforts to habituate virtue through practice, for example, by using sticky notes, calendar reminders, or digital notifications to prompt gratitude journaling or habituate their chosen virtue for a month.

7.  Friendships of Mutual Accountability The influence of moral norms highlights a final feature of moral formation: character development never occurs in isolation. We inevitably shape and are shaped by the culture and community around us, whether we recognize it or not.147 This is why Aristotle holds that even the most self-​sufficient people need good friends.148 On an Aristotelian account, friendships contribute to the “cultivation of virtue” in several ways.149 For example, friendships embody and inculcate particular practices, values, and narratives, which shape friends’

136  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks understanding of moral character.150 By encouraging specific behaviors and making moral norms salient, friends help each other recognize and develop a shared conception of a good life and the virtues needed to pursue it. In particular, friendships provide a context for the “sharing of conversation and thought,” which enables friends to determine what kind of action or character is “choiceworthy.”151 As friends discuss ideas and experiences with each other, they may come to know aspects of each other better than they know themselves, which can prompt reflection and provide a mirror that helps them see themselves in a new light.152 Relatedly, friendships provide an “opportunity for beneficence” that enables friends to practice acts of virtue.153 With occasions to “do good” with and for others, friends come to habituate good thoughts, feelings, and actions and develop a more virtuous character through regular practice.154 Moreover, friendships provide access to relevant and attainable exemplars who can teach us how to improve our character. Since “we are able to observe our neighbors more than ourselves, and to observe their actions more than our own,” the virtuous person needs “virtuous friends.”155 Friends also supply assistance and support when others encounter difficulty since “we have our pain lightened when our friends share our distress.”156 Finally, friends supply “mutual correction” when the other goes wrong.157 Accountability contributes to moral development directly by countering certain forms of behavior and indirectly by shaping norms, values, and expectations, for “each molds the other in what they approve of, so that ‘[we learn] what is noble from noble people.’ ”158 As this last quote implies, simply having friends or being a member of a community is not enough to acquire good character: the moral quality of these relationships matters. As Aristotle writes, “the friendship of base people turns out to be vicious. . . . But the friendship of decent people is decent, and increases the more often they meet. And they seem to become still better from their activities and their mutual correction.”159 The influence of common activities is among the reasons Aristotle prioritizes friendships based on virtue rather than utility or pleasure.160 Recent empirical studies on “group effects” support these Aristotelian insights. Studies on helping behavior show that when individuals are surrounded either by strangers or by participants who do not assist a “victim” in the experiment, they are less likely to help, but when they are surrounded either by friends or participants who actively assist the victim, they are more likely to help.161 While these studies measure behavior rather than internal dispositions, they suggest that friendships can either “inhibit” or “enhance”

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  137 certain behaviors by providing models of moral behavior, generating norms that promote accountability, and encouraging common activities.162 One neuroscience study even suggests that brain waves—​and the patterns of perception, interpretation, and behavior they reflect—​are highly similar among friends.163 Since research suggests that relationships with family, colleagues, and friends provide the most common context for ethical decisions and the most common source of moral exemplars,164 friendship becomes an especially important context for moral development. Friendship is especially relevant for a leadership initiative that seeks to challenge “heroic” models of leadership and shift attention to the everyday contexts in which we might exercise influence. One of the most striking features of the moral exemplars studied by Colby and Damon is that they were actively receptive to, and shaped by, the influence and feedback of their followers and friends.165 Friendships provide a developmental context for ethical leadership, facilitating various forms of cooperation and exchange; providing increasing levels of support, accountability, and congruence; and encouraging more collaborative, egalitarian, and transformational forms of leadership.166 To challenge heroic, hierarchical, and individualistic models of leadership, one scholar has even proposed the metaphor of “leadership as friendship” to encourage a more “participatory,” “interdependent,” and “relational conception and practice of leadership.”167 Building on these insights, the GLI encouraged meaningful friendships in four ways. First, the GLI provided a community in which members had access to teachers, exemplars, and peers who share similar values and commitments and whose example could indirectly encourage ethical thought and action. These relationships provided opportunities for support and emulation and helped to make communal norms around leadership and character more salient. Second, the GLI intentionally organized opportunities for participants to develop strong friendships by pairing formal discussions with informal opportunities to talk or share a meal before or after an event. This provided occasions for participants to share the “conversation and thought” that Aristotle identifies as conducive to friendship, which in turn encourages good behavior and offers occasions to practice particular virtues. Third, the GLI led a discussion on friendship as an intentional practice of leadership. Participants were invited to reflect on what they value about their most meaningful friendships and then discuss several assigned readings, including an excerpt from Augustine’s Confessions that highlights friendship’s

138  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks various functions,168 a poem by Oriah Mountain Dreamer that encourages honesty and vulnerability,169 and a letter from Clementine Churchill that exemplifies a friendship of accountability.170 These readings offer both content about what friendship entails and an example of how it is enacted by relevant exemplars. Finally, the GLI provided occasions for participants to practice mutual correction and accountability. By enacting vulnerability, inviting questions during discussion, and structuring conversations as dialogues among peers, GLI facilitators sought to create a warm and trusting space that promoted mutual engagement and encouraged openness, vulnerability, and a diversity of perspectives, which challenged participants to reflect on their views in light of others’ experiences and adjust their assumptions accordingly. Moreover, during group conversations and mentoring meetings, GLI leaders gently challenged particular perspectives from participants and highlighted moments when participants’ professed values or commitments might not match their practice. Further, specific readings supplied examples of how participants can practice such candor and correction among themselves. One of the most interesting aspects of Benjamin Franklin’s efforts to cultivate virtue, for example, is that he added “humility” only after a close friend told him that he was “generally thought proud.”171 Future cohorts of the GLI could further expand this approach by creating “accountability partners” among participants, requiring each participant to meet monthly with one other participant to offer candid feedback, provide support, and practice accountability.

Conclusion The purpose of this chapter has been to present seven strategies of character development grounded in theoretical and empirical research and supply practical examples of how this research can inform an extracurricular program for character development in a university context. Preliminary evidence from a case study of the GLI in its first three years (2014–​2017) suggests that, when these seven strategies are combined and applied consistently over time, they are productive in helping students understand and cultivate important character virtues.172 Since its inception, the GLI has continued to iterate on its practical programming, expanding the number of participants, increasing the number of focal virtues, and developing new ways to integrate

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  139 these seven strategies. Similar work at Wake Forest University has integrated these seven strategies in undergraduate and professional school courses and programming, presenting new opportunities both to apply these strategies of character development and to assess their impact on students.173 More theoretical and empirical research is needed to refine and assess each strategy of character development as it applies to emerging adults and to evaluate how these strategies can be combined in a comprehensive program to cultivate virtue. Such programs will inevitably need to be adapted to fit different institutional, educational, and cultural contexts and the developmental needs of diverse participants, but we hope to have provided some theoretical and practical resources that can aid educators who seek to support students at a crucial time in their moral development.174

Notes 1. This chapter is adapted from Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks, “How Is Virtue Cultivated?: Seven Strategies for Postgraduate Character Development,” Journal of Character Education 17, no. 1 (2021): 81–​108, reprinted with kind permission of Information Age Publishing. For scholars who do address moral education within the university, see, e.g., Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, eds., Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010) and Anne Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” in Bringing in a New Era in Character Education, ed. William Damon (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2002), 149–​172. 2. See Jeffrey J. Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood: A Theory of Development from the Late Teens through the Twenties,” The American Psychologist 55, no. 5 (2000): 469–​480; Jeffrey J. Arnett, Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens Through the Twenties, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014); Jeffrey J. Arnett, “Presidential Address: The Emergence of Emerging Adulthood: A Personal History,” Emerging Adulthood 2, no. 3 (2014): 155–​162. See also Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 3. Arnett, “Presidential Address,” 158–​160, notes that in a 2012 Clark University Poll of Emerging Adults, 83 percent of respondents agreed with the claim, “This time of my life is full of changes.” Seventy-​two percent of respondents agreed that “this time of my life is stressful,” while 56 percent affirmed they “often feel anxious.” 4. See Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood” and “Presidential Address.” 5. Erik E. Noftle, “Character across Early Emerging Adulthood,” in Character: New Directions from Philosophy, Psychology, and Theology, ed. Christian B. Miller, R. Michael Furr, Angela Knobel, and William Fleeson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 490–​493; cf. Arnett, “Emerging Adulthood,” 472–​473; Daniel Lapsley and Sam Hardy, “Identity Formation and Moral Development in Emerging Adulthood,” in

140  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks Flourishing in Emerging Adulthood: Positive Development During the Third Decade of Life, ed. Laura M. Padilla-​Walker and Larry. J. Nelson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 14–​39. For a meta-​analysis of longitudinal studies of personality traits, including those often associated with character, suggesting that “young adulthood rather than adolescence is the primary period of mean-​level personality trait development,” see Brent W. Roberts, Kate E. Walton, and Wolfgang Viechtbauer, “Patterns of Mean-​level Change in Personality Traits across the Life Course: A Meta-​analysis of Longitudinal Studies,” Psychological Bulletin 132, no. 1 (2006): 21. 6. For a helpful discussion and defense of intentional moral education in the university, see Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” in Debating Moral Education, 3–​26, and Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Aim High: A Response to Stanley Fish,” in Debating Moral Education, 57–​75. More recently, David Carr, “Virtue and Character in Higher Education,” British Journal of Educational Studies 65, no. 1 (2017): 109–​124, has raised important concerns regarding the normative warrant for character development interventions aimed at adults in higher education. Carr endorses character education in preadult schooling and professional education, where character development is of clear public importance, but he worries that “its deliberate or explicit promotion may not be equally warranted in all educational contexts” (Carr, “Virtue and Character,” 118). In view of Carr’s concerns, we would underline that this chapter is not making a case for the universal justification of character education in higher education but presenting strategies of character development that may be legitimately employed in settings where the warrant exists. It is important to note that the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative discussed in this chapter is (1) a voluntary program for students who are informed in advance of its nature and aims, (2) explicit in sharing the strategies of character formation that it employs with participants, and (3) focused precisely on cases where there are the kind of personal, professional, and public implications of character development that Carr identifies as grounds for legitimacy. 7. The Oxford GLI is a seven-​month, extracurricular leadership and character development program for postgraduate students at the University of Oxford. The voluntary program is advertised as an opportunity to consider the nature of good leadership and develop character qualities needed to lead in a way that serves the public good. Students are selected to be part of a number of small, fifteen-​person “learning communities” through an open application process that seeks to draw together a diverse group in terms of academic discipline, gender, nationality, race, and religious and philosophical commitment. The forty students involved in the first three years of the program (2014–​2017) came from seventeen different countries, and 55 percent were women. In conjunction with their involvement, students voluntarily participate in a study that seeks to determine the effectiveness of the program in cultivating character for leadership. For details and results of the first iteration of this study, see Jonathan Brant, Michael Lamb, Emily Burdett, and Edward Brooks, “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates: An Empirical Study of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative,” Journal of Moral Education 49, no. 4 (2020): 415–​435; and Edward Brooks, Jonathan Brant, and Michael Lamb, “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character?

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  141 Insights from a Leadership and Character Development Program at the University of Oxford,” International Journal of Ethics Education 4 (2019): 167–​182. 8. Our account is Aristotelian without necessarily being Aristotle’s. This approach allows us to draw insights from Aristotle’s conceptual framework and the Aristotelian tradition while integrating insights from contemporary sources that Aristotle could not have imagined and rejecting Aristotle’s problematic views, for example, on women and slavery. On the strengths and shortcomings of Aristotelian accounts, see Kristján Kristjánsson, “There is Something About Aristotle: The Pros and Cons of Aristotelianism in Contemporary Moral Education,” Journal of Philosophy of Education 48, no. 1 (2014): 48–​68. For broadly Aristotelian approaches, see Kristján Kristjánsson, Aristotelian Character Education (London: Routledge, 2015); Wouter Sanderse, Character Education: A Neo-​ Aristotelian Approach to the Philosophy, Psychology and Education of Virtue (Delft: Eburon Academic, 2012); Julia Annas, Intelligent Virtue (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011); Linda T. Zagzebski, Virtues of the Mind: An Inquiry into the Nature of Virtue and the Ethical Foundations of Knowledge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Daniel C. Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue,” in Cultivating Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and Psychology, ed. Nancy E. Snow (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 17–​ 48; Dan P. McAdams, “Psychological Science and the Nicomachean Ethics: Virtuous Actors, Agents, and Authors,” in Cultivating Virtue, ed. Nancy E. Snow (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 307–​336; Brad K. Wilburn, “Moral Self-​Improvement,” in Moral Cultivation: Essays on the Development of Character and Virtue, ed. Brad K. Wilburn (New York: Lexington Books, 2007), 69–​84; and William J. Prior, “Moral Philosophy and Moral Cultivation,” in Wilburn, Moral Cultivation, 49–​67. 9. We draw insight from Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Terence Irwin, 2nd ed. (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1999); Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 4, 8–​15; and Zagzebski, Virtues of the Mind, 84–​137. 10. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1106b22–​23, 1109a20–​b7; cf. 1106a16–​1109a19. 11. Christian B. Miller has also suggested the possibility of “mixed traits” of character. See Christian B. Miller, Moral Character: An Empirical Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013) and Character and Moral Psychology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 3–​61. 12. See Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VII. 13. For detailed accounts of this process as it applies to moral education, see Myles F. Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. Amelie O. Rorty (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), 69–​92; Wilburn, “Moral Self-​Improvement,” 74–​76; and Sanderse, Character Education, 102–​117. 14. Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 4–​5, 16–​32, 38. 15. For the purpose of theoretical application and empirical assessment, we operationalize our four focal virtues as follows: a sense of vocation is “characteristic of those who believe themselves to have an orienting purpose that transcends mere personal success or flourishing. In secular contexts, vocation may be understood to be the result of a ‘call’ from a particular community. In religious contexts, vocation may

142  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks be understood to arise out of relationship with God or a divine being(s) who calls individuals to make use of their unique gifts”; a commitment to service is “characteristic of those who are appropriately other-​focused rather than merely self-​focused and intends a positive impact and contribution to the common good within their wider social and communal context”; humility is “characteristic of those who are not deceived by pride and see themselves as they truly are. This trait makes it possible to see the worth, merit, and value of others and of others’ opinions and beliefs. Humble people will consider others’ needs and be open to new developments and ideas and willing to revise their own positions”; and gratitude is “characteristic of those who are appropriately grateful or thankful and recognize that they are not responsible for all the good that they have enjoyed but that others—​ancestors, parents, teachers, or peers, for example—​have contributed to their life, success, and happiness.” For similar definitions and how they relate to relevant constructs in psychology, see Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates.” After an initial three-​year program focused on these four virtues and feedback from colleagues, the second iteration of the GLI (2017–​2020) altered the aforementioned definitions slightly and added honesty and practical wisdom as focal virtues. A third iteration of the GLI began in 2020, drawing on new research undertaken by the Oxford Character Project into culture, character, and leadership in commercial organizations. With regard to our Aristotelian approach, while Aristotle does not explicitly identify humility as a virtue, what he says about “truthfulness” as the virtue between vices of “boastfulness” and “self-​deprecation” has some similarities (see Nicomachean Ethics, 1127a14–​1127b35). For broadly Aristotelian accounts of humility and gratitude, see, respectively, Aquinas, Summa Theologica, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1947), II–​II.161 and II–​II.106, and Kristjánsson, “An Aristotelian Virtue of Gratitude,” Topoi 34, no. 2 (2015): 499–​511. While humility and gratitude are typically included among the virtues, a sense of vocation and a commitment to service often are not. Understood broadly, vocation and service might be conceived as part of the “telos” or “end” of virtue rather than virtues in themselves. However, a sense of vocation and a commitment to service refer to dispositions that can be guided by practical wisdom to achieve these ends in better or worse ways, which means that, when considered as virtuous dispositions, they, too, can align with a broadly Aristotelian account. On service in particular, see Michael Lamb, Emma Taylor-​Collins, and Cameron Silverglate, “Character Education for Social Action: A Conceptual Analysis of the #iwill Campaign,” Journal of Social Science Education 18, no. 1 (2019): 125–​152. 16. Peter Meindl, Abigail Quirk, and Jesse Graham, “Best Practices for School-​Based Moral Education,” Policy Insights from the Behavioral and Brain Sciences 5, no. 1 (2018): 7; Miller, Chapter 12 (this volume), 166–167. 17. Christopher Peterson and Martin E. P. Seligman, Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association and Oxford University Press, 2004) show cross-​cultural support for a variety of related virtues: on gratitude, see “Gratitude” (553–​568); on humility, see “Humility and Modesty” (461–​475); cf. on humility, William Damon and Anne Colby, The Power

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  143 of Ideals: The Real Story of Moral Choice (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 124–​154; on “service,” see “Kindness (Generosity, Nurturance, Care, Compassion, Altruistic Love, ‘Niceness’)” (Peterson and Seligman, Character Strengths and Virtues, 325–​335); and on vocation, see “Spirituality (Religiousness, Faith, Purpose)” (Peterson and Seligman, Character Strengths and Virtues, 599–​622), which includes an element of responding to callings or pursuing a purpose. We do not, however, see vocation as a purely religious concept. On our view, it can also include a secular sense of purpose or calling. 18. E.g., Dirk van Dierendonck and Kathleen Patterson, “Compassionate Love as a Cornerstone of Servant Leadership: An Integration of Previous Theorizing and Research,” Journal of Business Ethics 128 (2015): 119–​131; Steve Kempster, Brad Jackson, and Mervyn Conroy, “Leadership as Purpose: Exploring the Role of Purpose in Leadership Practice,” Leadership 7, no. 3 (2011): 317–​334. 19. van Dierendonck and Patterson, “Compassionate Love”; Kempster, Jackson, and Conroy, “Leadership as Purpose.” 20. Arnett, “Presidential Address,” 158. 21. Arnett, “Presidential Address,” 159. 22. Arnett, “Presidential Address,” 159. 23. Jean M. Twenge, Generation Me: Why Today’s Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled—​ And More Miserable Than Ever Before (New York: Free Press, 2006). 24. Jeffrey J. Arnett, “Oh, Grow Up! Generational Grumbling and the New Life Stage of Emerging Adulthood—​ Commentary on Trzesniewski & Donnellan (2010),” Perspectives on Psychological Science 5, no. 1 (2010): 89–​92. 25. Mary Keys, Aquinas, Aristotle, and the Promise of the Common Good (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), for example, has identified a correlation between gratitude and humility in the work of Thomas Aquinas. 26. Elliott Kruse et al., “An Upward Spiral Between Gratitude and Humility,” Social Psychological and Personality Science 5, no. 7 (2014): 805–​814. 27. See Daniel Lapsley and David S. Yeager, “Moral Character Education,” in Handbook of Psychology: Educational Psychology, ed. William M. Reynolds, Gloria E. Miller, and Irving B. Weiner (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley, 2012), 167–​170; Meindl, Quirk, and Graham, “Best Practices,” 5. While we affirm some indirect forms of character education, we resist forms that these authors describe as “stealthy,” which might imply that educators should intentionally deceive participants or hide efforts to shape their character. By contrast, the GLI explicitly communicates that it is focused on character so that everyone who applies and is selected consents to, and voluntarily participates in, efforts to develop their character. This transparency enables us to avoid some of the worries that Carr (“Virtue and Character”) presses against character education within universities. 28. Nancy E. Snow, “From ‘Ordinary’ Virtue to Aristotelian Virtue,” in The Theory and Practice of Virtue Education, ed. Tom Harrison and David I. Walker (London: Routledge, 2018), 67–​81. 29. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103a15–​18.

144  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks 30. Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 4, 38; cf. Sarah Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 72; Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good,” 69; Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue,” 17–​20. 31. On the limits of purely intellectual knowledge for character development, see Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103b27–​ 30, 1179b1–​ 1180b29; Prior, “Moral Philosophy and Moral Cultivation,” 49–​51; Wilburn, “Moral Self-​Improvement,” 71–​73. Kristján Kristjánsson, “Phronesis and Moral Education: Treading beyond the Truisms,” Theory and Research in Education 12, no. 2 (2014): 165–​167, however, observes that developing a vision of the good life in general can indirectly support the cultivation of virtue and practical wisdom. 32. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103a15–​1104b4, 1105a17–​1106a14; cf. Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good”; Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle, 72–​78, 103, 110. 33. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103a19–​1103b25, 1147a21–​22. For discussion, see Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle, 72–​74, 103–​104, 108–​110; Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good”; Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue”; Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 16–​32; Wilburn, “Moral Self-​Improvement,” 80–​81; Darcia Narvaez and Daniel K. Lapsley, “The Psychological Foundations of Everyday Morality and Moral Expertise,” in Character Psychology and Character Education, ed. Daniel K. Lapsley and F. Clark Power (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005), 150–​ 159; McAdams, “Psychological Science and the Nicomachean Ethics,” 311–​313. 34. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103a34–​1103b2. 35. For contemporary accounts of the “skill analogy,” see Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 8–​51, and Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue.” 36. Nancy E. Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence: An Empirically Grounded Theory (New York: Routledge, 2010), 39–​62; “How Habits Make Us Virtuous,” in Developing the Virtues: Integrating Perspectives, ed. Julia Annas, Darcia Narvaez, and Nancy E. Snow (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 135–​156. 37. Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence, 14, 39–​ 62; cf. Narvaez and Lapsley, “The Psychological Foundations of Everyday Morality”; Janet S. Walker, “Choosing Biases, Using Power and Practicing Resistance: Moral Development in a World without Certainty,” Human Development 43, no. 3 (2000): 135–​156; Anne Colby and William Damon, Some Do Care (New York: The Free Press, 1992), 307–​311; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals, 65–​71; H. Y. Weng et al., “Compassion Training Alters Altruism and Neural Responses to Suffering,” Psychological Science 24, no. 7 (2013): 1171–​1180. 38. Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 13–​15; Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle, 108–​109; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals, 65–​71; Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence, 43–​49. 39. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105a17–​b9, 1106a17–​1107a6. 40. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105a17–​b9, 1140b4–​25; see Zagzebski, Virtues of the Mind, 106–​116. 41. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105a17–​b9, 1106a15–​24, 1120a24–​28, 1140b4–​25. 42. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1106a23–​24; cf. 1105a27–​b6. 43. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105a34–​35. 44. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105b7–​9.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  145 45. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1105a26–​35; cf. Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue,” 20–​23. 46. Robert A. Emmons, Thanks! How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2007). 47. Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtues in Postgraduates.” 48. We are grateful to one of the reviewers for this suggestion, which aligns with our more recent practice in the Oxford Character Project and at Wake Forest University. See, for example, Michael Lamb, Elise M. Dykhuis, Sara E.Mendonça, and Eranda Jayawickreme, “Commencing Character: A Case Study of Character Development in College,” Journal of Moral Education (2021), doi: 10.1080/​03057240.2021.1953451. 49. Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, ed. Peter Conn and Amy Gutmann (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), 65–​74. 50. The GLI, for example, introduced participants to a contemporary analysis that challenges the myth of the “heroic” leaders: S. Alexander Haslam, Stephen D. Reicher, and Michael. J. Platow, The New Psychology of Leadership: Identity, Influence and Power (New York: Psychology Press, 2011), 197–​218. 51. The GLI assigned a chapter on leaders and followers from Nannerl O. Keohane, Thinking about Leadership (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010), 48–​82. 52. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1140a25–​ 1140b29, 1141a10–​ 1142a31, 1143b19–​ 1145a12. For insightful Aristotelian accounts of practical wisdom, see Daniel C. Russell, Practical Intelligence and the Virtues (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 1–​34; Rosalind Hursthouse, “Practical Wisdom: A Mundane Account,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 106, no. 1 (2006): 285–​309; Zagzebski, Virtues of the Mind, 211–​231; Kristjánsson, “Phronesis and Moral Education.” For an accessible account applied to various professions, see Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharpe, Practical Wisdom: The Right Way to Do the Right Thing (New York: Riverhead Books, 2010). 53. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1141b10–​24, 1142a12–​15, 1143b6–​14; cf. 1095a2–​ 9. See also Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume); Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 12, 16–​32; Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle, 72–​74; Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good”; Prior, “Moral Philosophy and Moral Cultivation,” 61–​65. In their influential study of moral exemplars, Colby and Damon note that “[o]‌ne of the characteristics of highly moral people is their ability to learn from their experience all throughout life” (Some Do Care, 8). 54. Monika Ardelt, “Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept,” Human Development 47 (2004): 257–​285; Judith Glück and Susan Bluck, “The MORE Life Experience Model: A Theory of the Development of Personal Wisdom,” in The Scientific Study of Personal Wisdom: From Contemplative Traditions to Neuroscience, ed. Michel Ferrari and Nic M. Weststrate (New York: Springer, 2013), 75–​97; Jeffrey D. Webster, “Measuring the Character Strength of Wisdom,” The International Journal of Aging and Human Development 65, no. 2 (2007): 163–​183. For dissimilarities between psychological models and Aristotelian practical wisdom, see Kristjánsson, “Phronesis and Moral Education,” 158–​160.

146  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks 55. Donald A. Schön, Educating the Reflective Practitioner: Toward a New Design for Teaching and Learning in the Professions (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-​Bass, 1987). 56. Philip Hart and Nick Cooper, “Reflective Practice Undertaken by Healthcare and Medical Trainees and Practitioners: So What’s All the Fuss About?,” Critical and Reflective Practice in Education 4 (2015): 11–​17; Elizabeth A. Kinsella and Allan Pitman, eds., Phronesis as Professional Knowledge: Practical Wisdom in the Professions (Boston: Sense Publishers, 2012); Schwartz and Sharpe, Practical Wisdom. 57. Deborah J. Cantrell, “Teaching Practical Wisdom,” South Carolina Law Review 55 (2003): 391–​409; Deborah J. Cantrell and Kenneth Sharpe, “Practicing Practical Wisdom,” Mercer Law Review 67 (2016): 331–​381. 58. Ronald M. Epstein, “Reflection, Perception and the Acquisition of Wisdom,” Medical Education 42, no. 11 (2008): 1048–​1050; Hart and Cooper, “Reflective Practice”; Hedy S. Wald and Shmuel P. Reis, “Beyond the Margins: Reflective Writing and Development of Reflective Capacity in Medical Education,” Journal of General Internal Medicine 25, no. 7 (2010): 746–​749. 59. Sandra Cooke and David Carr, “Virtue, Practical Wisdom and Character in Teaching,” British Journal of Educational Studies 62, no. 2 (2014): 91–​110; Mieke Lunenberg and Fred Korthagen, “Experience, Theory, and Practical Wisdom in Teaching and Teacher Education,” Teachers and Teaching 15, no. 2 (2009): 225–​240; Lee S. Shulman, “Practical Wisdom in the Service of Professional Practice,” Educational Researcher 36, no. 9 (2007): 560–​563. 60. Anne Colby, Elizabeth Beaumont, Thomas Ehrlich, and Josh Corngold, Educating for Democracy: Preparing Undergraduates for Responsible Political Engagement (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-​Bass, 2007), 252–​254. 61. Cf. Cantrell and Sharpe, “Practicing Practical Wisdom,” 358. 62. See also Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 250–​275. 63. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1095b4, 1095a2–​4; cf. Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 1–​7; Burnyeat, “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good,” 70–​73. 64. Malcolm S. Knowles, Elwood F. Holton III, and Richard A. Swanson, The Adult Learner: The Definitive Classic in Adult Education and Human Resource Development, 8th ed. (New York: Routledge, 2015), 44–​45, 223–​228; cf. Cantrell and Sharpe, “Practicing Practical Wisdom,” 345. 65. Lawrence J. Walker et al., “Reasoning about Morality and Real-​Life Moral Problems,” in Morality in Everyday Life: Developmental Perspectives, ed. Melanie Killen and Daniel Hart (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 375–​378, 403–​404. 66. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103b27–​30; cf. 1179b1–​1180a6. 67. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1107a1–​3, 1140a25–​1141b23. 68. Linda T. Zagzebski, Exemplarist Moral Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 69. Sara B. Algoe and Jonathan Haidt, “Witnessing Excellence in Action: The ‘Other-​ praising’ Emotions of Elevation, Gratitude, and Admiration,” Journal of Positive Psychology 4, no. 2 (2009): 105–​127; Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 22–​23, 31; Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 206–​208; Keith S. Cox, “Elevation Predicts Domain-​Specific Volunteerism 3 Months Later,” Journal of Positive Psychology 5, no.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  147 5 (2010): 333–​341; Mary Helen H. Immordino-​Yang and Lesley Sylvan, “Admiration for Virtue: Neuroscientific Perspectives on a Motivating Emotion,” Contemporary Educational Psychology 35, no. 2 (2010): 110–​115; Christian B. Miller, The Character Gap: How Good Are We? (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 200–​201; Michelangelo Vianello, Elisa Maria M. Galliani, and Jonathan Haidt, “Elevation at Work: The Effects of Leaders’ Moral Excellence,” The Journal of Positive Psychology 5, no. 5 (2010): 390–​411; Zagzebski, Exemplarist Moral Theory, 30–​59, 129–​155. 70. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 230–​231; cf. The Character Gap, 199–​200; Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 183. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 230–​ 231, cites Epictetus: “When you are about to meet someone, especially someone who seems to be distinguished, put to yourself the question: ‘What would Socrates or Zeno have done in these circumstances?’ and you will not be at a loss as to how to deal with the occasion.” See Epictetus, The Handbook (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1983), 33, 12–​13. 71. Character and Moral Psychology, 230; Miller, The Character Gap, 196. 72. Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 22–​23; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals, xvi–​xvii, 29–​30; Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 199–​200. 73. Miller, The Character Gap, 201. 74. Bart Engelen, Alan Thomas, Alfred Archer, and Niels van de Ven, “Exemplars and Nudges: Combining Two Strategies for Moral Education,” Journal of Moral Education (2018): 3. 75. Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 16–​24; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 230–​231; The Character Gap, 195–​204. 76. See Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 12, 21–​23, 176; Philip J. Ivanhoe, “Literature and Ethics in the Chinese Confucian Tradition,” in Wilburn, Moral Cultivation, 29–​49; McAdams, “Psychological Science and the Nicomachean Ethics,” 325–​327; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 229–​232; The Character Gap, 195–​201; Zagzebski, Exemplarist Moral Theory, 60–​98. 77. Immordino-​Yang and Sylvan, “Admiration for Virtue,” 110, cf. 112; cf. Jonathan Haidt and Patrick Seder, “Admiration/​Awe,” in The Oxford Companion to Emotion and the Affective Sciences, ed. David Sander and Klaus R. Scherer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 4–​5. 78. Algoe and Haidt, “Witnessing Excellence in Action,” 123. 79. For a summary, see Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 231–​232, who cites Stephen Holloway, Lyle Tucker, and Harvey A. Hornstein, “The Effects of Social and Nonsocial Information on Interpersonal Behavior of Males: The News Makes News,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 35, no. 7 (1977): 514–​522; John P. Wilson and Richard Petruska, “Motivation, Model Attributes, and Prosocial Behavior,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 46, no. 2 (1984): 458–​468; J. Philippe Rushton and Anne C. Campbell, “Modeling, Vicarious Reinforcement and Extraversion on Blood Donating in Adults: Immediate and Long-​Term Effects,” European Journal of Social Psychology 7, no. 3 (1977): 297–​306; Cashton B. Spivey and Steven Prentice-​ Dunn, “Assessing the Directionality of Deindividuated Behavior: Effects of Deindividuation, Modeling, and Private Self-​Consciousness on Aggressive and Prosocial Responses,” Basic and Applied Social Psychology 11,

148  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks no. 4 (1990): 387–​403. See also Miller, The Character Gap, 202, and Engelen et al., “Exemplars and Nudges,” 4. Others who highlight the importance of exemplars, role models, and teachers include Colby and Damon, Some Do Care; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals; Linda T. Zagzebski, “Moral Exemplars in Theory and Practice,” Theory and Research in Education 11, no. 2 (2013): 193–​206; “Exemplarism and Admiration,” in Character, ed. Miller et al., 251–​266; Exemplarist Moral Theory; Kristján Kristjánsson, “Emulation and the Use of Role Models in Moral Education,” Journal of Moral Education 35, no. 1 (2006): 37–​49; Wouter Sanderse, “The Meaning of Role Modelling in Moral and Character Education,” Journal of Moral Education 42, no. 1 (2013): 28–​42; Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 16–​24; Russell, “Aristotle on Cultivating Virtue,” 32–​36; Vianello, Galliani, and Haidt, “Elevation at Work”; Wilburn, “Moral Self-​improvement,” 72; Narvaez and Lapsley, “The Psychological Foundations of Everyday Morality,” 150–​159; Lawrence J. Walker, “Moral Exemplarity,” in Bringing in New Era in Character Education, ed. Damon, 65–​84. 80. Hyemin Han, Jeongmin Kim, Changwoo Jeong, and Geoffrey L. Cohen, “Attainable and Relevant Moral Exemplars Are More Effective than Extraordinary Exemplars in Promoting Voluntary Service Engagement,” Frontiers in Psychology 8, no. 283 (2017): 1–​14; cf. Penelope Lockwood and Ziva Kunda, “Superstars and Me: Predicting the Impact of Role Models on the Self,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 73, no. 1 (1997): 91–​103; Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 205–​206; Pieter H. Vos, “Learning from Exemplars: Emulation, Character Formation and the Complexities of Ordinary Life,” Journal of Beliefs & Values 39, no. 1 (2018): 17–​28. 81. Algoe and Haidt, “Witnessing Excellence in Action”; Kristján Kristjánsson, “Emotions Targeting Moral Exemplarity: Making Sense of the Logical Geography of Admiration, Emulation and Elevation,” Theory and Research in Education 15, no. 1 (2017): 20–​37; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 229–​232; Vianello, Galliani, and Haidt, “Elevation at Work”; Zagzebski, “Exemplarism and Admiration.” 82. Han et al., “Attainable and Relevant Moral Exemplars,” 11; cf. Zagzebski, Exemplarist Moral Theory, 68. 83. Rainer Maria Rilke, “Letter 1,” in Letters to a Young Poet, trans. Stephen Mitchell (New York: Modern Library, 2001), 3–​12. 84. Annie Dillard, “Living Like Weasels,” in The Annie Dillard Reader (New York: HarperCollins, 1994), 121–​126. 85. Naomi Shihab Nye, “Famous,” in Words Under the Words: Selected Poems (Portland, OR: The Eighth Mountain Press, 1994), 80. 86. Martin Luther King, Jr., “The Drum Major Instinct,” in A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr., ed. James M. Washington (New York: HarperCollins, 1986), 266–​267. 87. Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Ozymandias,” in Shelley’s Poetry and Prose, ed. Donald H. Reiman and Sharon B. Powers (New York: W. W. Norton, 1977), 103. 88. Nelson Mandela to Winnie Mandela in Kroonstad Prison, February 1, 1975, in Conversations with Myself (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2010), 212–​213. 89. Albert Einstein, “The World As I See It,” in The World As I See It (New York: Philosophical Library, 2010), 2–​6.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  149 90. David Carr, “On the Contribution of Literature and the Arts to the Educational Cultivation of Moral Virtue, Feeling and Emotion,” Journal of Moral Education 34, no. 2 (2005): 137–​151; David Carr, “Moral Education at the Movies: On the Cinematic Treatment of Morally Significant Story and Narrative,” Journal of Moral Education 35, no. 3 (2006): 319–​333; David Carr, “The Significance of Music for the Promotion of Moral and Spiritual Value,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 14, no. 2 (2006): 103–​117; Sanderse, Character Education, 137–​149. 91. In the Politics, Aristotle holds that “music has the power to produce a certain quality in the character of our souls,” in part, because its “rhythms and melodies contain the greatest likenesses of the true nature of anger, gentleness, courage, temperance, and their opposites, and of all of the other components of character as well” so that “when we listen to such representations our souls are changed” in ways that mirror these likenesses. See Aristotle, Politics, trans. C. D. C. Reeve (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1998), 1339b43–​1340b19. If this is the case, incorporating experiences of listening to music—​such as attending concerts or listening to particular songs—​and then reflecting on the effects of those musical experiences may aid character formation. We are grateful to a reviewer for this suggestion. 92. Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 198–​221. 93. On considering the “fullness” of exemplars’ lives, including their “weaknesses and struggles,” see Walker, “Moral Exemplarity,” 82. See also Nafsika Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” in From Personality to Virtue: Essays on the Philosophy of Character, ed. Alberto Masala and Jonathan Webber (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 224–​225, and Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 199–​ 206, 218. 94. Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 8, 17–​18, 321–​324. 95. See Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 213. 96. On the benefits and strategies of effectively utilizing speakers and mentors, see Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 209–​221. The GLI’s strategy aligns with many of these recommendations. 97. Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 218. 98. Colby et al., Educating for Democracy, 220–​221. 99. On modeling, including modeling vulnerability in response to failure, see Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 224–​225. 100. Cox, “Elevation Predicts Domain-​Specific Volunteerism”; Han et al., “Attainable and Relevant Moral Exemplars.” 101. Walker et al., “Reasoning about Morality,” 400. 102. Kristján Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw That Dialogue Is a Socratic But Not an Aristotelian Method of Moral Education,” Educational Theory 64, no. 4 (2014): 333–​348. 103. Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 223, argues that “[p]‌ractical skills involved in successful moral discussions such as being able to express one’s views, being able to understand other viewpoints, accurately pinpointing similarities and differences, being intellectually tenacious without being personally offensive, and so on, contribute both to one’s understanding of morality and to one’s character.”

150  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks See also Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 339–​347, and Nel Noddings, “Conversation as Moral Education,” Journal of Moral Education 23, no. 2 (1994): 107–​118. On some limits of dialogue in a cross-​cultural context, see Nicholas C. Burbules, “Dialogue,” in Encyclopedia of Educational Theory and Philosophy, ed. Denis C. Phillips (Washington, DC: Sage, 2014), 228–​231. 104. Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 223–​ 224; Marvin W. Berkowitz and Melinda Bier, “Research-​ Based Character Education,” The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 591, no. 1 (2004): 81; Ann Higgins, “Research and Measurement Issues in Moral Educational Interventions,” in Moral Education: A First Generation of Research, ed. Ralph Mosher (New York: Praeger, 1980), 197–​215; Andre Schlaefli, James R. Rest, and Stephen J. Thoma, “Does Moral Education Improve Moral Judgment? A Meta-​Analysis of Intervention Studies Using the Defining Issues Test,” Review of Educational Research 55, no. 3 (1985): 319–​352; Jaap Schuitema, Geert ten Dam, and Wiel Veugelers, “Teaching Strategies for Moral Education: A Review,” Journal of Curriculum Studies 40, no. 1 (2008): 69–​89, 75–​78; John Snarey and Peter L. Samuelson, “Lawrence Kohlberg’s Revolutionary Ideas: Moral Education in the Cognitive-​Developmental Tradition,” in Handbook of Moral and Character Education, ed. Larry Nucci, Darcia Narvaez, and Tobias Krettenauer, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2014), 75–​77. 105. Robert DeHaan et al., “Promoting Ethical Reasonings, Affect, and Behaviour Among High School Students: An Evaluation of Three Teaching Strategies,” Journal of Moral Education 26, no. 1 (1997): 5–​20, at 6–​7; Higgins, “Research and Measurement Issues”; Schlaefli, Rest, and Thoma, “Does Moral Education Improve Moral Judgment?”; Snarey and Samuelson, “Lawrence Kohlberg’s Revolutionary Ideas,” 75–​77. 106. For an influential philosophical critique of placing dilemmas at the center of ethics, see Edmund Pincoffs, “Quandary Ethics,” Mind 80, no. 320 (1971): 552–​571. On the limits of Kohlbergian accounts within the context of moral development, see, e.g., Walker et al., “Reasoning about Morality,” 371–​378; Lawrence J. Walker and Jeremy A. Frimer, “Moral Personality of Brave and Caring Exemplars,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 93, no. 5 (2007): 845–​860; Walker, “Moral Exemplarity,” 65–​ 73; Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 6–​7; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals, xiv–​xv; Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982); Nel Noddings, Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 95–​97. 107. James Arthur, Kristján Kristjánsson, Tom Harrison, Wouter Sanderse, and Daniel Wright, Teaching Character and Virtues in Schools (New York: Routledge, 2017), 94. 108. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1127a16–​17. 109. See Blaire Morgan, Liz Gulliford, and David Carr, “Educating Gratitude: Some Conceptual and Moral Misgivings,” Journal of Moral Education 44, no. 1 (2015): 108. 110. Morgan et al., “Educating Gratitude,” 108. 111. Anna O. Soter et al., “What the Discourse Tells Us: Talk and Indicators of High-​level Comprehension,” International Journal of Educational Research 47, no. 6 (2008): 373, cited in Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 348.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  151 112. Morgan et al., “Educating Gratitude.” 113. Mary Oliver, “The Summer Day,” in New and Selected Poems (Boston: Beacon Press, 1992), 94; Rumi, “The Guest House,” in The Essential Rumi, trans. Coleman Barks et al. (New York: HarperCollins, 2004), 109; Barbara Ehrenreich, “The Selfish Side of Gratitude,” The New York Times, December 31, 2015, https://​www.nytimes.com/​ 2016/​01/​03/​opinion/​sunday/​the-​selfish-​side-​of-​gratitude.html 114. Katy J. Harriger and Jill J. McMillan, Speaking of Politics: Preparing College Students for Democratic Citizenship through Deliberative Dialogue (Dayton, OH: Kettering Foundation Press, 2007). 115. Harold H. Saunders, A Public Peace Process: Sustained Dialogue to Transform Racial and Ethnic Conflicts (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001); Sustained Dialogue Institute, https://​sustaineddialogue.org/​ 116. Marvin W. Berkowitz and John C. Gibbs, “Measuring the Developmental Features of Moral Discussion,” Merrill-​Palmer Quarterly 29, no. 4 (1993): 399–​410. 117. John M. Doris, Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002); Gilbert Harman, “Moral Philosophy Meets Social Psychology: Virtue Ethics and the Fundamental Attribution Error,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 99, no. 1 (1999): 315–​332; Gilbert Harman, “The Nonexistence of Character Traits,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 100, no. 1 (2000): 223–​226. 118. For a brief overview of situationism and its critics, see Marcia Homiak, “Moral Character,” in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta (2015), http://​plato.stanf​ord.edu/​archi​ves/​spr2​015/​entr​ies/​moral-​charac​ter/​. For various responses to situationism, see, e.g., Maria Merritt, “Virtue Ethics and Situationist Personality Psychology,” Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 3, no. 4 (2000): 365–​383; Gopal Sreenivasan, “Errors about Errors: Virtue Theory and Trait Attribution,” Mind 111, no. 441 (2002): 47–​68; Rachana Kamtekar, “Situationism and Virtue Ethics on the Content of Our Character,” Ethics 114, no. 3 (2004): 458–​491; John Sabini and Maury Silver, “Lack of Character? Situationism Critiqued,” Ethics 115, no. 3 (2005): 535–​562; Robert M. Adams, A Theory of Virtue: Excellence in Being for the Good (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 115–​170; Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence; Russell, Practical Intelligence and the Virtues, 237–​331; Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 172–​176; Steven M. Samuels and William D. Casebeer, “A Social Psychological View of Morality: Why Knowledge of Situational Influences on Behaviour Can Improve Character Development Practices,” Journal of Moral Education 34, no. 1 (2005): 73–​87; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 187–​223. 119. Adams, A Theory of Virtue, 115–​ 170; Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 172–​176; Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education”; Jennifer Herdt, “Frailty, Fragmentation, and Social Dependency in the Cultivation of Christian Virtue,” in Cultivating Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and Psychology, ed. Nancy E. Snow (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 239–​242; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 187–​239; Samuels and Casebeer, “A Social Psychological View of Morality”; Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence, 1–​10, 63–​118. 120. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 233.

152  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks 121. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 233; see also Snow, Virtue as Social Intelligence, 31–​38; Jonathan Webber, “Instilling Virtue,” in Masala and Webber, From Personality to Virtue, 134–​153. 122. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1109b2–​8; cf. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 233–​234; Prior, “Moral Philosophy and Moral Cultivation,” 57. 123. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 233–​236; The Character Gap, 209–​214. See also Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 219–​220; Doris, Lack of Character, 146–​149; Ruth W. Grant, “Is Humanistic Education Humanizing?,” in Debating Moral Education, ed. Kiss and Euben, 288–​292; Samuels and Casebeer “A Social Psychological View of Morality,” 80–​82; Walker, “Choosing Biases”; and Wilburn, “Moral Self-​Improvement,” 72. 124. Arthur L. Beaman et al., “Increasing Helping Rates Through Information Dissemination: Teaching Pays,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 4, no. 3 (1978): 406–​411, also cited by Miller, The Character Gap, 211. 125. Beaman et al., “Increasing Helping Rates Through Information,” also cited by Miller, The Character Gap, 211. 126. See Samuels and Casebeer, “A Social Psychological View of Morality,” 80. 127. Miller, The Character Gap, 204; cf. Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 214–​219; Doris, Lack of Character, 146–​148; Webber, “Instilling Virtue,” 146–​147. As Damon and Colby observe (The Power of Ideals, 35–​36), Jane Addams endorses a similar strategy: “We are under a moral obligation in choosing our experiences, since the result of those experiences must ultimately determine our understanding of life. We determine our ideals by our daily actions and decisions.” See Jane Addams, Democracy and Social Ethics (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1964), 256. 128. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1109a25–​35. 129. Paul Piff, “Does Money Make You Mean?”, TEDx, 2013, https://​www.ted.com/​talks/​ paul_​pi​ff_​d​oes_​mone​y_​ma​ke_​y​ou_​m​ean?langu​age=​en#t-​43276. 130. Michael Lewis, “Occupational Hazards of Working on Wall Street,” Bloomberg, September 24, 2014, https://​www.bloomberg.com/​view/​articles/​2014-​09-​24/​ occupational-​hazards-​of-​working-​on-​wall-​street 131. Michael Inzlicht and Sukhvinder Obhi, “Powerful and Coldhearted,” The New York Times, July 25, 2014, https://​www.nytimes.com/​2014/​07/​27/​opinion/​ sunday/​powerful-​and-​coldhearted.html 132. Schwartz and Sharpe, Practical Wisdom, 197–​228. As optional reading, the GLI assigned a further chapter from Schwarz and Sharpe (Practical Wisdom, 233–​273), which identifies exemplars who effectively challenged their institutional cultures through many of the strategies used by the GLI, including intentional practice, reflection on personal experience, mentoring, and modeling. 133. Naomi Shihab Nye, “The Art of Disappearing,” in Words Under the Words: Selected Poems (Portland, OR: The Eighth Mountain Press, 1994), 29. 134. William Deresiewicz, “Solitude and Leadership,” American Scholar, March 1, 2010. 135. Mandela, Conversations with Myself, 212–​213. 136. Portia Nelson, “Autobiography in Five Short Chapters,” in Soul Food: Nourishing Poems for Starved Minds, ed. Neil Astley and Pamela Robertson-​ Pearce (Northumberland, UK: Bloodaxe Books, 2007), 43.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  153 137. Kurt Vonnegut to Xavier High School, in More Letters of Note: Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience, ed. Shaun Usher (London: Unbound, 2015), 274–​275. 138. Franklin, Autobiography, 65–​74. 139. Mary C. Gentile, Giving Voice to Values: How to Speak Your Mind When You Know What Is Right (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010), 169, xiii. 140. Athanassoulis, “The Psychology of Virtue Education,” 222–​223; Nina Mazar, On Amir, and Dan Ariely, “The Dishonesty of Honest People,” Journal of Marketing Research 45, no. 6 (2008): 633–​644; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 232–​ 233; Miller, The Character Gap, 134; Lisa L. Shu, Francesca Gino, and Max H. Bazerman, “Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience: When Cheating Leads to Moral Disengagement and Motivated Forgetting,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 37, no. 3 (2011): 330–​349. 141. Miller, The Character Gap, 134. 142. Mazar et al., “The Dishonesty of Honest People”; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 70–​72; Shu et al., “Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience.” 143. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 62–​82, 232–​233; The Character Gap, 125–​141. 144. Edward Diener and Mark Wallbom, “Effects of Self-​awareness on Antinormative Behavior,” Journal of Research in Personality 10, no. 1 (1976): 107–​111. In the “self-​ aware condition,” only 7 percent cheated, compared to 71 percent in the “non-​self-​ aware condition” (110). 145. Mazar et al., “The Dishonesty of Honest People”; Shu et al., “Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience.” 146. Mazar et al., “The Dishonesty of Honest People,” 637, 643; Miller, Character and Moral Psychology, 66–​70, 233; The Character Gap, 131–​136; Shu et al., “Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience,” 345. 147. See Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1169b17–​23, 1170a12, 1171b32–​1172a13; Annas, Intelligent Virtue, 21–​22, 52–​65; Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 9–​15, 167–​199; Damon and Colby, The Power of Ideals, 59–​65; James Davison Hunter, The Death of Character: Moral Education in an Age Without Good or Evil (New York: Basic Books, 2000), 15–​27. 148. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1169b3–​23, 1155a5–​32. 149. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1170a12. For helpful analysis of Aristotle’s account of friendship, see John M. Cooper, “Aristotle on the Forms of Friendship,” The Review of Metaphysics 30, no. 4 (1977): 619–​648; Elijah Millgram, “Aristotle on Making Other Selves,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 17, no. 2 (1987): 361–​376; Nancy Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship and the Shared Life,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 47, no. 4 (1987): 589–​613; Talbot Brewer, “Virtues We Can Share: Friendship and Aristotelian Ethical Theory,” Ethics 115, no. 4 (2005): 721–​ 758; Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 342–​346. 150. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1155a13–​14; Brewer, “Virtues We Can Share,” 735–​ 737, 740; Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 344–​345. 151. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1170b6–​19; cf. Brewer, “Virtues We Can Share,” 735–​ 736; Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 343–​347; Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 597–​599, 611–​612.

154  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks 152. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1169b34–​36; cf. Brewer, “Virtues We Can Share,” 736; Kristjánsson, “On the Old Saw,” 344; Millgram, “Aristotle on Making Other Selves,” 369; Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 609–​612; Wilburn, “Moral Self-​ Improvement,” 80–​81. 153. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1155a6–​10; cf. Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 609–​610. 154. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1171a22–​ 27; cf. Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 601–​602. By situating such acts within the context of friendship, this approach avoids the dangers of “do-​gooding” service that is overly simplistic or patronizing in relation to strangers. The GLI helped participants reflect on these dangers by assigning a reading that addresses the problematic “allure of ‘exotic problems’ ” and the attitudes that such an approach can foster. See Courtney E. Martin, “Western Do-​Gooders Need to Resist the Allure of ‘Exotic Problems,’” The Guardian, April 23, 2016, https://​www.theg​uard​ian.com/​glo​bal-​deve​lopm​ ent-​profes​s ion​a ls-​netw​ork/​2 016/​apr/​2 3/​west​e rn-​d o-​good​e rs-​need-​to-​res​ist-​ the-​all​ure-​of-​exo​tic-​probl​ems. 155. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1169b34–​ 1170a4, 1171b12–​ 13; cf. Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 609–​610. 156. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1171a22–​ 1171b4; cf. Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 599–​600. 157. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1172a11–​14; cf. 1155a13–​16. Kant affirms that “it is, of course, a duty for one of the friends to point out the other’s faults to him” since “this is in the other’s best interests and is therefore a duty of love.” See Immanuel Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 262. 158. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1172a13-​14; cf. Sherman, “Aristotle on Friendship,” 605, 610. 159. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1172a9–​14; cf. 1172a4–​8. 160. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1156a6–​1157b14, 1158a3–​10. 161. For overviews, see Miller, Moral Character, 142–​149; Character and Moral Psychology, 231–​232; The Character Gap, 202–​204. 162. Miller, Moral Character, 142–​149. 163. Carolyn Parkinson, Adam M. Kleinbaum, and Thalia Wheatley, “Similar Neural Responses Predict Friendship,” Nature Communications 9, no. 332 (2018): 1–​14. 164. Walker, “Reasoning about Morality,” 384–​386, 392–​393, 403–​404. 165. Colby and Damon, Some Do Care, 14–​15, 167–​199, 293–​295. 166. Nancy G. Boyd and Robert R. Taylor, “A Developmental Approach to the Examination of Friendship in Leader-​ Follower Relationships,” The Leadership Quarterly 9, no. 1 (1998): 1–​25; Ana M. Romero-​Iribas and Consuelo Martínez-​ Priego, “Developing Leadership through Education for Friendship,” Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences 15 (2011): 2248–​2252; Frank Shushock, Jr., “Learning Friendship: The Indispensable Basis of a Good Society,” About Campus 13, no. 3 (2008): 19–​26.

Strategies for Cultivating Virtue in University  155 167. Gerri Perrault, “Rethinking Leadership: Leadership as Friendship,” Advancing Women in Leadership 18 (2005). 168. Augustine, Confessions, trans. Henry Chadwick (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 60–​61. 169. Oriah Mountain Dreamer, “The Invitation,” in The Invitation (San Francisco, CA: HarperCollins, 1999), 1–​2. 170. Clementine Churchill to Winston Churchill, June 27, 1940, in Letters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience, ed. Shaun Usher (San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books, 2013), 103. 171. Franklin, Autobiography, 73. 172. We investigated the impact of the GLI’s first three years with a mixed-​method, longitudinal, controlled research design. Qualitative data suggest that participants increased in their understanding, valuation, and self-​perception of all four focal virtues (see Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates”) and that the GLI program effectively addressed prominent trends in emerging adulthood (see Brooks et al., “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character?”). Quantitative psychometric data indicated significant differences for two virtues (service and gratitude) but not for vocation or humility. However, the qualitative data also revealed that participants had some confusion about questions in the scales used to address vocation and humility (Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates”). 173. See, for example, Lamb et al., “Commencing Character.” 174. We are grateful to the Templeton World Charity Foundation for their generous support of the Oxford Character Project from 2014–​2020 through grant TWCF0061, and to the advisors, staff, and participants who have made this research so enjoyable. We are grateful to Marvin Berkowitz, Jonathan Tirrell, and the editors of the Journal of Character Education for publication of the original article from which this chapter is adapted. For helpful conversation and feedback on ideas in this paper, we owe a special thanks to anonymous reviewers, as well as James Arthur, Marvin Berkowitz, Nigel Biggar, Laura Blackie, Andrew Briggs, Dylan Brown, Emily Burdett, David Carr, Will Fleeson, Lachlan Forrow, Mike Furr, Liz Gulliford, Donald Hay, Ashley Hawkins, Rob Heimburger, Eranda Jayawickreme, Mark Jonas, Kristján Kristjánsson, Hannah Lafferrandre, Ard Louis, Sara Mendonça, Christian Miller, Blaire Morgan, William Morgan, Tim Pawl, Ann Phelps, Mike Prentice, Kate Seagrave, Kenneth Sharpe, Cameron Silverglate, Kathleen Stimely, Kenneth Townsend, Luna Wang, Bethan Willis, Brian Williams, Sarah Williams, Alan Wilson, and audiences at the Cultivating Virtues Conference hosted by the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at Oriel College, Oxford (2016), a seminar at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham (2016), a works-​in-​progress seminar and summer seminar of The Beacon Project at Wake Forest University (2017 and 2018), and the Cultivating Virtue in the University conference at the University of Oxford (2017). For helpful suggestions of readings and feedback that informed our practical program, we would like to thank JanaLee Cherneski, Charles Conn, Ian Desai, and other contributors to the Rhodes Trust’s

156  Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks Character, Service, and Leadership Programme. We also appreciate support from the Oxford Pastorate; McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Life; John Templeton Foundation; Lilly Endowment, Inc.; and Wake Forest University. The opinions expressed in this chapter are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Templeton World Charity Foundation, Inc., John Templeton Foundation, Lilly Endowment, Inc., or other supporting organizations.

8 Closing the Character Gap Some Ideas from Philosophy and Psychology Christian B. Miller

I approach the topic of cultivating virtue in the university as a philosopher. In doing so, I am entering uncharted waters. Despite the virtue revolution in the 1980s, which reestablished virtue ethics as a leading contender in philosophical ethics, philosophers have only just recently turned their attention in a sustained manner to questions of how to cultivate virtue.1 When it comes to the university context in particular, there is almost nothing in the literature. In this chapter, I aim to do some preliminary work to address this omission while also hoping to spark interest in others to carry the discussion further. Rather than the normal discursive philosophy paper, however, I will structure what follows around an imaginary conversation between myself and a fictional university president, invoking the spirit of the ancient dialogues that Greek and Roman philosophers used to cultivate virtues in their students. This chapter was initially delivered as a paper at a conference at the University of Oxford. Suppose that upon my return to North Carolina, a friend of mine who is the president of a local university (let’s call him “President Smith”) invites me to his campus to learn more about the conference and the general issue of cultivating virtue in the university.2 He proceeds to ask me a few background questions before we get to the heart of the matter. Finally, we end up turning to a specific example of the virtue of honesty in order to make things more concrete and consider some preliminary ways in which honesty might be fostered in university students. What follows is the written transcript of our conversation.

​

​

158  Christian B. Miller

Some Preliminary Questions President Smith: Welcome back from Oxford. How did it go? Miller: It was great. The conference was extremely well organized, and I learned a lot from the other speakers. My presentation seemed to be well received, which was a relief. President Smith: That’s great to hear. I am very interested in the topic of cultivating virtue in the university and would love to learn more about it. Would it be okay if I ask you some questions that have been on my mind for a while? Miller: I’d love that. Fire away. President Smith: It seems to me that the place to start when thinking about this topic is to first clarify what a virtue is. I’m guessing that, as a philosopher, you agree we should always start by getting clearer on what we are talking about, right? Miller: I couldn’t agree more! Here is how I think of a virtue. Virtues are positive character traits. They enter into all areas of life—​there are virtues associated with morality (honesty, compassion), virtues associated with our self-​interest (prudence, cleverness), virtues associated with knowledge and truth (understanding, wisdom), virtues associated with sports (discipline, competitiveness), and so forth. To keep things simpler for our time together, let’s just focus on the moral virtues. I think of moral virtues as dispositions which, among other things, give rise to certain patterns of behavior. Which patterns? Well, for one thing a virtue is cross-​situationally consistent. Take compassion, for instance. If Jane has the virtue of compassion, then she will try to help others in a variety of different circumstances when someone is in need, although she needn’t help in every such situation (she would be utterly exhausted if she did). This could range from rescuing a person who is drowning, to carrying a heavy box for a neighbor, to writing a check for a famine relief organization. In addition, virtues are stable over time. This means that our compassionate person won’t be compassionate one time and never again. Rather, she will be reliably

Closing the Character Gap  159 helpful over time. The next time the neighbor needs help carrying something, she will volunteer again (other things being equal, of course). Needless to say, the behavior which results from a virtue has to be morally excellent. After all, the vices also give rise to patterns of behavior which are cross-​situationally consistent and stable. Behavior that arises from a virtue is appropriately responsive to the correct moral considerations which obtain in a given situation. But moral virtue has to do with more than just behavior. Motivation matters, too. Suppose the neighbor asks Jane why she is taking the time to help him carry the box. If Jane says, “Because I am bored,” or “Because it improves my image in the community,” then that hardly counts as acting from the virtue of compassion. Reasons like “Because I thought you might need some help” or “Because that’s what neighbors are for” are much more in line with virtue. These features of a virtue are summarized in Figure 8.1.3 No doubt there is more to a virtue than this, but these features are enough to get us started. President Smith: Well, that is a lot to take in. You have talked about what a virtue is, but not about what the virtues are. Is there any consensus these days about which character traits are virtues, and how many virtues there are in total? Miller: Unfortunately, there is not. But I think there is a reasonable way to still move forward. The psychologists Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman, with the help of over fifty leading scholars working on character, spent an immense amount of time pouring over writings from a wide diversity of religious and philosophical traditions, such as Confucianism, Buddhism, ancient Greek philosophy, and medieval Islam. They even

Figure 8.1  Central features of a virtue. (Adapted from Christian Miller, The Character Gap; reprinted with permission of Oxford University Press.)

160  Christian B. Miller examined lists of traits from Charlemagne, Benjamin Franklin, the Boy and Girl Scouts, Hallmark greeting cards, and Pokémon characters.4 The result was a massive compilation of traits to consider for potential selection as what they called “character strengths.” To help them narrow things down, Peterson and Seligman came up with the following ten criteria:





1. A strength contributes to various fulfillments that constitute the good life, for oneself and for others. 2. Each strength is morally valued in its own right, even in the absence of obvious beneficial outcomes. 3. The display of a strength by one person does not diminish other people in the vicinity. 4. Being able to phrase the “opposite” of a putative strength in a felicitous way counts against regarding it as a character strength. 5. It should be trait-​like in the sense of having a degree of generality across situations and stability across time. 6. The strength is distinct from other positive traits in the classification and cannot be decomposed into them. 7. The character strength is embodied in consensual paragons. 8. We do not believe that this feature can be applied to all strengths, but an additional criterion where sensible is the existence of prodigies with respect to the strength. 9. Conversely, another criterion for a character strength is the existence of people who show—​selectively—​the total absence of a given strength. 10. The larger society provides institutions and associated rituals for cultivating strengths and virtues and then for sustaining their practice.5

A trait did not have to meet all these criteria to qualify as a character strength, but it did have to satisfy “most” of them.6 The results were published in a now famous volume called Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification as the “Values in Action” or VIA classification.7 Here is the list of twenty-​four character strengths they came up with: Creativity, Curiosity, Open-​mindedness, Love of Learning, Perspective, Bravery, Persistence, Integrity, Vitality, Love, Kindness, Social Intelligence,

Closing the Character Gap  161 Citizenship, Fairness, Leadership, Forgiveness and Mercy, Humility/​ Modesty, Prudence, Self-​ Regulation, Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence, Gratitude, Hope, Humor, Spirituality.

Now admittedly questions could be raised about this list.8 Patience, for instance, is missing. But again, as a useful starting point which is backed by an enormous array of research, I know of no better approach. President Smith: Okay, you have given me a lot of background material to think about on the virtues. Let’s now turn to the university, which is obviously very near and dear to my heart. Before we consider how to cultivate virtue in the university, I’d like to pause first to consider whether I as a university president should be trying to intentionally promote virtue in this context. The family is one thing, but should this fall under our job description as a university, alongside academic training, career services, and other goals? Miller: I agree this is a really important topic. Frankly, universities are already shaping the character of their students, whether they are being intentional about it or not. Merely in virtue of having exams, or homework, or honor codes, or student conduct guidelines, the university is pushing student character in certain directions and not others.9 But whether they should be more intentional in promoting virtue in students is a big question. We need to schedule another meeting to try and tackle it! Let me say a few quick things, though. I see at least four reasons for answering “yes”: 1. Students often find virtuous lives admirable and inspiring. When they read about Abraham Lincoln or Sojourner Truth, Socrates or Confucius, they can have a strong emotional reaction. They can be inspired by feelings of what psychologists call “elevation,” in which they find themselves wanting to be more like a particular exemplar or moral hero.10 This can in turn motivate them to change their lives and actually become more like him or her. Emotions can reveal value in the world, and these responses should be taken seriously. 2. Virtuous lives make the world a better place. Compare the impact on the world or on our society if students gradually progressed in the direction of being honest, compassionate, and diligent, as opposed to being more dishonest, cold-​hearted, and lazy. Or just consider

162  Christian B. Miller how the university itself would be enriched by greater virtue among the student body. Indeed, it is in the university’s own self-​interest to foster virtue in its students. Consider, for instance, the importance of a university culture of honesty and how much damage a major cheating scandal can do to the reputation of a school. Harvard University and the University of Virginia, for instance, had to find this out the hard way.11 3. Good character can also be personally rewarding. There is plenty of evidence that cultivating virtue can make us better off, and there is no reason to think that students would be an exception. To take just one example, increased gratitude has been linked to better health, greater optimism, more positive mood, higher work satisfaction, better school achievement, and increased life satisfaction.12 Admittedly, if students end up trying to become better people to gain these benefits, that would be self-​undermining since it would make the motivation for doing virtuous things self-​interested. As we already noted, virtue requires appropriate motivation and not just appropriate action. Self-​interest is rarely an appropriate kind of motivation for the moral virtues. Fortunately, there is a difference between a goal and a by-​product. The idea would be to foster virtue among students for the right reasons and then along the way they benefit too, as a by-​product or side-​effect of being virtuous. 4. Faith traditions often support cultivating virtue. This wouldn’t apply in your own case, President Smith, but there are many religious colleges and universities that have additional reasons from within their own faith tradition to work toward virtue. In the case of the Western monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, for instance, it is clear from their sacred texts that the higher being wants everyone, including students, to become good people.13 Miller: Let me stop here and catch my breath. Sorry that that was a lot to throw at you all at once. President Smith: No worries, it is all very helpful. Let’s definitely get together again for another meeting to dive into this in more detail. Before we go any further, I find it interesting that so much of our discussion thus far has been focused on students. What about everyone else who is affiliated with a

Closing the Character Gap  163 university? Perhaps we should back up a moment and ask whose moral character should be our main focus at the university. Miller: I couldn’t agree more. The natural tendency, I think, is to gravitate immediately toward undergraduate students. But what about: Graduate students Administrators Faculty Sports coaches and trainers Librarians, custodians, dining hall workers, and other staff In fact, one reason to not focus primarily on undergraduate students is that they are so transitory. They reside at the university for four years (or thereabouts), and even then, they may spend only eight to nine months of the year on campus. Thirty-​six months, let’s say, is a fairly short time in the course of their lives. Also, since character change tends to be slow and gradual, it is unlikely to be enough time to significantly move the needle. Similarly, one reason to focus on faculty and staff is that they can be the long-​term foundations of the university. There is plenty of time to affect character growth if someone spends decades at the same institution. Furthermore, faculty and staff can be powerful influences on the characters of students. For instance, the intellectual humility of a professor could be inspiring to the students working in her lab. Or a dining hall worker’s kindness could have a positive effect on hundreds of students whom he serves in a given day. Having said this, let’s continue to focus on undergraduate students during our remaining time together, but not lose sight of the larger community. President Smith: Fair enough. One more preliminary question for you, and then we can get down to business. We have discussed what a virtue is and come up with a tentative list of virtues. We have also said that universities should aim to cultivate virtue in their students (perhaps along with other members of their school’s community as well). But if students tend to be virtuous already, then there is not much to worry about and we can devote our limited time and resources elsewhere, right? However, if they are mired in vice, then there is probably little we can do for them anyway. I guess what I am getting at is this—​what do you think we have to work

164  Christian B. Miller with when students arrive on campus? What is our baseline so we know where we can go from there? Miller: You don’t give me any softball questions, that’s for sure! Fortunately, this is a question I can deflect, as I have just written two books on this very topic.14 In those books, I closely examined dozens of studies in psychology which looked at the behavior of participants in a wide variety of situations, especially those pertaining to helping, harming, lying, and cheating. I won’t try to do that here. But this is my takeaway message. What I found collectively from this body of research is that we have good reason to think most people (or most Westerners at least) do not have the moral virtues. Participants in study after study would fail to do the morally appropriate thing. They would ignore the needs of someone else, even in an emergency. They would cheat on a test. They would even go so far as to kill an innocent person under pressure from an authority figure. Plus, there were times when if they did the admirable thing, it didn’t seem to be for virtuous reasons but rather for reasons like alleviating feelings of guilt or maintaining a good mood. In my books, I formulated a number of criteria for different virtues. It turned out they failed to map onto the behavior of most participants in the relevant experiments. Hence, I have come to think there is a sizable character gap, as shown in Figure 8.2. But does this mean that most of us are mired in vice instead—​in other words, that we are people who are dishonest, cowardly, hateful, and slothful? Not necessarily. For what was even more surprising to me is that I also discovered patterns of behavior which were not in line with vice either. In many experiments, participants in certain conditions would not cheat even if they could get away with it. Or they helped a stranger at great expense to themselves. Or

A Virtuous Character The Character Gap Our Actual Character

Figure 8.2  The character gap. (Adapted from Christian Miller, The Character Gap; reprinted with permission of Oxford University Press.)

Closing the Character Gap  165 Strongly Weakly Virtuous Virtuous

Closer to Virtue

Closer to Vice

Weakly Vicious

Strongly Vicious

Neither Virtuous Nor Vicious Threshold for Virtue

Threshold for Vice

Most People

Figure 8.3  Where most of our characters reside. (Adapted from Christian Miller, The Character Gap, Chapter 7; reprinted with permission of Oxford University Press.)

they told the truth even though it didn’t promote their self-​interest. Again, I formulated a number of conditions for various vices like dishonesty and cruelty. They were not met by the empirical data either. So the conclusion I have drawn is that, for most people, our character is somewhere in the middle between virtue and vice. It is not good enough to count as virtuous, but not bad enough to count as vicious. It is what I call, using very technical and sophisticated philosophical vocabulary, a “mixed” character. Figure 8.3 illustrates what I have in mind. Two notes about this conclusion. First, it is a proposal about most people’s character. I have in mind a bell curve here, with some people on the virtue side and some others on the vice side. I think we can easily come up with examples of each. Secondly, this is a view about people in general, not students in particular. While it is true that many of the relevant experiments did use college participants, I did not separate out the studies by participants’ age when arriving at the mixed-​trait account. Nevertheless, I have no reason to think that college students would be markedly different from the rest of us, especially when it comes to not being virtuous. This is the main takeaway. Whatever a student’s character actually looks like (mixed, vicious, or something else), it is unlikely to be virtuous. In other words, there is a widespread character gap. That should be our baseline assumption.

166  Christian B. Miller

The Main Questions President Smith: Well, I have just put your books in my online shopping cart and look forward to reading them. At this point I think we have done enough by way of background. Let’s shift to how we might go about cultivating virtue in the university. The first question that comes to mind here is strategic. Do you think we should intentionally promote all the virtues in general, or just focus on a few specific virtues? Miller: Ideally, you would want to focus on all the virtues, such as the twenty-​four character strengths from the VIA classification. But I don’t think this is wise given various constraints. One is simply that university administrators and faculty are very busy, and it would take a mammoth effort to tackle that many virtues and do it well. Another constraint is the limited amount of time with students. As noted earlier, it could just be thirty-​six months or so. Of course, one could try something like a “virtue-​of-​the-​month” program. But the worry with programs like that is that they tend to give a superficial treatment of each virtue and end up moving the needle very little on any of them. So, instead, I think a much more promising strategy is to focus on two to four important virtues and introduce programming around them which will hopefully make a real difference for all four years.15 President Smith: Fair enough, but which ones? Miller: I don’t think there is one answer for every college and university. Given different student populations and different challenges a given university might face, I doubt it is as simple as that. Rather, it would be up to the administrators heading up a character initiative to try to discern what makes the most sense for their particular school. By way of general advice, though, I find two rough guidelines helpful. Using them, one would choose virtues to cultivate in a university which are: 1. Especially relevant to the college and postgraduation years. 2. Easier to get buy-​in to promote them from the relevant parties at the university, including the faculty, board of trustees, and alumni.

Closing the Character Gap  167 Suppose for the moment that chastity, understood as the character trait opposed to morally inappropriate lust, is a virtue. Then it might be especially relevant to the college years. But one can imagine some of the difficulty getting widespread buy-​in at many schools for chastity programming. Instead, using these criteria, several alternative character traits might emerge, such as honesty, compassion, perseverance, and open-​mindedness. It is clear to me that these are highly relevant traits for the college years. They also seem to be widely accepted and valued. It is hard to envision many schools which would not accept that honesty is an important trait that the school should care about, for instance. President Smith: Suppose I go along with you for the sake of discussion, and we even select these four particular virtues as our core virtues at my school. Is there one strategy we can use to promote all of them at once? Miller: There might be, and I have to confess that I am not an expert on character development strategies.16 But my initial reaction is to be cautious. Virtues can differ a great deal one to the next. Compassion, for instance, requires altruistic motivation aimed at relieving the suffering of those in need, regardless of whether the compassionate person benefits or not. Perseverance does not require altruistic motivation. So presumably trying to cultivate compassion would involve, in part, trying to strength our capacities for altruistic motivation. But that wouldn’t be part of what is done to cultivate perseverance. So rather than a “one-​approach-​fits-​all” mindset to cultivating various virtues, I think we need to go virtue by virtue. In other words, we need to see what the best strategies are for fostering honesty, which may not be the best strategies for also fostering compassion or open-​mindedness. President Smith: Very interesting. I see that we only have about twenty minutes left before my next meeting. Let’s try to pursue your last suggestion in more detail by picking one of the virtues from your list of four and seeing how we might proceed just with respect to it. Miller: Sounds great. Since I have finished a book on it recently, how about we choose the virtue of honesty?

168  Christian B. Miller President Smith: Honesty it is. Where do we start if, as a university, we want to intentionally foster honesty in our students?

A Case Study: Focusing on Honesty Miller: I admit that as a philosopher I am a bit biased, but it seems to me that the best place to start is trying to figure out what honesty even is in the first place. In other words, we should start by unpacking our concept of what it is to be a person of exemplary honesty. Otherwise, how are we supposed to know what we are aiming at with our character education programs, if we don’t have a clear sense of what the end point is supposed to be? Of course, we can’t spend forever on this, and we shouldn’t set as our goal to find a detailed account of honesty (whether original to us or already existing in the literature) that is largely uncontroversial. If that is the standard, then we will probably be waiting forever to find such an account and never get down to the business of implementing character development programs. Instead, it is enough to have a rough idea of the contours of the virtue. If that rough idea is controversial, then it would help to have some sense of what the controversy is about in order to see if it matters for the purposes of cultivating honesty among college students. The job of clarifying a given virtue can be much harder if it has been neglected by philosophers and other writers. Surprisingly, honesty is just such a virtue. Given its obvious moral importance, one might have thought that there is already an extensive literature trying to unpack what this virtue involves. Quite the opposite. In fact, there haven’t been more than one or two peer-​reviewed articles in philosophy on the moral virtue of honesty in over fifty years! In recent work, I have begun to take steps to address this omission.17 I am not going to use this space to outline my own proposal about honesty but simply want to note what is involved in trying to develop a view. Honesty appears to be a wide-​ranging virtue that covers at least the following: Truthfulness: The virtue of being disposed to reliably tell the truth for good moral reasons, rather than lie. Forthrightness: The virtue of being disposed to reliably avoid misleading by giving a sufficient presentation of the relevant facts for good moral reasons, rather than mislead. Being Respectful of Property: The virtue of being disposed to reliably respect the property of others for good moral reasons, rather than steal.

Closing the Character Gap  169 Proper Compliance: The virtue of being disposed to reliably follow the relevant rules in a situation of voluntary participation when they are fair and appropriate and when there are good moral reasons to do so rather than cheat. Fidelity to Promises: The virtue of being disposed to reliably keep promises for good moral reasons, rather than break those promises. This then raises a challenge which I have called the unification challenge: Unification Challenge: What is it exactly that these various virtues (and their corresponding vices) have in common such that they all pertain to the virtue of honesty (and the vice of dishonesty)? Figure 8.4 provides a visual illustration of this question. I think there is a way to answer the unification challenge, but that is a topic for another occasion.18 I also think one does not need to have an answer to the challenge in order to move ahead with a character development program on honesty at a university. But it is important to develop some awareness of what the relevant issues are surrounding the virtue in question and to give some thought to trying to address them. President Smith: Okay, after we get a better conceptual handle on the virtue of honesty, what comes next? Miller: I would say psychology. If there is good research available, we can paint a psychological picture of how students tend to be disposed when it comes to

Honesty

Truthfulness

Forthrightness

Being Respectful of Property

Proper Compliance

Fidelity to Promises

Figure 8.4  The unification challenge for virtue and its subvirtues. (Adapted from Christian Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue; reprinted with permission of Oxford University Press.)

170  Christian B. Miller cheating, for instance. This will give us a better sense of what we have to work with. From there, we can better develop strategies to improve students’ character which are specifically tailored to where they are coming from psychologically. We can also develop helpful measures to see how much progress we are making. Again, this is not the place to try to review all the relevant psychological literature, even pertaining just to cheating. But to give a sense of some of the more interesting findings, here are a few studies that found widespread cheating.19 Going Past Five Minutes. Edward Diener and Mark Wallbom had participants take an anagram test, and before leaving the room, the experimenter set a timer bell for five minutes with the warning to “Remember not to go any further after the bell rings.” As observed through a two-​way mirror, 71 percent of participants kept going after the bell sounded.20 Cheating and Predicting Coin Flips. Christopher Bryan and his colleagues told online participants about recent evidence for paranormal phenomena and then asked them to find a coin to flip ten times while trying to influence the outcome of each flip with their minds. To make them “properly motivated,” they were told that they would receive $1 for each time they reported getting heads. As a cheating curb, they heard, “Please don’t cheat and report that one or more of your coin flips landed heads when it really landed tails! Even a small amount of cheating would undermine the study.”21 Yet on average this group reported 6.22 heads, well above chance.22 Cheating and Shredding. In a control group, Lisa Shu and her colleagues had participants complete a worksheet with twenty problems after being told that they would receive $0.50 per right answer. The experimenter checked the answers and oversaw payment. But in the shredder condition, the participants were told to count the number of correct answers, record this total on the collection sheet, shred their worksheet, and then pay themselves the correct amount. The experimenter did not check any of this. In other words, participants in the shredder condition could write down whatever number of correct answers they wanted, get paid accordingly, and no one would know the difference. Here were the results:23 No opportunity to cheat Opportunity to cheat

7.97 problems answered correctly (group average) 13.22 problems answered correctly (group average)

Closing the Character Gap  171 Clearly a lot of cheating was going on in this second group, which we can call the “shredder condition.” However, here are some of the more interesting studies which found very little to no cheating: Not Going Past Five Minutes. Recall that Diener and Wallbom found that 76 percent of participants cheated by continuing to work after the five-​ minute timer went off. But in a different group, the participants were seated directly in front of a two-​way mirror and “thus saw themselves whenever they glanced up.”24 The result? Only 7 percent of participants cheated in this condition.25 Little Cheating in Predicting Coin Flips. A different group of participants in the study by Bryan and his colleagues also got to flip a coin and receive $1 for each heads flip. The only change for this group was with the warning message. Instead of asking that they not cheat, they were asked to not be cheaters: “Please don’t be a cheater and report that one or more of your coin flips landed heads when it really landed tails! Even a small number of cheaters would undermine the study.”26 Instead of 6.22 heads, the group average dropped to 5.23, which is only slightly above chance.27 The Honor Code. Nina Mazar and her colleagues ran a study with a standard control and shredder condition. But this time a third group of participants had to first sign the following honor code before they began the problems: “I understand that this short survey falls under MIT’s [Yale’s] honor system.”28 No threat of external punishment was at work here, Mazar reasoned, since neither school did in fact have an honor code at the time.29 Here were the results:30 Solved Matrices ($0.50 per correct answer) Control Condition 3.4 Shredder Condition 6.1 Shredder +​HC 3.1 Condition

Solved Matrices ($2 per correct answer) 3.2 5.0 3.0

So even though nothing changed in the third condition in terms of their ability to get away with cheating, participants on average self-​reported

172  Christian B. Miller performing even slightly worse than the controls. Nor did the additional reward of $2 per correct answer seem to tempt them to cheat. As a side note, this overall pattern of behavior again points toward mixed traits. In certain situations, participants cheated with some abandon. In other situations that differed in only a small detail, they did not cheat at all. It is hard to chalk this up to flat-​out honesty or flat-​out dishonesty, in my view. These results raise a number of interesting questions, such as: • Why would participants often cheat to some extent, but not to the maximum? • Why would signing the honor code be so influential? • Why would a mirror make such a difference? An emerging psychological account has at least a preliminary answer to offer.31 The account is built on three claims. First is the idea that most of us really do accept that cheating is wrong. So moral reminders like the honor code can bring that belief to bear in curbing cheating. But secondly, we also want to pursue our own self-​interest and do things that will benefit us. When it comes to cheating, often unconsciously we tally up the costs and benefits of going against the rules. If the calculation looks to be favorable to us, then often we give it a try. Hence the cheating we find in these different experiments. Yet there is one more piece to the puzzle. We also tend to care about how honest we are appearing in the process. Naturally we want to seem honest to other people so that we don’t suffer any negative social consequences. But we also want to appear honest to our own selves. In other words, it tends to matter a lot to us that we are honest in our own eyes. That’s why a mirror or the instructions to not be cheaters can be so effective. It is hard to cheat, look yourself in the mirror, and continue to think of yourself as an honest person. There is much more to this story, but the details don’t matter for now.32 What matters is that the story serves as a helpful guide to some of what is going on in the minds of many students when it comes to cheating. Hence strategies to promote honesty should be anchored in starting points like this one, and then work to improve them. President Smith: I wish we had more time, but I just have a few minutes left before I have to run. One more question, I promise. I’d like to end on a more practical note. We have talked about clarifying what honesty is.

Closing the Character Gap  173 We have talked about some of the psychological tendencies we can expect in our students when it comes to cheating. Do you have any concrete recommendations of what we might do to help students in this area of their moral lives? Miller: I do. Being mindful of the time, let me very briefly offer three strategies. The first is to increase the frequency of moral reminders of honesty. An honor code is an effective way of doing just that.33 Earlier we saw cheating essentially disappear in the shredder condition when the participants had signed an honor code, even if the payment amount for “correct” answers was increased from $.50 to $2. This effect of an honor code is not surprising, given the results of many studies looking at such codes on college campuses. For instance, McCabe and colleagues found that 28 percent of college students at schools without an honor code reported helping another person on a test, versus 9 percent at schools with an honor code. Similarly, there was a significant decrease in plagiarism (18 percent versus 7 percent), unauthorized crib notes (21 percent versus 9 percent), and unpermitted collaboration (39 percent versus 21 percent).34 The key is to make it clear that the honor code is taken seriously by your school. Just mentioning it during orientation or having it up on the wall in some building is not taking it seriously. Having students hand-​write and sign it every time they take a test or turn in a paper is. That’s what we had to do when I was an undergraduate. Similarly, I just saw that at Davidson College incoming freshmen have to publicly sign the honor code in front of their peers at a ceremony before classes start. At my school, Wake Forest University, I make my students verbally recite our honor code with me before every test. To be fair, there are a number of unanswered questions about using moral reminders with students. For instance, do reminders like the honor code have lasting positive effects in promoting virtuous behavior? Or is their effect momentary and fleeting? Also, what motivational impact do they have? If a student is tempted to cheat but refrains from doing so after reciting the honor code, is he typically doing it for virtuous reasons, or mainly out of fear of punishment or the like? We don’t have clear answers to these questions yet. The second strategy is to encourage faculty and staff (including resident advisors and upper-​class students) to serve as role models of honesty.35 In a stunning result from a study by Francesca Gino and Adam Galinsky, cheating in a shredder condition occurred when a stranger was observed

174  Christian B. Miller to cheat first, but it increased dramatically when a stranger was observed to cheat and participants knew beforehand that they shared the same birthday as the stranger.36 Not surprisingly, what students see other people do in their surroundings has a major impact on whether they will cheat or not as well. On the flip side, there is some preliminary evidence that professors can have a positive impact as role models in curbing cheating.37 Here, too, though, the same questions arise as with the first strategy. How long does the effect of admiring role models last among students? We really don’t have much of an idea at this point. And secondly, what is the motivational impact of admiring role models? Do professors not only inspire more positive behavior when it comes to not cheating but also more positive motivation as well? Again, we don’t really have much of an idea. Finally, there is the approach of trying to get the word out and educate students about the surprising psychological tendencies they have to cheat (and not cheat!). The hope is that they can be more mindful when in situations where those tendencies might be activated and can work to compensate for the negative ones and encourage the positive ones. Unfortunately, the amount of experimental evidence testing this approach is noticeably (and surprisingly) scarce. There has been a bit of experimental work on the effect of getting the word out with respect to other areas of morality like helping, but as far as I know nothing when it comes to cheating or lying.38 So a first question is, what will future studies show? A second question is, what would getting the word out look like, practically speaking, in a university setting? Part of a required course? An elective? A special discussion group on campus that is not taught by a professor (at least for credit)? Something else? The idea, I think, is an important one, but there are a lot of practical details that would need to be worked out first. So here are three preliminary strategies to get the ball rolling. I hope they make sense and sound promising.39 President Smith: They do. I am so sorry to have to run, but I really appreciate your taking the time to come over and visit with me. Great to see you again, and let’s set up another meeting to talk about cultivating virtue in the university some more. Miller: I’d love that. Thank you for your interest in these important issues. Take care.40

Closing the Character Gap  175

Notes 1. For some recent work, see Nancy Snow, ed., Cultivating Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and Psychology (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014) and Julia Annas, Darcia Narvaez, and Nancy Snow, eds., Developing the Virtues: Integrating Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). 2. This would not work so well in the case of my own president, Nathan Hatch, as he was actually sitting in the fourth row of the room at the Oxford conference. 3. Of course, this isn’t the only way to think about the features of a virtue. There are rival approaches in the philosophy literature. For more on my preferred approach, which is in line with the Aristotelian tradition of thinking about virtue, see Rosalind Hursthouse, On Virtue Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). 4. Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman, eds., Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 15, 33–​52. 5. Peterson and Seligman, eds., Character Strengths and Virtues, 17–​27. 6. Peterson and Seligman, eds., Character Strengths and Virtues, 16. 7. Peterson and Seligman, eds., Character Strengths and Virtues, 29–​30. 8. For an extensive discussion, see Christian Miller, “Virtue and Positive Psychology: Some Concerns about the VIA Classification of Character Traits,” Journal of Positive Psychology 14, no. 1 (2019): 6–​19. 9. See also Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 10. For elevation, see Jonathan Haidt, “Elevation and the Positive Psychology of Morality,” in Flourishing: Positive Psychology and the Life Well-​Lived, ed. Corey Keyes and Jonathan Haidt (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2003), 275–​289. 11. For Harvard, see Richard Pérez-​Peña, “Students Disciplined in Harvard Scandal,” New York Times, February 1, 2013, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2013/​02/​02/​educat​ion/​ harv​ard-​for​ced-​doz​ens-​to-​leave-​in-​cheat​ing-​scan​dal.html. For Virginia, see Diane Jean Schemo, “U. of Virginia Hit by Scandal over Cheating,” New York Times, May 10, 2001, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2001/​05/​10/​us/​u-​of-​virgi​nia-​hit-​by-​scan​dal-​over-​ cheat​ing.html. 12. On gratitude, see Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume); Michael McCullough, Robert Emmons, and Jo-​Ann Tsang, “The Grateful Disposition: A Conceptual and Empirical Topography,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 82, no. 1 (2002): 112–​127; Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough, “Counting Blessings Versus Burdens: An Experimental Investigation of Gratitude and Subjective Well-​being in Daily Life,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 84, no. 2 (2003): 377–​389; Christopher Peterson et al., “Strengths of Character and Work,” in Oxford Handbook of Positive Psychology and Work, ed. P. Alex Linley, Susan Harrington, and Nicola Garcea (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 221–​ 231; and L. Wagner and W. Ruch, “Good Character at School: Positive Classroom Behavior Mediates the Link between Character Strengths and School Achievement,” Frontiers in Psychology 6, no. 610 (2015), http://​dx.doi.org/​10.3389/​fpsyg.2015.00610.

176  Christian B. Miller 13. For a longer discussion of these and other reasons to work toward cultivating virtue in general, see Miller, The Character Gap, Chapter 2. 14. See Christian Miller, Moral Character: An Empirical Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013); Character and Moral Psychology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014). 15. For a similar view, see Anne Colby, “Fostering the Moral and Civic Development of College Students,” in Handbook of Moral and Character Education, ed. Larry Nucci, Darcia Narvaez, and Tobias Krettenauer (New York: Routledge, 2014), 368–​369. 16. For a helpful discussion of moral development in college students, see Colby, “Fostering the Moral and Civic Development.” See also Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume). 17. See Christian Miller, “Honesty,” in Moral Psychology, Volume V: Virtue and Character, ed. Walter Sinnott-​ Armstrong and Christian B. Miller (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2017), 237–​273; Integrity, Honesty, and Truth Seeking, ed. Christian Miller and Ryan West (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020); Christian Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue (New York: Oxford University Press, 2021). 18. See Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue. 19. The summaries which follow are drawn from Miller, “Honesty,” and are reprinted with permission of MIT Press. 20. Edward Diener and Mark Wallbom, “Effects of Self-​Awareness on Antinormative Behavior,” Journal of Research in Personality 10, no. 1 (1976): 110. It could be that many of these participants went over the time limit by just a little bit in order to finish the problem they were working on. However, Diener and Wallbom also recorded the number of responses completed after the time period, and the mean number of cheating responses was 2.71 (“Effects of Self-​Awareness,” 110). 21. Christopher Bryan, Gabrielle Adams, and Benoit Monin, “When Cheating Would Make You a Cheater: Implicating the Self Prevents Unethical Behavior,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 142, no. 4 (2013): 1003. 22. Bryan, Adams, and Monin, “When Cheating,” 1004. 23. Lisa Shu, Francesca Gino, and Max Bazerman, “Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience: When Cheating Leads to Moral Disengagement and Motivated Forgetting,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 37, no. 3 (2011): 339. 24. Diener and Wallbom, “Effects of Self-​Awareness,” 109. 25. Diener and Wallbom, “Effects of Self-​Awareness,” 110. 26. Bryan, Adams, and Monin, “When Cheating,” 1003, emphasis mine. 27. Bryan, Adams, and Monin, “When Cheating,” 1004. 28. Nina Mazar, On Amir, and Dan Ariely, “The Dishonesty of Honest People: A Theory of Self-​Concept Maintenance,” Journal of Marketing Research 45, no. 6 (2008): 637. 29. They also replicated the experiment at an institution with a “strict” honor code and found similar results (Mazar, Amir, and Ariely, “The Dishonesty of Honest People,” 637). 30. Mazar, Amir, and Ariely, “The Dishonesty of Honest People,” 637.

Closing the Character Gap  177 31. For extensive discussion, see Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue. 32. For more, see Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue. 33. See, e.g., Colby, “Fostering the Moral and Civic Development,” 381. 34. Donald McCabe, Linda Treviño, and Kenneth Butterfield, “Cheating in Academic Institutions: A Decade of Research,” Ethics & Behavior 11, no. 3 (2001): 219–​232. 35. For general discussion of the role of admiration and role models in fostering moral development among college students, see Colby, “Fostering the Moral and Civic Development,” 377–​378. 36. Francesca Gino and Adam Galinsky, “Vicarious Dishonesty: When Psychological Closeness Creates Distance from One’s Moral Compass,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 119, no. 1 (2012): 15–​26. 37. Mark Simkin and Alexander McLeod, “Why Do College Students Cheat?,” Journal of Business Ethics 94 (2010): 441–​453. 38. See, e.g., Arthur Beaman et al., “Increasing Helping Rates through Information Dissemination: Teaching Pays,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 4, no. 3 (1978): 406–​411. 39. For more on these and other strategies for improving character, see Miller, The Character Gap, Chapters 8–​10. 40. I am grateful to Michael Lamb, Jonathan Brant, and Edward Brooks for inviting me to be a part of this volume. Portions of this chapter are adapted from Miller, The Character Gap and Miller, Honesty: The Philosophy and Psychology of a Neglected Virtue, with permission from Oxford University Press. Work on this chapter was supported by a grant from the Templeton Religion Trust and a grant from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this chapter are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of these foundations.

9 The Beneficial Effects of Cultivating Gratitude in the University Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford

Conceptions and understandings of virtue are varied and complex, as this volume attests. As a result, educational programs that seek to cultivate virtue are faced with a myriad of considerations surrounding the introduction to, and discussion of, each virtue of interest. This chapter focuses on one particular virtue—​gratitude—​to demonstrate the intricacies involved with cultivating even this one virtue within university settings. In the first part of this chapter, we examine the conceptual contours of gratitude and outline our multicomponent view of gratitude as a virtue. Then we consider how the virtue of gratitude might be cultivated in educational contexts with reference to its complex nature and multicomponent structure. As gratitude has been integrated into educational curricula in schools, we critically examine gratitude practices in primary and secondary sectors before developing recommendations for cultivating gratitude in universities. If we are to cultivate gratitude, we need to be clear about what gratitude is and how and why it is worth promoting. At first blush, the concept seems uncomplicated—​it is, after all, an important element of everyday social interaction and politeness. “Thank you” is one of the first phrases we learn in our native tongue and when we begin to learn other languages. However, as with many concepts, once one digs beneath the surface, a number of complexities emerge. From the point of view of social interaction, behavioral expressions of gratitude, such as saying “thank you” and offering tokens of reciprocation, are central. However, the virtue of gratitude also involves grateful feelings and a certain attitude toward gratitude in addition to outward behaviors associated with gratitude. A number of other considerations take us beyond gratitude as a simple expression of politeness; we enter the realm of people’s motives and intentions in bestowing benefits and the value of those benefits

​

​

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  179 to the beneficiary. These latter considerations might be said to define the contours of individuals’ different conceptualizations of gratitude.1 In this chapter, we understand gratitude as a multicomponent concept that incorporates the following: a cognitive element, which calibrates whether gratitude is deemed fitting in a given circumstance; an emotional component, which includes an individual’s strength of grateful feelings and the incidence and range of “targets” that might evince these grateful emotions; a component corresponding to people’s attitudes toward gratitude; and a behavioral component, which includes individuals’ expressions of gratitude and gratitude-​related practices and routines.2 Our treatment of gratitude has been inspired by a broadly Aristotelian approach to virtues wherein each virtue or trait of character comprises a unique set of attention, emotion, desire, behavior, and a certain comportment or style of expression.

Aristotelian and Other Multicomponent Approaches to Virtue Aristotle conceived of virtues as relatively stable and consistent character traits (ἕξεις, hexeis) that are concerned with morally praiseworthy conduct. Virtues have cognitive, conative, affective, and behavioral elements such that a person possessing the virtue of compassion manifests this virtue in a number of related ways. The compassionate person notices easily and attends to situations in which the lot of others has been undeservedly compromised, feels for the needs of those who have suffered this misfortune, desires that their misfortune be reversed, acts for the relevant (ethical) reasons in ways conducive to that goal, and exudes an outward aura of empathy and care. Virtues constitute, on Aristotle’s reading, an educable subset of personality traits. This is good news from a didactic point of view since people can be taught to better embody these desirable character traits across a range of domains and in a variety of educational and other settings. If one takes gratitude to be a stable and consistent character trait concerned with morally praiseworthy conduct (a virtue), what would an Aristotelian approach to this virtue be like? First, it should be noted that gratitude was not regarded as a desirable quality for the paragons of moral virtue (the megalopsychoi) sketched out by Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics, though it was praised as a positive personal quality in his Rhetoric.3 Scholars disagree about whether Aristotle’s rejection of gratitude as an attribute of the

180  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford megalopsychoi applies specifically to them (in view of their specific public role as benefactors) or to all fully virtuous agents.4 However, notwithstanding Aristotle’s own position, the Aristotelian architectonic of virtue can be fruitfully applied to other virtues, including many he might not have considered desirable qualities himself. Features of an Aristotelian virtue of gratitude would therefore include the following elements: (1) a stable emotional trait of feeling thankful, in (2) a morally justifiable way (i.e., for good reasons). This reasoning would include considerations about benefactors’ motives in conferring, or attempting to confer, benefits. These affective and cognitive components would be supplemented by a behavioral aspect (3) acknowledging or returning benefits (saying thank you and/​or engaging in reciprocation). Finally, (4) gratitude would need to be esteemed as a valuable and indispensable constituent of the flourishing life. This captures an individual’s attitude toward gratitude. In this way, an Aristotelian approach can be applied to virtues Aristotle did not take into account himself or even to virtues about which he seems to have been ambivalent.5 It should be noted, however, that other multicomponent approaches exist. Aristotle is not alone in recognizing that for a trait of character to be fully embedded within an individual, it needs to make its mark cognitively, affectively, and behaviorally. For instance, the moral psychologist James Rest proposed that moral maturity was undergirded by four psychological components that tap an individual’s moral sensitivity (the ability to recognize moral issues), moral judgment (being able to make correct and intelligent judgments), moral motivation (being motivated to take action), and moral character (in the sense of having an integrated moral self to maintain consistent moral decisions across the lifespan).6 Philosopher Howard Curzer offers a vastly more complex view regarding the components of virtue. In a recent paper he proposed that each virtue (and the list is not exhaustive) consists of ten components, which he calls “deci-​ virtues.”7 They are perception, passion, reason, choice, goals, action, feedback loops, imagination, focus, and cooperation. He suggests the order in which these deci-​virtues are acquired is not important. There is no stage-​wise progression in which moral perception is developed first: “Acquiring a deci-​virtue is like building a house. There is no fixed order in which each bit of the house must be constructed. Similarly . . . there is no fixed order in which the parts of a deci-​virtue must be acquired.”8

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  181 Curzer further subdivides each deci-​virtue into ten components, creating a hundred centi-​virtues. By way of illustration, the centi-​virtues of the deci-​virtue of perception are curiosity, synthesizing, carefulness, open-​ mindedness, reasoning (concerning the gathering of information), objects, occasions, people, motive, and degree (concerning moral sensitivity). The centi-​virtues of the deci-​virtue of “goals” are divided into six “characteristic goals” (ambitious, clear, authenticity, flexibility, self-​oriented, and consistent) and four “noble goals” (virtuous acts, qua virtuous, qua ends in themselves, and brought about with good will).9 Curzer’s rich and complex picture of the components of virtue is certainly interesting and quite compelling from a theoretical point of view. However, such a complex framework would simply not offer a practicable basis for the purposes of creating a questionnaire measure of virtue. The components of gratitude identified earlier (cognitive, affective, behavioral, and attitudinal) offer many more nuanced possibilities for the measurement of gratitude than existing measures. To this end, we previously developed a measure of gratitude based upon this conceptualization.10 This measure represents a significant improvement in terms of the current means by which gratitude has been evaluated as a virtue. The broadly Aristotelian model of virtue undergirding the Multi-​Component Gratitude Measure (MCGM) therefore steers a middle course between the undifferentiated measurement of gratitude offered by existing measures and an overly theoretically prescriptive model which would be intractable from an empirical point of view.

Measuring Multiple Components of Gratitude Unless all dimensions of gratitude are examined, only a partial view of a person’s gratitude can be gleaned. It also follows from this conceptualization that individuals could differ in terms of the number and type of components of gratitude they demonstrate. For instance, some people could experience strong grateful feelings but engage in fewer gratitude-​related behaviors and practices than others. People manifest gratitude in different ways. Existing gratitude measures, such as the GQ6,11 the GRAT scale,12 and the Appreciation scale,13 do not conceptualize gratitude in this differentiated multicomponent manner. Consequently, they cannot tap into key differences between individuals in terms of the effect these different elements of gratitude might have on a person’s well-​being or social functioning.

182  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford Moreover, these existing measures of gratitude fail to probe the conceptual contours of how individual people answering these measures actually understand gratitude and the conditions under which they believe it is experienced. For example, how do a benefactor’s intentions impact a person’s experience of gratitude? Must these intentions be wholly benign and entirely in the interests of the beneficiary in order for the latter to experience gratitude? Would a beneficiary consistently and correctly impute the motivations of a benefactor in any case? In an early psychological paper on the topic of gratitude, Tesser, Gatewood, and Driver put forward a cognitive theory of gratitude driven by attributions regarding a benefactor’s intention, the cost of the benefit to the benefactor, and whether the benefit was deemed to be of value to the beneficiary.14 How important are these three conditions, and do they interact with each other in determining how much gratitude a person experiences in a given situation? Moreover, are there other determinants of gratitude besides the three they identified? For example, should gratitude be reserved for someone who goes above and beyond what is expected from duty? Roberts has previously taken the view that gratitude does require supererogation (going above and beyond the call of duty), while McConnell believes gratitude is due even when people are simply fulfilling their obligations.15 In an interdisciplinary review of gratitude, we addressed a number of conceptual controversies of this sort.16 We questioned whether gratitude necessarily involves a benefactor or whether it can be felt in a nontargeted, more generalized sense. For instance, Lambert, Graham, and Fincham take the view that gratitude is a broad category that encompasses both targeted and generalized kinds, while Adler and Fagley regard nontargeted gratitude as appreciation and consider targeted gratitude a subspecies of this higher-​order category.17 These conceptual controversies represent more than merely hypothetical considerations since they circumscribe how people differ in terms of conceptual (cognitive) conditions they place on gratitude. Some people may believe that gratitude is not due if an intended benefit ultimately fails to materialize, whereas other people would be less concerned with the outcome itself and more impressed by the intention to confer a benefit at all, endorsing the maxim that it is the “thought that counts.” Clearly the way in which individuals resolve these conceptual controversies has implications for whether (and how much) they experience gratitude. A good measure of gratitude needs to capture these important distinctions for researchers to know what

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  183 underlying concept of gratitude a questionnaire respondent had in mind when they completed the survey.

Introducing the Multi-​Component Gratitude Measure (MCGM) The first section of our multicomponent measure of gratitude consists of short vignettes that epitomize conceptual controversies around gratitude.18 This allows some “calibration” of an individual’s understanding of gratitude which they can be assumed to have had in mind when they answered the other elements of the measure (grateful emotions, attitude regarding the importance of gratitude as a value, and gratitude-​related behaviors and practices). The vignettes could be used to both map out and measure an individual’s understanding of gratitude and to spark group discussion about the complexities around gratitude in a secondary school or university setting. As noted previously, we posit that a variety of factors function to filter understanding of the appropriateness of gratitude in a given situation. In the first part of the MCGM, a person’s conceptual understanding of gratitude is examined by means of their responses to a vignette questionnaire in which variations from the following “baseline” scenario are measured: “A colleague nominates you for an award at work. If you win, you will receive recognition of your hard work and a voucher.” Respondents indicate whether they would be grateful in this circumstance on a 5-​point Likert scale (ranging from 1—​ strongly disagree to 5—​strongly agree). They also rate the degree of gratitude they would feel on a scale from 0 (Not at all grateful) to 100 (Most grateful you could feel). The first question yields an “Are” score, while the second affords a “Degree” score. Responses to this original baseline scenario are subsequently compared with a number of different scenarios encapsulating different conceptual controversies around gratitude, which are also rated on the same scale. For instance, the variant tapping ulterior motives reads: “A colleague nominates you for an award at work. If you win, you will receive recognition of your hard work and a voucher. The colleague has nominated you because she wants you to repay the favor by helping her with her own workload.” This part of the questionnaire also probes whether the respondent is differentially grateful to a benefactor who spent a long time filling in the nomination form outside work (cost to benefactor), the effect of nonrealized benefits on gratitude, the

184  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford influence of malicious intentions on the part of a benefactor, the value of the benefit to the beneficiary, and the impact of mixed emotions on gratitude.19 This component of the measure, which was based on an earlier vignette questionnaire probing laypeople’s understanding of the conceptual contours of gratitude, examines an individual’s conceptual understanding of gratitude and gauges whether a respondent has a relatively broad or comparatively narrow view of the meaning and scope of gratitude.20 Some people’s understanding of gratitude could be limited to when benefactors act entirely in the interests of the beneficiary, whereas other people may take a broader view, allowing for gratitude in situations where there was an ulterior motive (or perhaps even a malicious motive) on the part of the benefactor. By means of the vignettes, we are able to calibrate individuals’ understanding of gratitude. Higher “Are” and “Degree” scores are recorded in those respondents who have a more broad (“permissive”) understanding of when gratitude is experienced. The use of these vignettes is not restricted to measuring gratitude in psychological studies. Rather, we suggest that these can be implemented in educational settings and used both diagnostically (to profile an individual’s gratitude) and pedagogically (to explore and debate factors that differentially impact on people’s understanding of gratitude).21 The MCGM is unique in offering a way of tapping respondents’ conceptual grasp of gratitude (component A) in addition to grateful emotions (component B), attitude toward gratitude (component C), and gratitude-​ related behaviors (component D). The conceptual component (component A) is used to “diagnose” an individual’s understanding rather than prescribe it. In other words, we do not make any value judgements about whether respondents have the “right” understanding of gratitude. Component A affords an outline of people’s understanding of gratitude that is separate from the score they obtain across components B, C, and D. An individual could believe that gratitude is not warranted when a benefit fails to materialize (one of the conceptual issues explored in the vignettes in component A), yet they might have a high score across components B, C, and D of the MCGM. Given that most people are almost as grateful for benefits that fail to materialize as they are for a realized benefit, we might say this person had an “atypical” conceptual understanding of gratitude, but this does not preclude them from experiencing grateful feelings, endorsing gratitude as an important value, or engaging in gratitude-​related rituals.

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  185 The scores obtained across components B, C, and D of the measure can be aggregated to yield an overall score if desired, but the measure allows correlations between each component and other variables to be examined separately. Being able to measure distinct elements of gratitude allows more nuanced relationships between gratitude and other variables to come to light. For instance, we found that Christians report higher levels of grateful emotions than atheists but are no different from atheists in terms of their attitudes toward the value of gratitude or the frequency of gratitude-​related behaviors in which they engage.22 This discovery would not have been observable in a survey-​based study without an instrument that taps into each component of gratitude separately. Such a finding challenges a widely accepted view (based largely on questionnaires measuring grateful feeling) that religious respondents tend to be more grateful than nonreligious respondents.23

Fostering Virtuous Gratitude in Educational Settings The promotion of gratitude in any educational context (from primary to tertiary education) should address these conceptual complexities as a central part of the program. This is particularly important in schools where gratitude interventions have risen to prominence in recent years as a central component of positive education.24 A great number of these programs have incorporated practices such as keeping a gratitude journal,25 writing and delivering a thank-​you letter,26 and gratitude reframing exercises.27 However, it is not clear that young people taking part in these interventions are given space in which to discuss important questions like whether gratitude is unambiguously positive or whether it is called for when someone appears to have had an ulterior motive in conferring a benefit.28 Yet we have found that even primary school children are aware of the fact that gratitude can sometimes encompass mixed emotions, which tells against a simplistic “mono-​valenced” view.29 In our research with young people aged eight to eleven years, we devised four workbooks that explored gratitude by embedding the conceptual controversies referenced earlier into stories. Respondents were asked how they thought characters in the story would feel (and why) when various benefits were conferred on them that manipulated benefactors’ intentions. We were able to see how young people felt about intended benefits that miscarried

186  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford or benefits which they did not deem to be personally valuable. The story workbooks not only shed light on the way in which young people understand gratitude at a particular point in time, but they can also be used as tools for teaching children about the concept of gratitude itself and the factors that might impact an individual’s own experience of gratitude. We propose that reflection on the meaning of gratitude is a vital element of cultivating gratitude that has too often been sidelined in the interests of promoting an indiscriminate approach to cultivating gratitude.30 It is unhelpful to encourage students of any age to feel “indiscriminately grateful.” Young people need to be able to tell the difference between gifts given with strings attached and those that have been conferred freely. This is not to say that ultimately one could (or should) never be grateful for a benefit that had ulterior motives—​in fact, our empirical research shows that a great many people are grateful for benefits involving such motivation. However, it is important to be able to distinguish between more and less virtuous forms of giving. It should be borne in mind that virtues can turn into vices not only through underreactions but also overreactions. An indiscriminately grateful outlook could render an individual subservient and easy prey to manipulators.31 While in an ideal world one might want a child to learn these complexities around gratitude as soon as they have the intellectual capacity to do so, it is quite likely that many people will reach adulthood without having reflected on the conceptual contours of gratitude and the pathologies of giving that sometimes feed it. Consequently, when fostering gratitude in university students, it is important to provide a space for such reflection to take place. Indeed, it may be the first time in which individuals have reflected on the complexities that surround the concept.

Educating for Gratitude in Universities Universities are places of intellectual discovery and debate, and it is our view that this should hold for the exploration and discussion of moral values such as gratitude. If we take the view that universities are places where character and virtues should be cultivated (to which this volume attests), then this should be done in a way that fits with the overall premise of higher education. That is, character and virtue should be examined rigorously and with a certain degree of critical reflection and open debate. It would not be sufficient, for instance, to provide one specific definition of gratitude—​instead,

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  187 the construct should be explored from multiple angles and perspectives and, where possible, across multiple disciplines. Indeed, we have already provided examples of how this particular virtue might be interrogated: Must benefaction always be benevolent? Must a benefit be valuable and/​or materialize? Other questions include whether gratitude must involve a benefactor and how this construct differs from appreciation. As previously noted, this construct, on deeper consideration, is extremely complex and multifaceted, bringing together theoretical and empirical enquiry from psychology, philosophy, education, theology, history, literature . . . and the list goes on (again, as this volume attests). Fortunately, this provides a prime example of how just one moral value could form part of a university’s curricula and the number of disciplines into which it might be incorporated. On that note, it is important to highlight that the cultivation of character and virtue need not be situated within a specific virtue ethics or character strengths program. Rather, when explored in a rigorous and intelligent way, moral values can be built into existing programs and curricula. We provide a case study of this here from the University of Worcester, where the topic of gratitude has been incorporated into the existing “Introduction to Psychology” module for first-​year undergraduate students. This module aims to give students a grounding in the discipline of psychology by exploring key historical figures and introducing fundamental theories and models from the core areas of this discipline (i.e., cognitive psychology, biological psychology, social psychology, developmental psychology, and individual differences psychology). In the academic years 2017–​2018, 2018–​2019, and 2019–​2020, the essay topic for this module prompted an exploration of how these core areas of psychology have helped us to understand gratitude. Students, for example, could explore the research and theory on prosocial behaviors to explain the empirical links between gratitude and charitable giving. Alternatively, they might draw upon the development of theory of mind in children to explore how gratitude develops alongside perspective-​ taking abilities. Importantly, we can learn something about gratitude from each of the core areas of psychology that enables the lecturers to bring moral constructs into individual lecture content as well as the wider curricula and module assessment. This approach demonstrates how the core areas of psychology are symbiotic rather than distinct and also enables students to explore character and virtue in a scientific, critical, and rigorous way—​qualities that are integral to

188  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford the discipline of psychology. This approach could easily be adapted to explore a range of moral values or virtues such as empathy, compassion, honesty, or courage, for instance. It could also be used to examine character strengths that have seen a resurgence of interest in recent years, such as grit, resilience, or mindfulness.32 Crucially, the case described earlier is one in which a focus on character has been adopted within an existing program rather than building any stand-​ alone courses which can be costly and time consuming. Not only should this indicate how easily character and virtue could be incorporated into university courses, but it should also demonstrate that the approach taken can be designed to be in line with the goals and purpose of a particular discipline.33

Fostering Gratitude in Universities While educating around the construct is one way in which an appreciation and understanding of gratitude might be fostered, there are many other approaches to cultivating gratitude that could be adapted for use in higher education. The popularity of gratitude—​in educational, clinical, occupational, or home-​life settings—​is largely due to the ease with which gratitude can be practiced: common techniques include counting blessings, keeping gratitude journals (or, more recently, app-​based diaries), and writing gratitude letters. Copious research studies have demonstrated how practicing gratitude is associated with positive psychological gains, including increases in subjective well-​being and life satisfaction and reductions in anxiety and depression.34 These quick and easy practices could be adopted for use in universities—​ indeed, these would make for cost-​effective strategies for cultivating gratitude (although not necessarily gratitude in a virtuous sense unless they also incorporated the necessary conceptual reflection referenced earlier). Given the findings cited earlier, these practices could function as part of well-​being initiatives or aid with transition into university life. These approaches are likely to be successful in fostering increases in hedonic and eudaemonic well-​ being, an important goal for universities, given the rising levels of mental health problems reported by university students in recent years.35 Another case study from the University of Worcester is of relevance here. Following the COVID-​19 pandemic, the first author codeveloped a well-​being program to support student well-​being, social connection, and

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  189 learning during remote working.36 This program encompasses a focus on several character traits, including an hour-​long session on gratitude. Within this session, conceptions of gratitude (including the multicomponent view) are outlined, and gratitude practices are introduced with links to hedonic and eudaemonic well-​being (namely, experiencing positive affect, finding meaning, nurturing positive relationships, and striving for excellence). Popular gratitude techniques can be effective in cultivating a general sense of appreciation or an ability to focus on the positive aspects of one’s life.37 While this might be considered as an orientation toward gratitude, it might not be regarded as virtuous gratitude. As we argue earlier, this would depend on whether gratitude is being practiced discriminately, with sufficient consideration around the factors at play, such as intention, value, and cost, and is associated with activation of all four components of gratitude: cognitions, emotions, attitudes, and behaviors. There is evidence that suggests gratitude is important for forming and maintaining social relationships.38 Gratitude can facilitate relationship-​ forming behaviors, for example, by promoting social affiliation and socially inclusive behaviors.39 Gratitude can motivate individuals to help others, including but not limited to the original benefactor, and in this way it can fuel prosocial behaviors and an upward spiral of giving, or what has been termed “upstream reciprocity.”40 More recently, gratitude has been associated with oxytocin, and the oxytocin system is thought to play a role in binding adults into meaningful and important relationships.41 In the context of higher education, therefore, gratitude could function to facilitate the formation and maintenance of student–​student, student–​staff, and staff–​staff relationships. Encouraging a climate of giving and generosity could help to build social bonds between members of academia, and, according to the research referenced earlier, practicing gratitude is one way in which this might be achieved. Moreover, given that gratitude is positively associated with other moral values, such as empathy and compassion,42 cultivating one virtue might indirectly encourage the development of others.43 Encouraging an environment that is conducive to the cultivation of virtue, however, is no mean feat. Indeed, it has been suggested elsewhere that for character and virtue to truly thrive within universities it needs to be adopted within the institution as a whole; that is, it needs to be incorporated into teaching as well as policy and professional practices.44 It should be role-​ modeled by all its members and should be observable in classrooms, study spaces, student halls, and in offices and meeting rooms.45

190  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford There are, of course, many barriers to fostering gratitude within higher education, and we recognize that the picture we have painted just now could be considered more idealistic than realistic. Therefore, we would like to highlight two major obstacles to the cultivation of gratitude within the university, both of which are intertwined: the first is a consideration of the current higher education climate and the move toward consumerism, and the second is an issue of “supererogation” and the role of duty.

Barriers to Fostering Gratitude in University In the United Kingdom, tuition fees for university have increased astronomically in recent years with the controversial increase to £9,000 per year in 2012 and a further increase in line with inflation from 2016. This has brought with it a new era for higher education, one of consumer-​based interactions and, understandably, high expectations from its consumers. While certainly not all students view their education at university as a consumer-​based interaction, this new relationship certainly has ramifications for gratitude and cognitions around what is due by right.46 As alluded to earlier in the section “Measuring Multiple Components of Gratitude,” one conceptual controversy that surrounds gratitude is whether gratitude must involve “supererogation”—​that is, whether gratitude must go beyond what is expected or due to beneficiaries as a function of duty or obligation. This debate has been most prominent within philosophy where theorists, such as Robert C. Roberts, are advocates of conditions of supererogation. In Roberts’s paper, he speaks of a time where he experienced gratitude toward a doctor who finally prescribed him the correct medication.47 Roberts later reflected on this experience and surmised that, in fact, gratitude was not due here—​the doctor was simply fulfilling the requirements of his job. Roberts goes as far as saying that his gratitude was misguided in this situation.48 What would this condition of supererogation mean for higher education in this new consumer-​based enterprise? If supererogation were to hold here, gratitude would not be due to educators or university staff as they are simply fulfilling the duties of their job. This would be a worrying development, if true, and surely a step away from cultivating virtue within higher education. Fortunately, it is our belief that the condition of supererogation does not often hold true; our empirical work has demonstrated that the majority of

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  191 us do feel gratitude toward those who are simply doing their job.49 This empirical work, however, also demonstrates that supererogation can function as an intensifier for gratitude experience, such that those who go above and beyond duty are awarded with higher levels of gratitude in return, such as the lecturer who provides additional support sessions before an assessment is due. Certainly, these kinds of supererogatory acts will aid with the promotion of gratitude. However, it is important to reiterate here the earlier point from Oades et al. that the cultivation of character, in what they term a “positive university,” must be accommodated within policies and procedures such that there is space for, and encouragement of, such supererogatory acts.50 Indeed, as demands on higher education staff steadily increase, supererogation will become harder to achieve and more difficult to aspire to. The other side of the coin here is the notion that university staff should be grateful for their students. Indeed, there is much to be grateful for in terms of intellectual stimulation and discussion as well as personal and professional fulfilment. However, just as gratitude cannot be expected of or forced on students, the same is true for staff. We have talked at length elsewhere about the dangers of forcing gratitude, and as discussed earlier, it is our view that in order for gratitude to be cultivated as a virtue, this cultivation should address the various components that make up this complex construct.51 It is not sufficient to focus on simply increasing grateful feelings, for instance. Gratitude, like all virtues, is a multicomponent construct such that successful cultivation requires concentration on cognitions, emotions, attitudes, and behaviors.52 A particularly useful starting point, especially in higher education, is a critical consideration of what gratitude is and when it is due: the very fact that there is not a simple answer to these questions makes gratitude exploration a fruitful endeavor for universities to embrace. If gratitude can be cultivated within higher education, there is reason to believe that this could have beneficial effects on social relationships,53 well-​ being,54 coping strategies,55 and even academic performance.56 As suggested by McCullough et al., gratitude can give rise to moral behaviors, and the moral functions of gratitude do not need to be centered on personal gain but can have widespread effects, creating what might be considered a virtuous cycle of gratitude.57 In conclusion, this chapter has advocated that gratitude is a multifaceted construct and that educators seeking to cultivate gratitude in their students

192  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford should recognize its many complexities and strive to foster gratitude as a virtue in place of a sole focus on its instrumental intrapersonal or interpersonal value. Within university contexts, we have argued that character traits and virtues—​with gratitude as one example—​be examined with intellectual rigor, appropriate critical reflection, and an opportunity for open debate. Through the introduction of individual case studies, we have demonstrated how the goal of cultivating character and virtue can be incorporated into existing programs and curricula without needing specially designed virtue ethics or character strengths courses. However, an example of a stand-​alone well-​being program has also been provided as an alternate approach to cultivating character, alongside hedonic and eudaemonic well-​being. In recognition of the contextual and cultural barriers to cultivating gratitude, we have also signaled some salient barriers that educators should be mindful of when incorporating gratitude into Higher Education contexts, specifically, navigating issues of duty and supererogation. Further consideration should be paid to “positive universities” where character and virtue is adopted throughout the institution. For character and virtue to be cultivated in universities, educational curricula should be supported by university policies and practices that reinforce the cultivation of character and virtue across all levels of the organization and across all of its members.

Notes 1. See Liz Gulliford and Blaire Morgan, “An Empirical Exploration of the Normative Dimensions of Gratitude,” in Perspectives on Gratitude: An Interdisciplinary Approach, ed. David Carr (London: Routledge, 2016), 175–​188. 2. Blaire Morgan, Liz Gulliford, and Kristján Kristjánsson, “A New Approach to Examining Moral Virtues: The Multi-​Component Gratitude Measure,” Personality and Individual Differences 107 (2017): 179–​189. 3. Aristotle, On Rhetoric, trans. George Kennedy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 1385a16–​1385b11. 4. See Kristján Kristjánsson, “An Aristotelian Virtue of Gratitude,” Topoi 34, no. 2 (2013): 499–​511. 5. Kristjánsson, “An Aristotelian Virtue of Gratitude”; David Carr, “Is Gratitude a Moral Virtue?,” Philosophical Studies 172, no. 6 (2015): 1475–​1484. 6. See James Rest et al., Postconventional Moral Thinking: A Neo-​Kohlbergian Approach (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1999). 7. Howard Curzer, “Teeny Tiny Bits of Virtue,” paper presented at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues (2016). http://​www.jubile​ecen​tre.ac.uk/​userfi​les/​jubile​ecen​tre/​ pdf/​semi​nar-​pap​ers/​Curze​r_​H.pdf.

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  193 8. Curzer, “Teeny Tiny Bits of Virtue.” 9. Curzer, “Teeny Tiny Bits of Virtue.” 10. Morgan et al., “A New Approach to Examining Moral Virtues.” 11. Michael McCullough, Robert Emmons, and Jo-​ Ann Tsang, “The Grateful Disposition: A Conceptual and Empirical Topography,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 82, no. 1 (2002): 112–​127. 12. Philip Watkins et al., “Gratitude and Happiness: Development of a Measure of Gratitude, and Relationships with Subjective Well-​ being,” Social Behavior and Personality 31, no. 5 (2003): 431–​452. 13. Mitchel Adler and N. S. Fagley, “Appreciation: Individual Differences in Finding Value and Meaning as a Unique Predictor of Subjective Well-​being,” Journal of Personality 73, no. 1 (2005): 79–​114. 14. Abraham Tesser, R. D. Gatewood, and Margaret Driver, “Some Determinants of Gratitude,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 9, no. 3 (1968): 233–​236. 15. R. C. Roberts, “The Blessings of Gratitude: A Conceptual Analysis,” in The Psychology of Gratitude, ed. Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 58–​78; Terrance McConnell, Gratitude (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993). 16. Liz Gulliford, Blaire Morgan, and Kristján Kristjánsson, “Recent Work on the Concept of Gratitude in Philosophy and Psychology,” Journal of Value Inquiry 47, no. 3 (2013): 285–​317. 17. Nathaniel Lambert, Steven Graham, and Frank Fincham, “A Prototype Analysis of Gratitude: Varieties of Gratitude Experiences,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 35, no. 9 (2009): 1193–​1207; Adler and Fagley, “Appreciation.” 18. Morgan, Gulliford, and Kristjánsson, “Examining Moral Virtues,” 181–​182. 19. See the Supplementary Appendix of Morgan, Gulliford, and Kristjánsson, “Examining Moral Virtues,” for the wording of each manipulation from the baseline scenario. 20. See Liz Gulliford and Blaire Morgan, “An Empirical Exploration of the Normative Dimensions of Gratitude.” 21. See Blaire Morgan, Liz Gulliford, and David Carr, “Educating Gratitude: Some Conceptual and Moral Misgivings,” Journal of Moral Education 44, no. 1 (2015): 97–​111. 22. Morgan, Gulliford, and Kristjánsson, “Examining Moral Virtues,” 185. 23. McCullough, Emmons, and Tsang, “The Grateful Disposition,” 119. 24. Martin Seligman et al., “Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions,” American Psychologist 60, no. 5 (2005): 410–​421; Martin Seligman et al., “Positive Education: Positive Psychology and Classroom Interventions,” Oxford Review of Education 35, no. 3 (2009): 293–​311. 25. Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough, “Counting Blessings Versus Burdens: An Experimental Investigation of Gratitude and Subjective Well-​being in Daily Life,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 84, no. 2 (2003): 377–​389. 26. Seligman et al., “Positive Psychology Progress,” 416–​419. 27. Jeffrey Froh et al., “Nice Thinking! An Educational Intervention That Teaches Children How to Think Gratefully,” School Psychology Review 43, no. 2 (2014): 132–​152.

194  Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford 28. See Liz Gulliford and Blaire Morgan, “The Meaning and Valence of Gratitude in Positive Psychology,” in Critical Positive Psychology, ed. Nicholas Brown, Tim Lomas, and Francisco Eiroa-​Orosa, 53–​69 (London: Taylor & Francis, 2017). 29. See Gulliford and Morgan, “The Meaning and Valence of Gratitude”; Blaire Morgan and Liz Gulliford, “Assessing Influences on Gratitude Experience: Age-​ related Differences in How Gratitude Is Understood and Experienced,” in Developing Gratitude in Children and Adolescents, ed. Jonathan Tudge and Lia Freitas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 65–​88. 30. See Blaire Morgan, Liz Gulliford, and David Carr, “Educating Gratitude: Some Conceptual and Moral Misgivings”; David Carr, Blaire Morgan, and Liz Gulliford, “Learning and Teaching Virtuous Gratitude,” Oxford Review of Education 41, no. 6 (2015): 766–​781. 31. See Liz Gulliford, Can I Tell You about Gratitude? (London: Jessica Kingsley, 2018). 32. Angela Duckworth et al., “Grit: Perseverance and Passion for Long-​term Goals,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92, no. 6 (2007): 1087; Kirk Brown and Richard Ryan, “The Benefits of Being Present: Mindfulness and Its Role in Psychological Well-​being,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 84, no. 4 (2003): 822. 33. For an extracurricular program that seeks to cultivate gratitude as one of its focal virtues, see Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume). 34. See, for example, Emmons and McCullough, “Counting Blessings Versus Burdens”; Nancy Fagley, “Appreciation Uniquely Predicts Life Satisfaction Above Demographics, the Big 5 Personality Factors, and Gratitude,” Personality and Individual Differences 53, no. 1 (2012): 59–​63. 35. Mathias Harrer et al., “Internet Interventions for Mental Health in University Students: A Systematic Review and Meta-​analysis,” International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research 28, no. 2 (2018): e1759. 36. Blaire Morgan and Laura Simmons, “A PERMA Approach to the Pandemic: An Online Positive Education Program to Promote Wellbeing in University Students,” Frontiers in Education 6 (2021): 172, https://​doi.org/​10.3389/​feduc.2021.642632 37. Froh et al., “Nice Thinking!” 132–​152. 38. Sara Algoe, “Find, Remind, and Bind: The Functions of Gratitude in Everyday Relationships,” Social and Personality Psychology Compass 6, no. 6 (2012): 455–​469. 39. Monica Bartlett et al., “Gratitude: Prompting Behaviours That Build Relationships,” Cognition & Emotion 26, no. 1 (2012): 2–​13. 40. Monica Bartlett and David DeSteno, “Gratitude and Prosocial Behavior: Helping When It Costs You,” Psychological Science 17, no. 4 (2006): 319–​325. 41. Sara Algoe and Baldwin Way, “Evidence for a Role of the Oxytocin System, Indexed by Genetic Variation in CD38, in the Social Bonding Effects of Expressed Gratitude,” Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience 9, no. 12 (2014): 1855–​1861. 42. McCullough, Emmons, and Tsang, “The Grateful Disposition,” 115–​119. 43. See Liz Gulliford and Robert Roberts, “Exploring the ‘Unity’ of the Virtues: The Case of an Allocentric Quintet,” Theory and Psychology 28, no. 2 (2018): 208–​226; Liz Gulliford, “Strengths and Virtues: An Integrated Approach,” in Future Directions in

Cultivating Gratitude in the University  195 Wellbeing: Education, Organisations and Policy, ed. Mathew White, Gavin Slemp, and Simon Murray (Cham, CH: Springer International, 2017), 71–​74. 44. Lindsay Oades et al., “Towards a Positive University,” Journal of Positive Psychology 6, no. 6 (2011): 432–​439. 45. See also Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume). 46. On consumerism in relation to moral education in the United States, see Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume). 47. Roberts, “The Blessings of Gratitude.” 48. It should be noted that Roberts’s thinking on supererogation has subsequently been updated with a distinction made between the benefactor accomplishing more than was his/​her duty and being motivated by more than a sense of duty. See Robert C. Roberts, “The Normative and the Empirical in the Study of Gratitude,” Res Philosophica 92, no. 4 (2015): 883–​914. 49. Gulliford and Morgan, “Normative Dimensions of Gratitude.” 50. Oades et al., “Towards a Positive University,” 432–​439. 51. Morgan, Gulliford, and Carr, “Educating Gratitude,” 101–​108. 52. Morgan, Gulliford, and Kristjánsson, “Examining Moral Virtues,” 187–​188. 53. Algoe, “Find, Remind, and Bind,” 455–​469; Bartlett et al., “Gratitude,” 2–​13. 54. Emmons and McCullough, “Counting Blessings Versus Burdens,” 377–​389. 55. Alex Wood, Stephen Joseph, and Alex Linley, “Coping Style as a Psychological Resource of Grateful People,” Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology 26, no. 9 (2007): 1076–​1093. 56. Froh et al., “Gratitude and the Reduced Costs of Materialism in Adolescents,” Journal of Happiness Studies 12, no. 2 (2011): 289–​302. 57. Michael McCullough et al., “Is Gratitude a Moral Affect?,” Psychological Bulletin 127, no. 2 (2001): 249.

10 Forming Virtuous Character Perspectives from Psychology and Christian Theology Joanna Collicutt

This chapter approaches the question of cultivating virtue in the university from an interdisciplinary perspective: that of psychology and Christian theology. This approach needs to be distinguished from the related fields of psychology of religion (using psychology to study religious behavior) and pastoral psychology (applying psychology to Christian pastoral care).1 Elsewhere I have described this approach as “creative dialogue” in which the disciplines of psychology and theology offer complementary perspectives on the same topic to give an enriched description, or in which the insights of one are used to advance the agenda of the other.2 The chapter begins with a brief consideration of virtue from the perspectives of the Christian tradition and positive psychology before introducing the related concept of character. There follows a case study of virtuous health care that is then applied to the issue of cultivating virtue in higher education, with a particular focus on the way that this might be fruitfully informed by a consideration of the character of Jesus of Nazareth.

Virtue in the Christian Tradition Christian approaches to virtue have their origin in the Law of Moses, which is summarized by Jesus as “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind” and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”3 Jesus says that this pronouncement also sums up the preaching of the Prophets, such as Micah 6:8: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”4

​

​

Forming Virtuous Character  197 The third division of the Hebrew Bible, the Writings, includes wisdom literature. Much of this relates to what might now be termed virtue. The book of Proverbs, an essentially pedagogical document, offers systematic advice on how to live life well, and Chapter 30 presents an extended profile of a virtuous woman. As with the Law and the Prophets, questions of morality and ethics are here contextualized within larger theological considerations: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.”5 Jesus’s own teaching refreshes and renews this inherited tradition, crucially approaching it from an urgently eschatological perspective. His discussion of virtuous living takes place in the context of his proclamation of the imminent arrival of what he called the Kingdom of God, a kingdom whose rules of conduct were in several respects in conflict with his society’s understanding of what it meant to live a life of civic and religious virtue. For example, his pronouncements on loyalty to the birth family were (and remain) particularly challenging in this respect. Consider, for instance, his call to “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”6 This radical eschatological perspective is also characteristic of the writings of St. Paul. His description of virtuous living is crafted for specific local contexts and an interim time between the first coming of Christ and his return, during which the Holy Spirit is available to believers to assist them in the process.7 While the core principles might be understood as eternal, much of the detail is essentially setting out provisional guidelines for living well during a time of waiting. Paul was influenced by both Hebraic and Graeco-​Roman thought, and the concept, if not the language, of “the virtues” can be seen in his writings at several points. Plato identified four principal virtues in The Republic: temperance, prudence, justice, and courage. These are understood to be human attributes. In contrast, the New Testament, like the Hebrew Bible before it, understands virtues to come ultimately from God, using the language of spiritual fruit,8 clothing,9 and armor.10 Its emphasis is not so much on the Platonic virtues (though these are often implicit) but rather on bodily purity, truthfulness, kindness, faithfulness, peace-​making, and humility. As in the teaching of Jesus, it is made clear that the practice of these qualities must emanate from something more fundamental: agapē, usually translated as love or charity. As expectations of the imminent return of Christ began to fade, and with the rise of Christendom, the theology and ethics of Jesus and the first Christians became uncoupled from its original eschatological context and

198  Joanna Collicutt was reappropriated and reworked into a single systematic, timeless, and universalist account of Christian virtue. Ambrose of Milan (340–​397) took the four Platonic virtues, which he termed “cardinal,” and reinterpreted them in Christianized form as gifts from God.11 In the history of the church, these virtues have been placed alongside, but are seen as qualitatively distinct from, the Christian virtues12 of faith, hope, and agape;13 the last three are transitive and directed specifically toward God. This overall framework has proved both pleasing and enduring; it involves the magic numbers of three and seven, which respectively have resonances with the Trinity and the completeness of God.

Virtue in Positive Psychology At the turn of the twentieth century, a new movement emerged within the field of academic empirical psychology. A key point in its development was Martin Seligman’s 1998 presidential address to the American Psychological Association in which he asserted that, through its postwar obsession with mental ill-​health (largely driven by funding sources), psychology had lost its way: The message of the positive psychology movement is to remind our field that it has been deformed. Psychology is not just the study of disease, weakness, and damage; it is also the study of strength and virtue. Treatment is not just fixing what is wrong; it also is building what is right. Psychology is not just about illness or health; it is also about work, education, insight, love, growth, and play. And in this quest . . . positive psychology . . . tries to adapt what is best in the scientific method to the unique problems that human behavior presents in all its complexity.14

The aspiration of this fledgling movement was to construct a robust theoretical framework and rigorous empirical methodology for the study of human “positives.” Seligman and his colleagues, most notably Christopher Peterson, invoked the language of virtue at an early stage in the enterprise but approached it from a biological rather than a philosophical or theological perspective. Their provisional hypothesis was that virtues “are universal, perhaps grounded in biology through an evolutionary process that selected for these aspects of excellence as means of solving the important tasks necessary

Forming Virtuous Character  199 for survival of the species.”15 Drawing an analogy with personality theory,16 they took the view that a limited number of virtues underlie a greater number of habitual patterns of behavior on which a community places moral value.17 So, just as the personality dimension of extraversion is expressed in habitual sociability, risk taking, stimulation seeking, and so on, the virtue of courage might be expressed in habitual bravery, perseverance, honesty, and so on. On this understanding, personality dimensions and virtues are theoretical, second-​order constructs, but the behavioral patterns that express them can be observed and recorded. Representative writings from the philosophical and religious traditions of the world were systematically examined in the search for a set of habitual behaviors that are held in high esteem by all cultures. The writings were initially drawn from Athenian philosophy, Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Taoism, and subsequent research has gone even wider.18 The habitual behavior patterns that were finally identified were termed “character strengths.” Twenty-​four character strengths were found to be ubiquitous, though not completely universal, across the cultures examined. These were in turn grouped under six headings taken to represent the underlying “virtues”: wisdom and knowledge; courage; humanity; justice; temperance; and transcendence. This taxonomy was dubbed Values in Action (VIA) and published in 2004 as an eight-​hundred-​ page handbook, which includes questionnaire measures of each character strength and reviews of the empirical research relating to it, all of which has stimulated a massive program of subsequent research.19 The distinctive features of this psychological approach to virtue are, first, that it is essentially descriptive rather than prescriptive: it documents human cultural values without passing judgment on them. Second, its aim has been to operationalize virtue into behavioral patterns that can be reliably measured (hence the inclusion of “action” in its title). This gives it a high degree of analytic power, enabling the identification of factors that may enhance or inhibit particular character strengths.20 More practically, operationalization opens up the possibility of measuring the success of interventions designed to develop particular character strengths.21 Third, and perhaps most usefully, this approach shifts attention from the rather vague and theoretical concept of virtue to the more specific and embodied issue of virtuous character. Positive psychology is, of course, a secular approach that understands virtue and character to be human attributes rather than divine gifts. Bringing it into creative dialogue with Christian theology therefore poses something

200  Joanna Collicutt of a challenge. Nevertheless, a number of writers have attempted to do this with at least a degree of success.22 My own attempt at this dialogue was published in 2015 as The Psychology of Christian Character Formation.23 Here, rather than beginning with a list of disembodied virtues drawn from either the Christian tradition or the VIA, I attempted an analysis of the virtuous character of Jesus of Nazareth. On the face of it, this is logical from a Christian perspective. After all, Christianity’s most distinctive teaching is that the morally perfect but ultimately unknowable divine became an embodied human being with an observable personality and character in a specific time and place. Therefore, a Christian need look no further for a model of moral excellence. I will return to this point at the end of the chapter. First, and bearing in mind that the subject of this book is a system rather than an individual, I want to consider an example of a virtuous system in the area of health care.

Virtuous Rehabilitation Practice In the early 1990s, I was working as a clinical psychologist in an internationally renowned unit for the rehabilitation of people who had survived very serious brain injury caused by stroke or traumatic incidents (most commonly, road traffic accidents). They no longer needed acute medical or surgical treatment but had been left with complex physical and cognitive impairments. The approach was essentially educative (teaching them to walk, talk, and remember again). At this time, I undertook a research project that involved in-​depth interviews with about one hundred of these patients. Two of them (ironically both of whom had problems with verbal communication) expressed a deep sense of unhappiness with the regime that was being operated at the unit in remarkably pithy form: “You treat us like bits and pieces of people.” “There are programs but there is no project. There is no connection with a wider sense of purpose in my life.” These phrases summed up for me a problem with the ethos of the unit that had been concerning me for some time. It was efficient and humane, but it delivered therapy in a fragmented fashion; each rehabilitation professional (physiotherapist, occupational therapist, doctor, speech and language therapist, etc.) dealt with her “bit” of the patient in isolation. The professional, not the patient, decided on the treatment goals, which were framed largely in medical language and focused on independence in

Forming Virtuous Character  201 activities of daily living. Yet when I talked to the patients, I found that because their condition had already broken and dislocated them, they expressed an acute need to be treated as whole integrated human beings. Moreover, I found that independence was only important to them insofar as it enabled them to achieve more fundamental goals to do with roles and relationships. This mismatch between the agenda of the institution and its patients frequently led to problems with “compliance” and outbursts of challenging behavior. In the light of my analysis, the staff at the unit decided to change the way that we did rehabilitation by setting treatment goals in a new way. Presciently in tune with positive psychology,24 we began framing our goals in terms of positive achievements rather than the elimination of problems. Moreover, we made three crucial shifts of focus in these goals: from professionally driven to patient-​centered; from the language of task performance to that of social roles and relationships; and from multidisciplinary to interdisciplinary implementation. This was achieved by developing detailed protocols and documentation and investing heavily in staff (re)training. We devised a questionnaire and structured interview aimed at eliciting the basis of each patient’s sense of identity, values, and motivation, and we set goals in line with these collaboratively with patients and relatives. Because these goals were more holistic than before, they often involved professionals from a number of disciplines working in active cooperation with each other rather than in professional silos. The goals were tailored to the needs, values, and motives of each patient, so, while some general principles applied, each patient’s goals were unique. This work was initially written up in a series of published papers. These had a great influence on clinical practice in the field, and in the following years, versions of the program were introduced across the United Kingdom and in Europe.25 Demonstrating the clinical effectiveness and efficiency of this approach has proved challenging for technical reasons, but there is evidence that it has a positive impact on emotional status, health-​related quality of life, and sense of self-​efficacy.26 These positive findings are perhaps not surprising; at the same time that we were developing patient-​centered goal planning, social psychologists were, quite separately, becoming interested in the relationship between well-​being and life goals.27 Their research findings indicate that where the goals pursued in daily life have a clear relationship to a person’s felt identity (they are “self-​concordant”), there will be a sense of authenticity and autonomy. Where they are not, there will be a sense of alienation or even disorientation. Where the different goals a person is pursuing hang

202  Joanna Collicutt together well and are “coherent,” there will be a sense of integration. Where they pull in different directions, there will be a sense of chaos and stress or even disintegration.28 Moreover, everyday emotions are quite closely tied to the individual’s appraisal of success in achieving their goals. This is a particularly important factor in educational settings, including that of rehabilitation where people are engaged in relearning life skills, and it may explain why a clear and personally relevant system of goal planning that includes timely feedback on progress has a positive impact on the psychosocial status of rehabilitation patients.29 Personal relevance is important because, as clinicians have increasingly come to recognize, the core issue following brain injury—​that for which roles and relationships are a cipher—​is that of identity: “The aim of rehabilitation is . . . to support the person . . . in establishing a new sense of identity continuous with, but not stuck in, the past, while managing the medical complications, pain, and emotional distress that arise during the process.”30 And, as the Christian spiritual writer Thomas Merton points out, identity is in its turn closely connected with goals: You think you can identify a man by giving his date of birth and his address, his height, his eyes’ color, even his fingerprints. . . . But if you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I think I am living for, in detail, and ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for. Between these two answers you can determine the identity of any person.31

Can a health system that places overriding importance on the personal identity of its patients be considered virtuous? In other words, can it be said to aspire to moral excellence? In 2007, I published a book on rehabilitation ethics suggesting that it can.32 Because it is both holistic and individualized, it can be considered not just patient-​centered but person-​centered, thus intentionally affirming the personhood of very damaged individuals and placing them within the scope of human moral obligation.33 In order to have initiated a change in ethos and to maintain the new ethos, it has to be reflexive and self-​ critical. Moreover, it requires its practitioners to embrace virtuous attitudes, in particular hope and compassion in a context where despair and emotional detachment are always temptations, and to cultivate wisdom to deal with

Forming Virtuous Character  203 the challenging clinical and human dilemmas that often arise.34 A virtuous system will only work properly if it is implemented by virtuous characters. The system is based on certain assumptions: • Life is going somewhere, and our practice always needs to keep this end in mind. • Each human being is unique and precious and must be unconditionally treasured as such—​they can never be a “product.” • Organizations work best when each part is equally respected and all work collaboratively for the common end. • Human beings exist in communities, and human significance only makes sense in relational terms. While not explicitly Christian, these assumptions are deeply aligned with Christian theology, which asserts the teleological nature of time and space, interpreting reality through the story of creation and redemption. It understands the Christian life as highly goal-​directed. This is expressed in numerous ways in the New Testament and Christian spiritual traditions but is essentially about moving morally and relationally toward the Trinitarian God while stripping off the encumbrances that impede this journey.35 Furthermore, this journey is not primarily that of the individual but that of a baptized community that is being constantly renewed and transformed en route to its goal, which is often described in terms of maturity or completeness.36 More fundamentally, this goal is about identity—​becoming like Christ and ultimately being drawn through Christ into the Godhead itself. Hence, the common observation that New Testament ethics can be summed up by “Become who you are!” Or, to put it another way, “Make sure that your goals are self-​concordant.” In order to function well, the community’s goals should also be coherent. The New Testament epistles emphasize the importance of the relationships of the individual members both with each other and the corporate whole; all should work together for the common good—​a silo mentality is not an option.37 In summary, a goal-​focused system whose goals are framed in terms of personal identity and implemented through interdisciplinary practice in which professionals both assist and learn from each other (and their patients) can be said to be not simply virtuous but to exhibit a specific form of virtue aligned with Christian values.

204  Joanna Collicutt

Virtue in the University Higher education has several points in common with rehabilitation practice but also significant differences. The obvious commonality is that a process of instruction and learning is central to the enterprise. The issue of identity is equally important. University undergraduates are at a key point of transition in their lives during which issues of identity are dominant.38 This is also true for older learners who may be using a period of study to renegotiate a sense of self and self-​worth. The psychological task is to work out a provisional sense of who one is in the context of one’s learning and social relationships and, for many, a geographical location that is removed from one’s origins. The learning that takes place in universities is not confined to the academic subject but involves the whole of life. The difference between a university and an intensive rehabilitation unit is largely one of scale and staff-​student/​patient ratio. The sheer volume of students and the workload of academics in the areas of teaching, research, and administration seem to be increasing relentlessly. This is also true of the health service, and the work practices that I have described could be said to be the privilege of a very few specialist centers that have the staffing levels that can support them. Both health care and university education are becoming more impersonal. Despite the best efforts of staff, graduation ceremonies can feel like massive circuses at which cohorts officially reach the end of their production lines. Perhaps more than anything else, a sense of a learning community needs to be cherished where it exists and reestablished where it has been lost. The differences between the virtuous rehabilitation case study and the current situation in higher education are too great for the practical details of one to be directly applicable to the other. However, the principles of a goal-​ directed, person-​centered, and interdisciplinary approach are transferable. First, both systems are goal-​directed, and it is important to reflect on the nature of the ultimate goal. The first virtue identified by the VIA is also the one that has been found to evoke the greatest degree of consensus across cultures: “wisdom and knowledge.” It seems reasonable to view education in general, and higher education in particular, to be aimed at the development of wisdom. Concepts of wisdom vary, but they usually emphasize the integration of different types of knowledge, the importance of lived experience, and embodiment of this in the lives of wise individuals. Thus, personal contact and opportunities for apprenticeship modes of learning will be vital

Forming Virtuous Character  205 to its successful transmission.39 One definition of wisdom from the field of positive psychology is “Orchestrating mind and virtue to excellence [in] the art of life.”40 The medieval mystic and scholar, Meister Eckhart, goes further, seeing the goal of education as extending even beyond the wisdom of living life well: “If the ignorant are not taught they will never learn, and none of them will ever know the art of living and dying.”41 Second, framing learning outcomes in the language of social role and personal identity rather than exclusively in terms of instrumental task performance is likely to increase perceived personal relevance to students. This in turn may increase their engagement with the learning process and enhance generalization to areas of life beyond the classroom. The need is to connect with Merton’s “what I think I am living for, in detail” so that academic learning is incorporated into an overall life project of pursuing self-​ concordant goals and thus personal authenticity. This focus on educating wise and authentic individuals provides a potential counternarrative to professional, institutional, and government accounts that rationalize the imposition of centrally determined capricious targets on organizations, including universities. It offers the possibility of reclaiming scholarship as vocation.42 This is not merely an ideological aspiration; it has functional consequences: the perception that one’s daily work is a personal vocation has been found to be associated with higher staff morale and better workplace communication.43 Finally, the partition of knowledge into silos should be resisted. “Bits and pieces” of knowledge make for a fragmented learning community. The division of “common knowledge” into specialist intellectual disciplines largely organized around the creative arts, humanities, and sciences is a relatively recent development of the last two hundred years.44 Such specialization has achieved great depths of understanding in each field but arguably at the expense of breadth and the opportunity for cross-​ disciplinary integration. Pursuing doctoral study in an interdisciplinary area is seen as risky and ill-​advised; there are few interdisciplinary academic positions, and an interest in more than one field can be seen as signifying a dilettante attitude. Yet the cost of this can be personal and cultural fragmentation, where different approaches to knowledge are seen as in competition or conflict with each other.45 The process of choosing a small range of subjects to study (and therefore rejecting others) can be stressful for young people, precisely because it seems to be foreclosing their identity prematurely. Anecdotally, it is

206  Joanna Collicutt interesting that learners who return to university in later life often choose to study a subject that they were forced to relinquish as young people. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge have a distinct character, being made up not only of divisions, departments, and faculties defined by subject specialties, but of colleges whose memberships are typically interdisciplinary. Indeed, their original vision related to character formation. While these bodies can be seen as archaic and elitist, there is an argument for rediscovering their founding ethos and applying it more widely in higher education. They are (relatively) small in scale and can encourage integration through regular interdisciplinary communication and the development of a common discourse that can break into the echo chamber that can be characteristic of single-​subject discourse. In this sort of environment, there is at least a chance that the different goals within the wider organization might come together in a cooperative fashion rather than pull against each other.

“To teach his brethren and inspire”: Jesus of Nazareth Some of what I have commended here resonates strongly with John Henry Newman’s argument in his 1852 lectures, The Idea of a University.46 Writing just at the time when the specialist disciplines were beginning to be seriously established in Britain, Newman saw the ideal university as a community of scholars pursuing knowledge as an end in itself and covering a broad range of subjects. He freely acknowledged that academic learning alone is insufficient for the formation of virtuous character; something more is required. Newman is perhaps better known for his sacred poetry. In one famous stanza from The Dream of Gerontius of 1865, he writes of Christ: And in the garden secretly, and on the cross on high, should teach his brethren, and inspire to suffer and to die.47

Here, in words strongly reminiscent of the Eckhart quote from earlier, Newman presents the incarnation not just as an act of divine solidarity with human beings but also as a means of instilling virtuous character through the inspirational example of the human being—​ the “second Adam.”48 For Christians, Jesus is the ultimate example of how to live life and to face death well.

Forming Virtuous Character  207 Earlier in this chapter, I referred to my attempt to analyze the virtuous character of Jesus of Nazareth with a view to bringing into conversation with some of the findings of positive psychology that might support those whose intention is to imitate it. While apparently logical, this focus on Jesus is actually an unusual approach in the history of Christianity and is often viewed as problematic on several fronts. First, the rise of historical and literary critical approaches to the Bible has demonstrated that retrieving reliable information about the character of Jesus of Nazareth is complicated and difficult (some would claim impossible) because the accounts of his life are edited to serve theological and political agendas and were written long after the events in question. Second, as early Christianity moved beyond its first generation, the divine status and soteriological function of the “Christ of faith” began to eclipse the life and teaching of the “Jesus of history,”49 and continues to do so. Related to this, there can be a psychological barrier to the use of Jesus as a model of human virtuous character; he can seem too perfect, too distant, too “other.” It has become more traditional to look instead to the saints of Christian history, beginning with John the Baptist.50 Yet the character of Jesus of Nazareth cannot be excluded from discourse on Christian virtue, given that Christianity has from earliest times been construed as contemplating and following both his teachings and his example.51 While it is not possible to reconstruct an “objective” historical Jesus from the pages of the New Testament, this does not mean that he is absent from them. He left such an impression (or more correctly, multiple impressions) on his followers that many were prepared to face martyrdom for living in its light. Thus, while it is not appropriate to read the New Testament as a historical record of Jesus of Nazareth in the modern sense of that term, it is appropriate to understand it as reminiscence: “Jesus remembered.”52 In this spirit my book tried to trace the impressions left by Jesus of Nazareth on the memories of those who had known him in terms of his habitual (characteristic) practices: “remember how he used to . . . .” These impressions are to be found in the four Gospels but also at several points in other New Testament writings. I used a number of criteria to ensure that the practices in question could be described as habitual, and I focused only on those that are presented as exemplary (and therefore morally excellent) either by Jesus himself or by others in the text. For example, Jesus is presented on several occasions as both taking on a “servant” role and instructing his followers to do likewise, while Paul describes Jesus as having taken the form of a “slave” and encourages Christians to be of the same mind.53

208  Joanna Collicutt Using this method, I was able to identify principles that form a framework within which to describe Jesus’s virtuous character: • Deep intimacy with the divine (expressed as a sense of secure attachment, sense of self-​worth, and place in the world) • Humility (expressed as an intentional setting aside of entitlement) • Attentiveness (to the small scale, ordinary, marginal, and the natural world) • Personal coherence (expressed in an appropriate balance of work, play, contemplation, and action) • Hospitality (expressed as openness to and engagement with “the other”) • Compassion (expressed in embodied seeing, feeling, and effective action aimed at righting wrongs) • Nonretaliation (not rendering evil for evil) • Wisdom (expressed in a parabolic genre that connects the apparently disconnected and sensitivity to timeliness) • Generative transformation of suffering and adversity (suffering and dying well). This is an example—​ Christians would say the example—​ of virtue expressed primarily in embodied form in the life of a virtuous individual, taught largely by modeling actions, sometimes with added explanation (washing feet with commentary rather than a sermon on humility54), initially using an apprenticeship model with those who were then instructed to do likewise. It is only secondary analysis that generates more general underlying principles or “virtues.” While related to both the traditional seven Christian virtues and those of the VIA (the VIA anyway being somewhat dependent on scholastic Christian theology), this framework is distinct from them, being more grounded in records of the human life of Jesus. I was thus able to bring it into noncircular and fruitful conversation with empirical work conducted within the framework of the VIA in order to explore ways in which psychology could support the cultivation of a distinctively Jesus-​focused virtuous character. Translating these characteristics into a form appropriate to a secular higher education environment entails only small modification: • Developing a clear sense of identity, self-​worth, and place in the world • Being able to set aside a sense of entitlement

Forming Virtuous Character  209 • Attentive to the small scale, ordinary, and marginal; respectful of the natural world • Pursuing an appropriate balance of work, play, contemplation, and action • Being open and prepared to engage with “the other” • Having a passion for social justice and care • Being responsive rather than reactive, not compounding evil • Being able to integrate different fields of knowledge or apply knowledge across different situations • Developing resilience in the face of suffering and adversity, learning to accept human limitation and mortality. A university that, alongside academic instruction, cultivates these characteristics in its students, teachers, administrators, and support staff would thus be a university with a Christian soul, even as it celebrates its members of all faiths and none. Findings from positive psychology and from other areas of the human and social sciences provide a rich and as yet largely untapped resource that could inform the implementation of this aspirational vision.

Notes 1. See Fraser Watts, Theology and Psychology (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2002), 1–​3. 2. Joanna Collicutt, The Psychology of Christian Character Formation (London: SCM Press, 2015), 45. 3. Matt. 13:37, 13:39, drawing on Deut. 6:5 and Lev. 19:18 NRSV. 4. Mic. 6:8. 5. Prov. 9:10a. 6. Matt. 8:22b. 7. See, e.g., 1 Cor. 7:29–​31. 8. Gal. 5:22. 9. Eph. 4: 22–​32; Col. 3: 12–​17. 10. Eph. 6:10–​18; 1 Thess. 5:8. 11. Ambrose, De Officiis, ed. and trans. Ivor Davidson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 1.29.142. 12. Paul refers to these in the context of a discussion of spiritual gifts, not virtues. 13. 1 Cor. 13:13; 1 Thess. 1:13. See, for example, Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 2nd, rev. ed., trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (New Advent, 1920): II–​II.1–​7; 17–​21; 23, 27. http://​w ww.newadv​ent.org/​summa/​ 2001.htm.

210  Joanna Collicutt 14. Martin Seligman, “Positive Psychology, Positive Prevention, and Positive Therapy,” in Handbook of Positive Psychology, ed. C. R. Snyder and Shane Lopez (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 4. 15. Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman, Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 13. On evolutionary accounts of virtue, see also Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 16. Robert McCrae and Paul Costa, Personality in Adulthood (New York: Guilford Press, 1990). 17. Christopher Peterson and Nansook Park, “Classifying and Measuring Strengths of Character,” in Oxford Handbook of Positive Psychology, ed. Shane Lopez and C. R. Snyder, Oxford Library of Psychology (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 25–​34. 18. For a fuller account of the process involved, see Collicutt, Psychology, 57. 19. Peterson and Seligman, Character Strengths and Virtues. Miller draws on this work in Chapter 8 (this volume). 20. For example, low self-​esteem appears to inhibit readiness to offer interpersonal forgiveness. See Nathaniel G. Wade, Everett L. Worthington, Jr., and Julia E. Meyer, “But Do They Work? A Meta-​Analysis of Group Interventions to Promote Forgiveness,” in Handbook of Forgiveness, ed. Everett L. Worthington, Jr. (New York: Brunner-​ Routledge, 2005), 423–​439. 21. Martin Seligman et al., “Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions,” American Psychologist 60, (2005): 410–​421. 22. See, for example, F. Leron Shults and Steven Sandage, Transforming Spirituality: Integrating Theology and Psychology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006); Jennifer S. Ripley and Everett L. Worthington, Jr., Couple Therapy: A New Hope-​focused Approach (Westmont, IL: IVP, 2013). 23. Collicutt, Psychology. 24. Joanna Collicutt McGrath, “Recovery from Brain Injury and Positive Rehabilitation Practice,” in Trauma, Recovery and Growth: Positive Psychological Perspectives on Posttraumatic Stress, ed. Stephen Joseph and Alex Linley (New York: Wiley, 2008), 259–​274. 25. Joanna Collicutt McGrath and Udo Kischka, “Interdisziplinare Teamarbeit und Zielsetzung in der Rehabilitation,” in NeuroRehabilitation: Ein Praxisbuch fur Interdisziplinare Teams, ed. Peter Frommelt and Hubert Losslein (Heidelberg: Springer, 2011), 259–​274; Joanna Collicutt McGrath, “Post Acute Rehabilitation Following Traumatic Brain Injury,” in Psychological Approaches to Rehabilitation After Traumatic Brain Injury, ed. Andy Tyerman and Nigel King (Oxford: BPS-​Blackwell, 2008), 39–​ 64; Derick T. Wade, “Editorial: Goal Setting in Rehabilitation: An Overview of What, Why and How,” Clinical Rehabilitation 23, no. 4 (2009): 291–​295. 26. William M. M. Levack, Mark Weatherall, E. Jean C. Hay-​Smith, Sarah G. Dean, Kathryn McPherson, and Richard J. Siegert, Goal Setting and Strategies to Enhance Goal Pursuit for Adults with Acquired Disability Participating in Rehabilitation (Review), The Cochrane Collaboration (London: Wiley, 2015). 27. Robert Emmons, The Psychology of Ultimate Concerns (New York: Guilford, 2003).

Forming Virtuous Character  211 28. Kennon Sheldon and Tim Kasser, “Coherence and Congruence: Two Aspects of Personality Integration,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 68, no. 3 (1995): 531–​ 543; Kennon Sheldon and Andrew Elliot, “Goal Striving, Need Satisfaction, and Longitudinal Well-​being: The Self-​concordance Model,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 76, no. 3 (1999): 482–​497. 29. Joanna McGrath and Louise Adams, “Patient-​centred Goal Planning: A Systemic Psychological Therapy?” Topics in Stroke Rehabilitation 6, no. 2 (1999): 43–​50; Richard Siegert, Kathryn McPherson, and William Taylor, “Toward a Cognitive-​ affective Model of Goal-​setting in Rehabilitation: Is Self-​regulation Theory a Key Step?,” Disability & Rehabilitation 26, no. 20 (2004): 1175–​1183. 30. Joanna Collicutt McGrath, Ethical Practice in Brain Injury Rehabilitation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 47. 31. Thomas Merton, My Argument with the Gestapo (New York: New Directions, 1969), 160–​161. 32. Collicutt McGrath, Ethical Practice. 33. Collicutt McGrath, Ethical Practice, 33–​39. 34. Collicutt McGrath, Ethical Practice, 79–​82. 35. For example, Matt. 19:20–​21; Phil. 3:12–​14. 36. E.g., Matt. 5:48; Eph. 4:15. 37. Rom. 12:4–​5; 1 Cor. 12:12–​31; Eph. 4:4–​16; Col. 2:19. 38. Erik Erikson, Identity and the Life Cycle (New York: International Universities Press, 1959). See also Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume). 39. Paul Fiddes, Seeing the World and Knowing God: Hebrew Wisdom and Christian Doctrine in a Late-​modern Context (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 351. 40. Paul Baltes and Ursula Staudinger, “Wisdom: A Metaheuristic (Pragmatic) to Orchestrate Mind and Virtue Toward Excellence,” American Psychologist 55, no. 1 (2000): 122–​136; Ursula Staudinger, “Older and Wiser? Integrating Results on the Relationship Between Age and Wisdom-​related Performance,” International Journal of Behavioral Development 23, no. 3 (1999): 641–​664. 41. Raymond Blakney, Meister Eckhart: A Modern Translation (New York: Harper Torch Brothers, 1941), xxiii. 42. See also Wellmon, Chapter 3 (this volume). 43. Amy Wrzesniewski, “Finding Positive Meaning in Work,” in Positive Organizational Scholarship: Foundations of a New Discipline, ed. Kim Cameron, Jane Dutton, and Robert Quinn, 296–​308 (San Francisco, CA: Berrett-​Koehler, 2003). 44. Robin Valenza, Literature, Language, and the Rise of the Intellectual Disciplines in Britain, 1680–​1820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 45. Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (New York: Bantam Books, 2006); Iain McGilchrist, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009). 46. John Henry Newman, The Idea of a University (London: Longmans, Green, 1852). 47. John Henry Newman, The Dream of Gerontius (1865 & multiple subsequent editions), Phase V, final stanza. 48. 1 Cor. 15:45, 15:47.

212  Joanna Collicutt 49. Christopher Rowland, Christian Origins (London: SPCK, 2002). 50. See, for example, Rowland Jones, Reflections for Sundays, Year B (London: Church House, 2017), 43: “While we should often ask ourselves ‘What would Jesus do?’, in important ways we are not Jesus Christ. He alone is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Therefore it may often be more helpful to ask what John the Baptist might do.” 51. Matt. 28:19–​20; Acts 9:2, 19:9, 19:23. 52. James Dunn, Jesus Remembered (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2003). 53. Phil. 2:7, 2:5. 54. John 13.3–​17.

11 Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen Jessica Richard

It is hardly surprising to propose Jane Austen as an author whose works offer an occasion for examining the cultivation of virtue in the university. From Archbishop Richard Whately, who praised the subtlety of her works’ moral lessons in 1821 (“it necessarily follows that a novel . . . becomes a far more instructive work . . . it guides the judgment”), to the commentary of critics such as F. R. Leavis (“the principle of organization, and the principle of development, in her work is an intense moral interest of her own in life”) and Lionel Trilling (“the great charm, the charming greatness, of Pride and Prejudice is that it permits us to conceive of morality as style”), Austen has been seen as a moral writer.1 And this view persists, as we can see in a more recent short assessment called “Reading Jane Austen as a Moral Philosopher,” published by a philosophy graduate student in the magazine Philosophy Now: “Austen is primarily concerned with setting up particular scenes—​moral trials—​in which we can see how virtuous characters behave in testing circumstances.”2 Such a reading recapitulates many critical accounts that emphasize the lessons characters—​especially women—​purportedly learn over the course of Austen’s novels. The scholar Eve Sedgwick once lambasted Austen criticism for “its unresting exaction of the spectacle of a Girl Being Taught a Lesson”; critics of a certain era seemed to be obsessed with performing disciplinary-​ didactic readings of Austen’s works. Sedgwick pulls lines from the scholar Tony Tanner to illustrate this, though he is hardly the only offender: “Emma . . . has to be tutored . . . into correct vision and responsible speech. Anne Elliot has to move, painfully, from an excessive prudence.” “Some Jane Austen heroines have to learn their true ‘duties.’ They all have to find their proper homes.” Catherine “quite literally is in danger of perverting reality and one of the things she has to learn is to break out of quotations”; she “has to be disabused of her naïve and foolish ‘Gothic’ expectations.” [Elizabeth and Darcy] “have to learn to see that their novel is more properly called . . .”3

​

​

214  Jessica Richard The moral aims of Austen’s works have often been discerned in their supposed education and discipline of wayward characters as much as in their supposed display of the proper behavior of virtuous characters. Another long-​lived strain in criticism of Austen’s novels as laboratories of virtue imagines that just as Austen skewers her foolish and/​or immoral characters, she would look upon her readers with that same “regulated hatred” (as D. W. Harding memorably put it in 1941): her “books are . . . read and enjoyed by precisely the sort of people whom she disliked.”4 The postgraduate philosophy student quoted earlier similarly notes that “The omniscient author of her books sees right through people to their moral character, and then exposes and dissects their follies, flaws, and self-​deceptions. I cannot read one of her novels without thinking, with a shiver, about what that penetrating moral gaze would reveal if directed at me.”5 Thus, while Austen examines the moral lapses of her characters, her readers imagine—​or worry—​that she would similarly dissect them. We might laugh at Lydia or Mr. Collins, but what if we are no better than they are, and Austen knows it? Yet another way of reading the supposed virtuous tendencies of Austen’s novels is to highlight the subversive direction of their satire. Thus, Austen is seen to anticipate liberal, feminist virtues by showcasing patriarchal corruption, female resilience, the insufficiencies of heteronormativity, or the moral vacuity inherent in a domestic model dependent on a slave economy. Here is an Austen whose works highlight the privileges of wealthy, sometimes morally weak men, and the powerlessness of women who sometimes nonetheless find solace in sisterly solidarity.6 My teaching of Austen in the university classroom offers another way of thinking of her as a “moral” writer, neither as a writer who inculcates traditional values, whether through affirmation or satire, nor as one who subverts them. Instead, I teach Pride and Prejudice as a text that interrogates the very definition of virtue, not in order to offer its own definition or standard of virtue, but to highlight virtue’s elusiveness. In the end, I suggest, the recognition of virtue’s elusiveness becomes itself a virtuous practice. How can we assess the virtue of others? What are the markers or signs of virtue? How can we know if the people we meet are good people? These questions animate the novel’s plot. Pride and Prejudice shows us characters wrestling with this challenge and, through Austen’s use of particular techniques of fictional form, gives readers practice in it as well. Yet even as it offers this practice in assessing the virtue of others, the novel demonstrates its limits; there is no

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  215 guaranteed approach to assessing others’ virtue. Ultimately, rather than teach us lessons either of a traditional or subversive kind, Pride and Prejudice leaves unanswered the questions it raises about how to know others. And it is the particular province of literature to render this complexity, to leave questions unanswered, to sustain the practice of assessing virtue (both for characters and readers) while also demonstrating the limitations of this practice. Why is assessing the virtue of others important? Shouldn’t we focus on developing our own virtue, on behaving according to our own high moral standards? Pride and Prejudice shows that because we live in community, our own virtue is inextricable from that of others; when we assess others inaccurately, we cannot be effective agents of virtue ourselves. Thus, when Elizabeth Bennett reads Darcy’s explanatory letter in the middle of the novel, learning how she has misjudged Darcy leads not to a reassessment of his character but to a revelation of her own: she had been “blind, partial, prejudiced, absurd,” and “till this moment I never knew myself.”7 Ultimately, the novel shows that virtue lies in our continuous efforts toward both self-​knowledge and care in judging others despite its clear demonstration that both goals will always remain elusive. From at least the first ball scene in Pride and Prejudice, when we, along with the village of Meryton, are introduced to Mr. Bingley and Mr. Darcy, Austen’s novel explores the relationship between codes of behavior, or manners, and virtue. This scene thus initiates us into the inquiry that animates the entire novel, namely, how much can we depend on manners as signifiers of virtue? As we begin to examine this scene, I ask my students for examples of good and bad manners in their own daily lives on a residential college campus, which, I contend, is not unlike an Austenian village. How do we use someone’s manners to assess their character? When we size each other up, what is the relationship in our judgment between manners and other wealth-​ and-​status signifiers such as clothes, accessories, or cars? How do manners work to include or exclude others? How do we deploy manners to signal our own status? University students are particularly adept at making the calculations these questions imply, and they recognize the assessments made by the attendees of Meryton’s dance as the assessments they might make at a fraternity party. Students fluently read each other’s wealth markers, physical attractions, and adherence to behavioral norms over the course of an evening’s entertainment. Not unlike at a college party, gossip flies around the ballroom when the Bingleys, Hursts, and Darcy enter; their fashionable appearance, physical

216  Jessica Richard attractiveness, and reported wealth generate excited approval. But, of course, Darcy’s behavior reverses this impression: The gentlemen pronounced him to be a fine figure of a man, the ladies declared he was much handsomer than Mr. Bingley, and he was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening, till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity; for he was discovered to be proud, to be above his company, and above being pleased; and not all his large estate in Derbyshire could then save him from having a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance, and being unworthy to be compared to his friend.8

I ask my students why Darcy’s manners at this ball matter so much to the assembled guests that they override the social capital of his fantastic wealth. To understand the social function of manners in this scene, we discuss one of the examples of campus behavior at Wake Forest University that my students always mention in our discussion of contemporary manners: door-​holding. Upon entering a campus building, we hold the door open for at least one person behind us. This may have grown out of the old-​fashioned practice of men holding doors open for women to walk through and then following them, but it is different. Current door-​holding practice on our campus is not gendered, and it does not require the door-​holder to stand aside to allow someone to pass in front and enter the building before them. It simply involves entering a building and holding the door open behind you until the next person has their hand on the door. This unspoken code of behavior is not a universal norm across America; it is more common in the American South, where Wake Forest is located, but the door-​holding norm is attended to with even more scrupulousness on campus than elsewhere in the South. Thus, it is experienced as an unfamiliar norm by students no matter where they grew up. No one tells us to hold the door open for those behind us, but new students adopt this behavioral norm almost immediately; it becomes a universal truth of campus life.9 Holding the door signals an awareness of and respect for those around us; it would be rude to let the door slam in the face of the person entering the building behind you. Yet a code of behavior that should signal inclusion and community inevitably also produces a social awkwardness that indicates that the inclusive gesture is not always completely successful. How far away must the person behind you be before you are released from your obligation to

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  217 hold the door for them? Twenty or thirty feet? If someone is holding the door for you, are you obliged to quicken your pace in order to reach the doorway more quickly and reduce the time the door-​holder must wait for you? I have a colleague who has admitted to intentionally slowing his steps as he sees someone holding the door for him, testing their commitment to our codes of politeness. Thus, manners, as Austen certainly knew, can be used for aggression and dominance as well. Just as students entering our campus community are expected to assimilate to existing codes of behavior such as door-​holding, Bingley and Darcy are expected to assimilate to the expectations of the Meryton assembly, and of course, Bingley does so with ease: he “soon made himself acquainted with all the principal people in the room; he was lively and unreserved, danced every dance, was angry that the ball closed so early, and talked of giving one himself at Netherfield.”10 His affable temperament readily lends itself to the unpretentious social intercourse of Meryton. Darcy, like the student who does not hold the door because it is not a behavior that he performed before coming to campus, refuses to adopt the codes of politeness that govern Meryton, adhering instead to the codes of his closed social circle. As he later explains, in an attempt to justify his behavior, “I had not at that time the honour of knowing any lady in the assembly beyond my own party.”11 In the context of his previous social experience, Darcy’s behavior does not violate but in fact perfectly aligns with standards of politeness; he sticks with his own group. But by not adapting to the behaviors of the community he has entered, Darcy insults that community. Manners that seemed virtuous to Darcy were perceived by Meryton as exactly the opposite. Instead of communicating a reticent politeness that does not assume he will be of central interest to the assembled gentry of Meryton, Darcy’s reserve is read as disdain for the guests and their entertainment. Such disdain suggests a lack of respect for the people of Meryton, a significant failure of virtue on Darcy’s part. The function of this scene thus seems straightforward. Austen contrasts the two men’s approach to their entrance into a new community in order to highlight the benefits of adapting to the behavioral codes governing that community and the costs of refusing to adapt in this way. If virtue is simply behavior that shows high moral standards, we see in this scene that behaviors that signify moral standards are not universal but contextual, defined by a community. Darcy fails to recognize that his behavior does not communicate his virtuousness in Meryton. Yet there is an additional layer to this scene created by Austen’s use of the literary technique of free indirect discourse. Free

218  Jessica Richard indirect discourse is a narrative technique in which the third-​person narrative voice takes on the qualities and traits of a character’s voice. As readers, we do not experience the contrasting behaviors of Bingley and Darcy through an objective third-​person narrator. Instead of reading an objective narrator’s report, we read the narrator appropriating the collective voice of the assembled guests: “The gentlemen pronounced him to be a fine figure of a man, the ladies declared he was much handsomer than Mr. Bingley, and he was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening, till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity; for he was discovered to be proud, to be above his company, and above being pleased; and not all his large estate in Derbyshire could then save him from having a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance, and being unworthy to be compared to his friend.”12 In this last phrase especially, we hear not a narrator’s objectivity but the extreme judgments of the assembled guests in words like “disgust” and “most forbidding.” Free indirect discourse thus amplifies our experience of Darcy’s inability to adapt his behavior to Meryton’s standards of virtue. As the narrator adopts the voice of the assembled guests, we hear how much Darcy has (unwittingly) offended them. Austen’s use of free indirect discourse subtly shifts the focus of this scene from the descriptions of characters and their actions to the community members’ judgments of them. The closer we look at this incident, the less certain my students are about what actually happens. All we can say definitively and with textual authority is that the excitement of the assembled gentry at Mr. Darcy’s wealth is soon turned by his reserve to disgust. We have not been told in this passage whether Darcy is actually by some objective standard (if there is such a thing) more or less handsome than Bingley, but rather that first Darcy’s reported wealth made everyone speak of him as attractive and later his manners completely erased his physical appeal. We cannot definitively say whether Bingley is more pleasant than Darcy, but that he was judged to be so by the others in the room, who were hardly unbiased observers. Bingley’s actions—​dancing every dance, talking of giving his own ball, making himself acquainted with the highest-​status guests—​are not reported objectively. Indeed, the narrator drops free indirect discourse for a moment to comment in a snide, sarcastic aside, “Such amiable qualities must speak for themselves,” suggesting that these traits are not worth the high praise they received from the assembled guests. Bingley’s social graces speak for themselves, but do not, the narrator implies, indicate anything more substantial about his character. Immediately after this aside, the narrator resumes free

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  219 indirect discourse: “What a contrast between him and his friend!”13 The exclamation point highlights the extent to which we are experiencing the subjective judgments of the guests rather than an objective account. We have no way of knowing whether the guests’ judgments are warranted, but the rapid shifts between extremes of enthusiasm and disgust revealed by free indirect discourse imply that they are not fully warranted. If free indirect discourse thus undermines both the initial enthusiasm and the eventual disgust of the guests toward Darcy, as readers we must question our faith in the guests’ assessments of his manners as a sign of his virtue. After all, these are the judgments of people like Mrs. Bennet, Mrs. Phillips, and Lady Lucas, characters who are the subject of much narrative satire elsewhere. Continuing free indirect discourse highlights the absolutism of the community’s judgment: “His character was decided. He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world, and everybody hoped that he would never come there again.”14 Note the hyperbole: “the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world” who should “never come there again.” This is not a reasoned assessment. Furthermore, the word “everybody” highlights the social norming taking place here as the assembled guests reinforce each other’s outrage. Later, in a passage of straightforward narration not colored by free indirect discourse, the narrator confirms the unreliability of Mrs. Bennet and her friends by telling us that when Mrs. Bennet recounts the evening to her husband, she “related, with much bitterness of spirit and some exaggeration, the shocking rudeness of Mr. Darcy.”15 Mrs. Bennet’s authority has been compromised by her satirical depiction from the very opening chapter, and she is hardly a reliable reporter here; her account is inflated by the offense she has taken to Darcy on Elizabeth’s behalf. Mrs. Bennet and her friends’ judgment of Darcy’s virtue indicts their own. They are superficial, hyperbolic, money-​obsessed, and biased toward members of their own community. We should be wary of accepting their assessment of Darcy’s virtue, and free indirect discourse deprives us of an objective narrator’s account that might resolve the villagers’ unreliability. Free indirect discourse makes this scene much more indeterminate than it first appears. As readers, we are unable to assess either the virtuousness of Darcy’s behavior or the fairness of the assembled guests’ judgments. Thus, the plot (or what happens in the scene) demonstrates the importance of adapting to local behavioral norms, while the mode of narration—​ free indirect discourse—​highlights the flaws in people’s assessments of those behaviors. While she does not give us an objective narrator’s authoritative

220  Jessica Richard account in this scene, however, Austen does give readers a chance to judge for ourselves as we read the directly reported conversation (overheard by Elizabeth) between Bingley and Darcy culminating in his infamous description of Elizabeth as “tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.”16 No free indirect discourse or narrator’s sarcasm can mislead us here. Darcy’s words speak for themselves. They reveal him to be reserved, proud, and self-​ absorbed. He does not enjoy dancing, especially with a stranger, and he has not noticed that a shortage of men has forced Elizabeth to sit out the current dance. Reading this scene directly as Elizabeth overhears it identifies us with her position and gives us the opportunity to practice virtue ourselves and then to compare our judgment with hers. What would a truly virtuous assessment of Darcy in this scene look like? We must recognize his faults here, of course. But the test for us (as for Elizabeth) is whether we can effectively assess the significance of these faults through the noise of the extreme judgments we have just read. Does Darcy’s behavior mean that he is “the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world?” The error Elizabeth makes in this scene, because his pride has mortified hers, is to get swept up in the community’s collective judgment of Darcy. Teaching this novel, I see most student readers, swept along the tide of free indirect discourse, make the same error. Thus, I argue that a proper—​or virtuous—​reading of this scene recognizes Darcy’s failings of virtue here, as signified by his manners, but does not assume that his failings of virtue in this moment indicate a broader failure of character. A careful reader does not condemn Darcy completely on the basis of this scene alone and also recognizes the flaws in the assembled guests’—​and Elizabeth’s—​judgment. Reading with this level of attention is a kind of virtue, as it gives us practice in careful assessments. Making this careful and limited judgment of Darcy’s virtue, however, is nearly impossible due to the multiple narrative layers I have been teasing out here. It is nearly impossible, at least as a first-​time reader, not to be influenced by the biased voices of the community disguised as the narrator. Austen uses free indirect discourse to complicate our experience of this scene and thus to approximate the challenges of assessing others in real life. Without an omniscient narrator in real life telling us what is going on in other people’s heads, it is difficult to assess the significance of various markers of virtue, from wealth, to status and background, to manners. If neither Elizabeth nor the reader is properly able to assess Darcy’s virtue in the Meryton assembly scene, we get additional opportunities as the novel unfolds, although Austen continues to complicate these opportunities with

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  221 narrative sleights of hand. Darcy’s letter responding to Elizabeth’s accusations of misconduct offers one such opportunity. Austen presents the letter verbatim to readers in a chapter that consists solely of Darcy handing Elizabeth the letter, followed by the full text itself, without any additional commentary. Thus, the reader’s experience of the letter is separated from Elizabeth’s; her reading and response are narrated in the succeeding chapter. The reader reads Darcy’s letter and assesses Darcy’s explanations in one chapter and then compares his or her reactions to Elizabeth’s in the next. Darcy’s letter in this way not only explains his conduct but provides an opportunity for readers to assess his explanations and then in the following chapter compare our assessments to Elizabeth’s. In class discussion of Darcy’s letter, I ask students to compare their reading of his explanations to Elizabeth’s. Elizabeth’s initial response to the letter is complete rejection: “She wished to discredit it entirely, repeatedly exclaiming, ‘This must be false! This cannot be! This must be the grossest falsehood!’ ”17 We notice that the word “wished” here shows how much Elizabeth is invested in her prior judgment of Darcy; not only does her view of him as proud and insolent prevent her from assessing the letter fairly, but she does not want to discover that she was wrong about him. Were we similarly invested in a particular view of Darcy? If not, what made us more receptive to the letter’s explanations than Elizabeth was? The separation of our reading of the letter from Elizabeth’s allows us to examine our prejudices and to compare them to Elizabeth’s. Prior to Darcy’s letter, Austen has given us access to information that Elizabeth does not have: we have known for many chapters that Darcy had reassessed Elizabeth. While he first dismissed her as “not handsome enough to tempt me,” he quickly and rather unwillingly discovered her face “rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes” and “began to wish to know more of her.”18 Does our awareness of his growing love give him more credibility with us? Should it, or are we at risk of bias in his favor due to sympathy for his unrequited love? Are there other factors that lend Darcy authority with us? While we probably only read the letter once as we eagerly move forward in the novel, Elizabeth reads it three times (and we review elements of the letter again indirectly through her commentary on it as she reads and rereads). This recursive process itself tells us something important about assessing others: it takes time and care, and it cannot be done quickly on one read. By narrating in this chapter Elizabeth’s gradual process of accepting Darcy’s veracity in the letter, Austen further develops the questions the initial ball scene raised: how do we assess the virtue of others? The letter-​reading chapter asks us which

222  Jessica Richard factors in the assessment of others’ virtue should have the most weight with us: behavior, public opinion, reports from others? At the Meryton assembly, Darcy’s wealth, physical appearance, and manners, along with the community’s judgment of them, all factored in Elizabeth’s assessment. This assessment was later reinforced by Wickham’s tale of his wrongs by Darcy, a tale that Wickham’s attractive physical appearance and pleasant manners made especially convincing. Austen shows in the letter-​reading chapter the various factors that eventually reverse Elizabeth’s earlier assessment of Darcy and convince her of the credibility of Darcy’s own testimony about his virtue. After her initial rejection of the letter, Elizabeth returns not to its first topic, Darcy’s justification of his separation of Bingley from Jane, but to its second half, Darcy’s history of Wickham’s connection with his family. Her rereading of this part of the letter forces Elizabeth to confront that her assessment of Wickham’s virtue was shallow indeed. “As to his real character . . . she had never felt a wish of enquiring. His countenance, voice, and manner had established him at once in the possession of every virtue. She tried to recollect some instance of goodness, some distinguished trait of integrity or benevolence,” but she cannot.19 While Wickham had only his good looks and politeness to validate his tale, Elizabeth recognizes that, by contrast, Darcy has the weight of his social position to verify his story. She could turn to his cousin Col. Fitzwilliam or his friend Bingley for corroboration of Darcy, whereas Wickham has no one to vouch for him; nothing was known of him “but what he told himself.”20 Capricious community judgments, such as those that turned quickly against Darcy at the Meryton assembly, are suspect, but deeper and longer-​lasting social ties are ultimately validated as references for Darcy’s character. This point is further developed in Elizabeth’s visit to Darcy’s family’s estate at Pemberley, where she can assess his virtue in its native context. Here she sees an aesthetic taste that is understood as virtue: landscaping that does not counteract “natural beauty” and furnishings that are “neither gaudy nor uselessly fine.”21 She learns from the testimony of one who has known Darcy from childhood that he is a devoted brother, “the best landlord, and the best master,” as well as “affable to the poor.”22 She learns the whole history of his and his family’s relationship with the Wickhams. She is able metaphorically to view Darcy from many angles, a point Austen emphasizes in the visit to Pemberley with tropes of vision: Elizabeth views the house’s setting in the estate as though it were a painting as they approach Pemberley; once inside the house she notes the shifting views of the landscape as she looks out different

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  223 windows; in the picture gallery she gazes on a full-​size painting of Darcy and imagines the painting looking back at her as she “fixed his eyes upon herself.”23 Only through this multifaceted assessment can Elizabeth see Darcy’s virtue. When we recognize that the first ball scene demonstrates not merely Darcy’s bad behavior or the guests’ and Elizabeth’s overemphasis on the significance of his bad behavior, but rather the difficulty of assessing the virtue of others, we must think differently about the moral direction of Pride and Prejudice. Not only is it very difficult to determine the significance of behavior as a marker of virtue in this scene, but at the novel’s end, Darcy and Elizabeth continue to dispute this question. The plot does not appear to resolve it. In other words, despite all the student papers that I read suggesting otherwise, the point is, of course, not merely that pride and prejudice are bad vices that we should avoid, and that “first impressions” (Austen’s original title for the novel)24 mislead us. Elizabeth comes to understand Darcy’s virtuousness by amassing a much richer set of data than his behavior at one ball or Wickham’s self-​interested account offered. Does this mean that Darcy’s behavior at the ball was not a relevant indication of his virtue? No, because his manners toward the Gardiners in their surprise visit to Pemberley are just as important as the richer picture that the estate, the testimony of servants, and his history have painted. Elizabeth marvels to see Darcy “speak with such civility [to the Gardiners,] to enquire after her family! Never in her life had she seen his manners so little dignified, never had he spoken with such gentleness as on this unexpected meeting! What a contrast did it offer to his last address in Rosings Park.”25 Manners still matter, in part because we use manners to signify our recognition of the value of others, a fundamental basis of virtue. Having previously disparaged Elizabeth’s relatives, Darcy now goes out of his way to show them respect. Elizabeth understands Darcy better in the context of his family home and history, but at the same time his altered manners suggest that she was not wrong to see his earlier behavior as ungentlemanlike and unvirtuous. How can Elizabeth be both wrong and right? When at the end of the novel her father recapitulates the community’s judgment of Darcy—​“We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man”—​she refutes this view saying, “Indeed, he has no improper pride.”26 But Darcy himself demurs, describing himself as “selfish and overbearing . . . car[ing] for none beyond my own family circle . . . think[ing] meanly of all the rest of the world”—​exactly, in other words, what he seemed to be at the first ball.27 Elizabeth learns a lesson,

224  Jessica Richard but at the same time was right all along, teaching Darcy “a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous . . . [namely] how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased.”28 The Meryton ball scene with which I began challenges readers with a multilayered narration that may obscure its complexity, and the novel’s ending does not resolve it. The question of how best to assess others’ virtue is not definitively answered since Darcy’s behavior at the ball both does and does not reflect his character and Elizabeth was both wrong and right in her response to his behavior. I argue that this complexity is the particular contribution that the study of literature makes to the cultivation of virtue. I have the immense luxury of sitting in a room with students pulling apart the strands of scenes such as I have done here.29 This analytical process does not cultivate virtue by modeling a particular set of behaviors (to be virtuous you must be like this character or avoid the faults of that character), but rather by highlighting the elusiveness of virtue, both our own and that of others. I have tried to show here that Austen reveals the elusiveness of virtue by means of fictional form, by manipulating readers’ experience of the novel’s events through different kinds of narration. Studying literature can cultivate virtue by properly humbling us, like Darcy, and by making us realize, like Elizabeth, how little we know ourselves.

Notes 1. Richard Whately, “Modern Novels,” Quarterly Review 24, no. 48 (1821): 353, emphasis original; F. R. Leavis, The Great Tradition (London: Chatto & Windus, 1960), 7; Lionel Trilling, The Opposing Self: Nine Essays in Criticism (New York: Viking, 1955), 222. 2. Thomas Rodham, “Reading Jane Austen as a Moral Philosopher,” Philosophy Today 94 (January/​February 2014), https://​philos​ophy​now.org/​iss​ues/​94/​Reading_​Jane_​Au​sten​ _​as_​a_​Mo​ral_​Phil​osop​her (accessed August 18, 2020). 3. Tony Tanner quoted with Eve Kosofsky Sedgick’s emphasis in Sedgwick, Tendencies (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993), 125. 4. D. W. Harding, “‘Regulated Hatred’: An Aspect in the Work of Jane Austen,” Scrutiny 8 (1940): 346. 5. Rodham, “Reading Jane Austen.” 6. Claudia L. Johnson, Jane Austen: Women, Politics, and the Novel (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988); Joseph Lew, “‘That Abominable Traffic’: Mansfield Park and the Dynamics of Slavery,” in History, Gender, & Eighteenth-​Century Literature, ed. Beth Fowkes Tobin (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1994), 271–​300.

Cultivating Virtue by Reading Jane Austen  225 7. Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, ed. Pat Rogers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 230. 8. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 10–​11. 9. “It is a truth universally acknowledged . . .” Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 3. 10. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 11. 11. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 196. 12. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 10–​11. 13. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 11. 14. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 11. 15. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 14, my emphasis. 16. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 12. 17. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 227. 18. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 26. 19. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 228. 20. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 228. 21. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 271, 272. 22. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 276, 275. 23. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 277. 24. Pat Rogers, “Introduction,” Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), xxiii. 25. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 279. 26. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 417. 27. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 409. 28. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 410. 29. The process of discussion Elizabeth and Darcy engage in and the process of discussion my students and I engage in seem akin to what Amanda Anderson calls “rumination.” See Amanda Anderson, “Thinking With Character,” in Character: Three Inquiries in Literary Studies, ed. Amanda Anderson, Rita Felski, and Toril Moi (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2019), 133.

12 The Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin

“Octavia warned us.” This was the message posted on a hand-​lettered sign carried at one of the many Women’s March events held on the day after the inauguration of Donald Trump in 2017.1 A picture of the sign held aloft a sea of down-​jacketed backs and pink pussy-​hatted heads made the rounds on social media after being posted to Twitter by children’s book author Linda Urban.2 Similar signs referencing the prescience of speculative fiction writer Octavia Butler likely appeared at other marches held around the world; yet other signs called to mind the correspondingly perceptive dystopias imagined by George Orwell and Margaret Atwood. Such signs conveyed the dread with which many protesters confronted their political situations and expressed a desire to act collectively to protect a common future. Importantly, the signs also pointed to the central role that literature—​and especially speculative fiction—​might play in efforts to stave off environmental, political, and economic apocalypse. As scholars and teachers of contemporary literature, we have noted a turn toward the dystopian by writers and critics concerned about our world’s well-​being. In a 2017 newspaper review article entitled “Boom Times for the New Dystopians,” Alexandra Alter writes that dystopian novels “seem to channel the country’s current anxieties, with cataclysmic storylines about global warming, economic inequality, political polarization and the end of democracy.”3 She features a discussion of Omar El Akkad’s novel American War, which Emily St. John Mandel (another postapocalyptic writer) sees as uncomfortably vatic. About the novel, which describes “a futuristic not-​so-​ United States that has been devastated by civil war, drone killings, suicide bombings and the ravages of climate change,” Mandel says, “You don’t like to imagine the endpoint of extreme partisanship, but that’s exactly what Omar’s done in this book.” Alter quotes bookstore manager Matt Keliher, who notes

​

​

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  227 that “[p]‌eople are finding comfort in dystopian books, or maybe more accurately, they’re finding answers in them.” In his editorial note introducing the Boston Review publication of Global Dystopias, Pulitzer Prize–​winning author Junot Díaz appears to agree. He observes that a critical dystopia is not only a “bad place”; it can also be a text that “maps, warns, and hopes.” When approached as “an arena of intellectual engagement,” Díaz suggests, critical dystopias can be “something regenerative and something useful.”4 The idea that people can find comfort or answers—​or both—​in narrative dystopias is central to our joint engagement with what we are calling the decolonial virtues of ethnospeculative fiction. Although dystopia as an adjective describes depravity and degradation (or, alternatively, totalitarianism), dystopia as a narrative form has often served the cultivation of “virtue”—​ whether that term is understood within Christian or classical traditions, or in relation to contemporary ethical and political stances such as antifascism, antiracism, and environmentalism. And although the notion of “virtue” and the articulation of “decoloniality” come from distinct—​and sometimes opposed—​intellectual and ethical traditions, decolonial writing has often used dystopian forms to critique unjust social arrangements and clear space for more egalitarian ways of living in the world. We find value in recovering the utopian impulses behind dystopian representations, and in recalling how decolonial thinkers make sustained inquiries into what makes a person, behavior, or society good, useful, or desirable. In this shared project, we are interested in the cultivation of “decolonial virtue” by way of speculative narrative practices that engage and reimagine dystopia not as a future to be avoided but rather as a historical, contemporary, and ongoing reality to be exposed and then redressed.5 At the heart of our inquiry is an understanding of literature as a privileged space for ethical inquiry. Literature is brilliantly suited to the exploration of what it means to be a virtuous human being in a particular time and place. Because works of literary fiction engage our emotions and challenge our perceptions, they help shape what people consider to be virtuous. But a worthwhile work of literature never provides “the” answer; rather, it sets its readers on a path of inquiry and asks them to think carefully and deeply about the ethical questions it raises. Literature is by nature dialogic and open-​ended; its speculative properties allow for an exploration of fundamental ethical issues without a need to experiment on actual people or communities. Certainly, we could round people up and put them—​as Toni Morrison says she does to the characters in her novels—​in situations in

228  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin which “something really terrible happens” in order to find out “what is heroic.”6 But fortunately most societies have determined that treating people as unwitting experimental subjects is not ethically permissible. Literature, then, is one of the most significant venues through which authors and readers alike can examine the myriad and complicated reasons that people—​as culturally and historically situated beings—​think and behave the way they do. Works of literature often invite readers to engage with difficult issues on a deep emotional level in an inescapably self-​relevant way. With the understanding that there is no account of a coming or a past apocalypse that is not also an argument—​albeit a negative one—​for how the world should ideally be organized, we embrace apocalyptic, postapocalyptic, and dystopian speculative fiction for its ethical potential in the university classroom. At a moment when the humanities face serious challenges within institutions of higher education, the practices of critical reading and writing developed by the study of literature are more crucial to the pursuit of a just society than they have ever been. In what follows, we introduce “ethnospeculation” as one of the most significant modes through which authors and readers, as well as teachers and students, communicate with each other as they cultivate virtue in the service of promoting justice. By contributing to a repository of wide-​ranging practices and behaviors that might constitute what can be considered “virtuous” or “good” in different societies, ethnospeculative fiction provides an invaluable space within which to examine ethical certainties and explore fundamental values.7

Ethnospeculative Fiction As scholars interested in both race and literature (and race in literature), we look to ethnospeculative fiction as an arena for intellectual, political, and ethical exploration around issues of race. Briefly, ethnospeculative fiction is genre fiction (science fiction, fantasy, gothic, horror) written by and/​or about people of color that seeks to create alternative worlds—​“elsewheres” and “elsewhens”—​that enable new perceptions and facilitate the development of more racially just and life-​affirming selves and ways of living. In the quest for racial justice, ethnospeculative fiction effectively illustrates the historically specific nature of racialized experience. Writers, artists, and critics interested in exploring the (il)logics of racism mine and expand the abundant resources of ethnospeculative aesthetics. In their diverse and varying manifestations,

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  229 ethnospeculative artists and critics embrace the complex temporalities of science fiction and fantasy to propose (and produce) alternative worlds. In the process of examining the dystopian racial dynamics within which we live, they imagine and enable alternative futures and/​or revised presents—​ temporalities that, in the words of Gloria Anzaldúa, enable us to “reimagine our lives, rewrite the self, and create guiding myths for our time.”8 Of course—​and this is an important caveat when considering how literature impacts ethical exploration—​judgments about how one should live, and what one should do with and to others, are historically and culturally particular. Such judgments are not universal, even when values and principles are widely shared across several different groups. As social psychologists Hazel Rose Markus and Shinobu Kitayama have amply demonstrated, there are several different cultural models of the self, some of which are more independent and others more interdependent.9 Accordingly, an action that might constitute a grievous infringement on a person’s autonomy in one sociocultural context might be perceived as appropriate, even desirable, in another. The multiplicity of cultures and value systems ensures that any reasonably diverse collection of people is unlikely to give stable or monologic content to the concept of the “good.” What one group considers of the most basic moral import (to abort a pregnancy is akin to murder; it is a sin), another would see as profoundly unethical (the prohibition on abortion abrogates the right of corporeal self-​determination). Rather than negating the fundamentally ethical character of literature, the fact of sociocultural variability serves to enhance the value of any writer’s or critic’s ethical project. Moreover, such variability makes the study of literature from different cultures that much more important. How else are we to know what is truly at stake in any given situation unless we explore and probe? How better to conduct an ethical exploration than through a richly developed imaginative process of the sort enabled by writing and reading literature from a wide variety of groups? In engaging ethnospeculative aesthetics as a crucial agent in the pursuit of racial justice, we enter a field founded on a spate of ground-​breaking articles, monographs, and edited collections that have appeared over the past twenty years.10 These works have plumbed the dynamics of racial subordination and have illustrated that the specific histories of different racial and ethnic groups have given rise to specific variants of common speculative techniques and tropes. Indeed, one of the most striking findings of the kind of comparative work we have undertaken is noting how these tropes differ across groups. For example, Mark Dery has demonstrated that the trope of alien abduction

230  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin resonates in distinct ways in literature written by people of African descent, whose ancestors were subjected to the experience of being ripped away from one’s land, home, and family and transported under inhumane conditions to a hostile environment to be raped, enslaved, and exploited with little regard for one’s subjectivity and bodily integrity. Dery explains: “African Americans, in a very real sense, are the descendants of alien abductees; they inhabit a sci-​ fi nightmare in which unseen but no less impassable force fields of intolerance frustrate their movements; official histories undo what has been done; and technology is too often brought to bear on black bodies (branding, forced sterilization, the Tuskegee experiment, and tasers come readily to mind).”11 Octavia Butler’s well-​known Xenogenesis series (which focuses on coerced interspecies breeding as it is experienced and enabled by a Black woman), and Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad (which literalizes the metaphor of self-​emancipation by having escaped slaves travel on a real railroad to different “moments” in the history of the United States), both engage, in line with Dery’s observation, the trope of alien abduction in relation to the history of racialized slavery. Latinxs have had a different historical experience and are positioned differently—​ albeit also in dynamics of abjection and exploitation—​ within the racial and economic order of the United States. More than five hundred years of racialized oppression, including being forced into the position of abject alien workers by neoliberal economic policies, have conferred upon Latinxs a particular trauma. As the descendants of Indigenous peoples who survived the massive demographic collapse resulting from the catastrophic epidemics associated with European diseases such as measles, typhus, influenza, and smallpox; who developed syncretic religious and social systems in the wake of the accompanying cultural collapse; and whose lands and labor were appropriated through encomienda systems that gave Spanish soldiers and priests power over Indigenous peoples, Latinxs have developed their own speculative imaginary.12 In works such as Ernest Hogan’s 1992 cyberpunk novel High Aztech (which tracks the spread of a virus that induces religious fervor in those it infects), and Alex Rivera’s 2008 futuristic sci-​fi film Sleep Dealer (which depicts a technology that allows US employers to exploit Mexican labor while keeping Mexicans on the far side of the border), Latinx writers often remediate the dystopian experiences of alien invasion, cultural and biological mestizaje, epidemiological transmission, forced migration, and labor exploitation.

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  231 The concerns of Indigenous futurists overlap with those of African American and Latinx writers, insofar as they also reimagine stories of alien invasion and abduction. But Native people’s unique experiences of settler colonialism, forced migration, genocide, family separation, cultural erasure and appropriation, and environmental catastrophe have resulted in specific techniques and themes.13 Indigenous writers take aim at official versions of the history of conquest and the corresponding fantasy of annihilation, often condensed into the trope of the Vanishing Indian.14 These writers assert presence and voice in what Gerald Vizenor calls narratives of “survivance,” acts of narrative agency in the face of material and ideological threats to Indigenous self-​definition and sovereignty. For example, in her 1991 novel Almanac of the Dead, Leslie Marmon Silko of Laguna Pueblo renarrates—​ on a massive scale—​the history of the Americas, illuminating a new world that is at once familiar and deeply unsettling. And in her 2018 virtual reality piece Bidabaan: First Light, filmmaker Lisa Jackson (Anishinaabe) focuses on cultural renewal and Indigenous futurity by building an interactive urban environment in which the resurgence of Indigenous language, in a complex relationship with nature, guides future societies.15 The patterns of racialization and gendering that have accompanied Asian immigration to the United States, and the economic forces and policies of exclusion that shaped it, have led to a very different set of alien tropes. Whether in the dehumanizing terms of the “yellow peril” or the limiting myth of the “model minority,” people of Asian descent have often been perceived by others as perpetual aliens. The trope of the alien is also transformed by a “techno-​Orientalist” discourse that paradoxically associates people of Asian descent with both a hypertechnological future and a primitive past (as in Ridley Scott’s 1982 film Blade Runner).16 The commonplace dystopian idea that technological progress associated with Asia will lead to a loss of humanity in favor of conformity and collectivism is complicated by works like Chang-​rae Lee’s 2014 novel On Such a Full Sea. Lee employs the collective narrative voice of a Chinese worker community to explore how the strictures of both capitalism and community affect the fortunes of one among them—​a girl whose life is turned upside down when her boyfriend disappears—​in a world that requires docile workers to support the demands of a non-​Chinese elite class. Karen Tei Yamashita’s 1990 novel Through the Arc of the Rainforest, which centers on the discovery of a rubber-​like substance in the Amazon that turns out to be the by-​product of industrial waste, also intervenes in reductive and racist associations of Asianness with alienness by locating the latter

232  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin term in the excesses and exploitations of global capitalism.17 Like African American, Latinx, and Indigenous writers and scholars, Asian Americans have developed ethnospeculative practices and concepts that reflect their specific historical experiences while addressing racial devastations that are shared across communities of color.

A Decolonial Ethos At the heart of most ethnospeculative fiction is a decolonial ethos. Decoloniality refers to a capacious and evolving mode of being that is devoted to dismantling the pernicious legacies of European colonialism—​particularly those related to the systemic objectification of “types” of human beings. Scholars, thinkers, and artists who have taken the “decolonial turn” hail from several disciplines (religious studies, philosophy, political theory, literary studies, psychology, and ethnic studies) and from a number of geographical spaces whose Indigenous peoples have suffered colonization (the Caribbean, the Americas, and Africa, among others). Although the varied projects of decolonial artists and scholars differ according to the contexts within which they work, they are united in their response to European colonialism. Their shared goal is not merely to seek political emancipation from European colonial powers, but more fundamentally to overturn the European colonial way of being in the world—​called “coloniality.” Coloniality describes a matrix of being, power, and knowledge that is constitutive of Western modernity and its project of civilization. As the “invisible” or “darker” side of modernity, it bolsters claims for European centrality, superiority, rationality, and universality while promoting the false belief that some groups of people (especially non-​whites of all races) are natural slaves and/​or inherently (that is, culturally or biologically) inferior to the European or European-​American heterosexual, property-​owning, and able-​bodied white male.18 Escaping the logic of “modernity/​coloniality” requires the formerly colonized to develop what Nelson Maldonado-​Torres calls an “insurgent subjectivity” by rejecting and reforming the logic that privileges a Eurocentric way of being in the world.19 Scholars and artists who have taken the decolonial turn agree on the imperative to take intentional and inventive action. Similarly to ethnospeculative artists and writers, they trace the outer edges of what is possible and seek to create more equitable modes of human inhabitation in alternative (or future) worlds. Because decolonial thinkers start from the referential inaccuracy

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  233 and genocidal logic of the colonial racial imaginary, they observe and critique key aspects of that imaginary—​including its commitment to autonomous individualism, abstract and binary thinking, and Eurocentrism. From a decolonial perspective, colonized peoples are not problems to be dealt with (e.g., “The Negro Problem,” the “Mexican Problem,” the “Indian Problem”); rather, they offer rich and diverse cultures whose ancestral forms of knowledge and current cultural self-​ways can chart a path away from the master morality and penchant for war that undergird unreconstructed Western modernity.20 By attending to occluded and denigrated perspectives on the social world, decolonial thinkers (like ethnospeculative thinkers) open up previously disregarded, as well as newly imagined, possibilities. Because they categorically reject the subordination or exploitation of others as either a primary goal or an unintended consequence of caring for the self, they put their energy and imagination into the service of remaking themselves and their world(s). The goal of decoloniality is thus the creation of a new world—​a different kind of world “in which many worlds fit,” to cite Subcomandante Marcos of the Zapatista Liberation Army.21 This “new” world entails a total renovation of the current one—​a reworking of subjectivity, community, institutional arrangements, and the logics by which humans live on the planet. Rather than merely challenging current relations of power and the logics that structure them, decoloniality seeks to subvert a colonial way of being by setting aside inherited assumptions to envision new social, political, and ontological possibilities. If “decoloniality” refers to critical projects that seek to undo the negative legacies of European colonialism, “virtue” is traditionally associated with those classical philosophical and Christian theological traditions that have played a central ideological role in the project of European colonialism. In rearticulating virtue in specifically decolonial terms, we seek to loosen its association with systems of thought that have been imposed on colonized people. At the same time, we hope to illuminate how familiar Western virtues, such as courage, truthfulness, justice, charity, and love, have been transformed by and also imbue decolonial projects. Consider, for example, Martin Luther King’s 1967 speech “Beyond Vietnam,” in which a searing critique of US imperialism culminates in the articulation of Christian virtues as political values: “This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation’s homes with orphans and widows . . . cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love.”22 Or Malcolm X’s 1963 speech “The Ballot or the Bullet,” which establishes moral values for the political project of Black

234  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin nationalism: “We have to come together with warmth so we can develop the unity and harmony that’s necessary to get this problem solved ourselves.”23 Similar examples can be found in the writings and speeches of organizers and activists from justice movements around the United States and the world.24 These articulations of decolonial virtue, we argue, are speculative in their efforts to imagine an alternative to an oppressive status quo. Because the project of pursuing justice is by nature speculative, we find speculative literature and criticism a rich arena for decolonial projects. Where ethnospeculative practices depart from decolonial aims is in the necessity of looking forward to a happy ending—​that is, in always imagining a heterotopic, loving, and more racially just world at the end of every story, film, or novel. Sometimes, ethnospeculativists point toward a better future, but just as often they attend to negative aspects of the present world for the purpose of exploring them in all their embeddedness and awfulness.

Ethnospeculative Temporalities Decoloniality necessitates a complex approach to time, inasmuch as it engages the continual presence of the past and the project of imagining alternative presents and futures. Similarly, ethnospeculative writers and artists radically reopen the temporal foreclosures enacted by the European colonial project, enacting a commitment to constructing a “usable past” in the service of presentist critique and futurist speculation.25 This practice calls to mind one of the truisms of science fiction: that science fictional futures comment on the present day. In “Some Presumptuous Approaches to Science Fiction,” science fiction writer and theorist Samuel Delany notes that “[s]‌cience fiction is not about the future; it uses the future as a narrative convention to present significant distortions of the present.”26 Like “mundane” (or realist) fiction, he argues, science fiction is about “the world shared by writer and reader.”27 However, rather than assuming an untroubled continuity between the world of the text and the world of the reader, science fiction exists in “tense, dialogic, agonistic relation to the given.”28 Readers are invited not only to participate in the co-​construction of a speculative fictional world that differs from their own but also to enter into a new relationship with their own world—​to read the present day differently. That the proper subject of science fiction is the world of the present is a claim of special significance to writers concerned about race and racism,

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  235 whose projects reimagine the temporalities of troubled race relations. When Lauren Oya Olamina, heroine of Octavia Butler’s Parable series, articulates a theology of humanity’s interstellar destiny, she speaks to a demand that human beings remake an unjust and ruined world. In insisting that her community must find or create a “home as it should have been,” she employs a phrase whose complex verb tense captures a complex sense of time.29 Critic Mark Bould also formulates the distinctiveness of speculative fiction’s (SF) “peculiar temporalities” as a matter of grammatical difference. He writes that “Black Power sf ” is “predicated not on the extrapolative tenet of ‘if this goes on . . .’ (familiar from Heinlein and the 1950’s satirical comic infernos), or even on the ‘this can’t go on’ (of the contemporaneous feminist utopian novel), but on a cry of ‘this has gone on for far too long: it stops now!’ ”30 Ethnospeculative fiction obsessively returns readers’ attention to the contemporary moment and the pasts that have led to it, whether in the form of “nostalgia for the now” or in “eerie anticipation of the present.”31 The temporal folding that characterizes ethnospeculation indexes both historical and continuing trauma as expressed in individual and group experiences of time. Alexandrina Agloro has observed that a future foreclosed by oppression is experienced as “a thing of the past.”32 Accordingly, a primary target of ethnospeculative intervention is the past that worked to foreclose the future. In her introduction to a 2002 special issue of Social Text devoted to Afrofuturism, sociologist Alondra Nelson challenges the neocolonial erasure of people of African descent from narratives of technological progress. She argues that futurist narratives which ignore the technological contributions of people of African descent imply that Black people are primitive and unable to “keep up” with technological progress. They erase the material contexts in which racial differences are produced in the digital age and disavow racial difference while also deploying it for profit (as in advertising campaigns for technology companies that fetishize Black bodies). Nelson pays special attention to the complex temporality of Ishmael Reed’s Mumbo Jumbo, reading the novel as a quintessential Afrofuturist text that challenges such vexing dismissals. Reed, she argues, draws from a “usable past” and employs “synchronism” and “anachronism” to disrupt simple linearity; the novel thus differs from the simplistic erasure or primitivizing of the past that some futurist discourses deploy against Black people. An Afrofuturist remaking of the self like the one Reed engages in “does not simply look to what is seemingly new about the self in the ‘virtual age’ but looks backward

236  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin and forward in seeking to provide insights about identity, one that asks what was and what if.”33 In addition to engaging in “chronopolitical interventions” that imagine alternate futures built on reclaimed histories, ethnospeculation also frequently defies the standard temporality of the apocalypse.34 For many writers of color, “apocalypse” is not a future event to be avoided or feared, but rather a historical event that has already occurred and a continuing reality that must be endured. In his 2010 essay “Apocalypse,” for example, Díaz calls attention to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti as a social disaster that reveals the mechanisms of contemporary “zombie capitalism” and its exploitation of poor people in the Caribbean.35 Marginalized populations throughout the world, and throughout history, have barely survived or been destroyed by economic and environmental catastrophes (flood, famine, drought, poverty). They suffer the impacts of massive imperialist and colonialist projects that provoke or exacerbate disasters to produce what Rob Nixon calls the “slow violence” of environmental destruction.36 Apocalypse, for the marginalized, can be sudden or slow, spectacular or mundane, localized, gradual, present, and ongoing. Meanwhile, privileged populations often regard catastrophes as natural and unavoidable for “other” people, even as they turn to the figure of apocalypse to imaginatively forestall their own subjection to total destruction or domination. Such is the logic that animates former World Bank president Lawrence Summers’s “extraordinary proposal” to “[offload] rich-​ nation toxins onto the world’s poorest continent,” a gambit designed to “appease” environmental activists in the global north by shifting the location of environmental threat to Africa.37 Novelist Nalo Hopkinson identifies the “speculative” as an apt—​even necessary—​mode for authors writing against colonialism and its aftermath: “science fiction and fantasy writing aren’t about prediction. What they do instead is to interrogate the tools which humanity puts in place to manipulate its reality.”38 “We will inhabit the future,” Hopkinson declares, before asking, “but what will that future mean to us who have a history of being racialized?”39 Severing “apocalypse” from “futurism” in the way we do here acknowledges that we live in a world shaped by conquest, slavery, genocide, and environmental devastation enacted on global and local scales. That Port-​au-​ Prince, Detroit, Dachau, Darfur, Srebrenica, Kigali, Sand Creek, Mexico City, and San Juan are apocalyptic or postapocalyptic spaces (in nonequivalent ways) is an insight that is both banal and crucial. When ethnospeculativists focus on the future, they often do so in the service of illuminating historical

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  237 and ongoing assaults on living beings—​assaults that have been underwritten by racism, sexism, and speciesism. Thus do the complex temporalities of ethnospeculation represent a mode of decolonial hope. An unflinching gaze on past, present, and future destruction can be a turn away from colonialism’s apocalyptic teleology and toward more just and life-​affirming worlds. As Gerry Canavan argues in the introduction to Green Planets: Ecology and Science Fiction, even the most dystopian novel is an enunciation of possibility in the face of violence and devastation.40 And as Díaz suggests, “the human capacity for oppression might be limitless, but equally limitless are our dreams for better places, for justice.”41

Ethnospeculation as a Reading Practice Despite the predominance of narrative in science and speculative fiction studies, the speculative as a mode is not specific to literary works, or even to particular genres of literary works such as science fiction.42 “The speculative” is broad enough to include a variety of resistant and imaginative practices central to the work of decolonial artists and thinkers. We are interested in what happens when we read speculative works through a decolonial lens—​that is, when writers and critics center the experiences and perspectives of people of color in a narrative field that has frequently erased or misrepresented them. But we are also interested in what happens when we read decolonial texts through an ethnospeculative lens. We argue that the critical potential of ethnospeculation resides not only in the narrative structures, rhetorical themes, and techniques of science or speculative fiction, but also in characteristic practices of interpretation. Samuel Delany is chief among those writers and critics who have argued that the interpretive operations required by science fictional texts are more elaborate and engaged than those invited by so-​called mundane or realist literature.43 The difference stems from a working assumption, shared by authors and readers, that the world of a science fictional text differs in significant ways from the real world outside the text. Therefore, in order to co-​create the fictional world, the reader of science fiction must be an active participant in decoding narrative clues. Whereas realist literature assumes significant continuity between the world of the text and the world of the reader, science fiction assumes no such unproblematic mimesis—​instead calling the operations of mimesis into question. Sentences such as “her world exploded” or “he

238  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin turned on his left side” (to borrow two examples from Delany) have straightforward, if metaphorical, meanings in a realist text. In a science fictional context, however, a world might have literally exploded, or a character might have activated his “sinistral flank.”44 The multiplication of possible meanings is a core aspect of “subjunctivity,” by which Delany means “the tension on the thread of meaning that runs between . . . sound-​image and sound-​image.”45 Subjunctivity operates in the consciousness of both characters and readers, the latter of which must engage in an ongoing process of self-​correction, as they decide whether statements are to be read literally or metaphorically. Rather than being absorbed by the text, Delany argues, science fiction readers absorb the text, co-​constructing its (often estranging) world. Science fictional reading is therefore more open, engaged, and self-​aware than mundane reading, and it shapes both texts and readers. Delany explains: “[W]‌e must think of literature and science fiction not as two different sets of labeled texts, but as two different sets of values, two different ways of response, two different ways of making texts make sense, two different ways of reading.”46 Delany pushes his argument further, proposing that the reading practices learned through an active engagement with science fictional texts are valuable and should be applied more broadly.47 Numerous critics since Delany have taken up his proposal. Literary scholar William Calvo-​Quirós, for example, argues that critics of Chicanx literature ought to regard what he calls “Chican@ Speculative Productions” as a mode of interpretation or way of reading rather than as a specific genre of art or literature. Calvo-​Quirós demonstrates his suggestion by reinterpreting standard Chicanx texts, such as Rodolfo Corky Gonzales’s “Yo Soy Joaquín,” through an ethnospeculative lens and by identifying the myth of Aztlán as a collective speculative production that has provided a “unifying point of cohesion” around which a very diverse group of people of Mexican origin could cohere. The concept of Aztlán, Calvo-​Quirós argues, provides a framework within which a fractured community could understand itself as a unified, historically subjugated social body: “Aztlán enabled Chican@s to understand their past, to make sense of their present, and to have hope for the future.”48 We follow this model by engaging speculation not simply as a collection of formal or thematic characteristics but also as a reading practice that can be applied to a wide variety of texts toward salutary ethical ends.49 We are particularly interested in the ethical invitations posed to readers by texts, and to texts by readers, as both parties “build up a world in specific dialogue, in a specific tension, with our present concept of the real,” to borrow

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  239 Delany’s phrase.50 If speculation involves imagining an alternative to the arrangements of power that currently organize our lives, then speculative reading requires us first to perceive those arrangements and then to imagine alternatives to them. Work that is typically labeled “science fiction” or “speculative fiction” employs specific strategies for prompting such insights: these are the techniques of what science fiction scholar Darko Suvin influentially labelled as “cognitive estrangement.”51 However, these effects are not strictly the purview of obviously speculative works. A great deal of literature labeled “ethnic” or “multicultural” is similarly designed to prompt critical reflection on questions of social injustice, to draw attention to continuities and discontinuities between the world of the text and the “real” world, to invite readers of multiple backgrounds to engage particular and possibly unfamiliar cultures, and to imagine alternative pasts, presents, and futures. In making this point, we follow Walidah Imarisha, who argues in the introduction to her groundbreaking fiction anthology, Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, that social justice work is by definition speculative in its effort to imagine an alternative present and future: “Whenever we try to envision a world without war, without violence, without prisons, without capitalism, we are engaging in speculative fiction. All organizing is science fiction.”52 In our turn toward ethnospeculation, many of the theoretical concepts animating our previous work have found fresh expression. Paula, drawing from cognitive and social psychology, has explored how schemas—​patterns of thought that help us make sense of new information—​inform literary interpretation, particularly when schematic continuity does not obtain between text and reader. She explains that literary works can challenge readers to become aware of and even alter their schemas, particularly as they pertain to received beliefs about race and racism. Within this framework, we can understand the speculative reader as one who understands that reading requires the learning of new schemas and who is enthusiastic about this process. Along related lines, Lesley has written about “critical self-​reflexivity” as a reading process that is open to the revision and reconstruction of the reading self in response to the experience of being “read” critically by a literary work—​particularly in a context of racial injustice. Her work has also applied the term “speakerly,” employed by Henry Louis Gates to describe the process whereby a third-​person narrator takes on the vernacular voice of a character, to explain another kind of “open” reading, whereby readers adopt a text’s narrative perspective.

240  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin Investigating the speculative quality of decolonial aesthetics, whether or not they include overtly science fictional or speculative content, opens up the world of art and literature as spaces for ethical exploration. Consider, for example, the introduction to Toni Morrison’s work of historical fiction A Mercy, a novel treated by both of us in our previous work.53 Morrison drops readers into the unfamiliar context of seventeenth-​century colonial America. For contemporary readers, this world is alien in several crucial respects, most notably the absence of the congealed racial schemas that, familiar to the point of appearing natural today, were then just emerging. The novel’s multiply focalized narrative structure invites readers to consider the relationship between the colonial historical moment and our own—​not as a teleological expression of nature or fate but as a contingent expression of human agency. This novel’s claims regarding the historical contingency of race are underscored by the estrangement produced even in its opening passage: Don’t be afraid. My telling can’t hurt you in spite of what I have done and I promise to lie quietly in the dark—​weeping perhaps or occasionally seeing the blood once more—​but I will never again unfold my limbs to rise up and bare teeth. I explain. You can think what I tell you a confession, if you like, but one full of curiosities familiar only in dreams and during those moments when a dog’s profile plays in the steam of a kettle. Or when a corn-​ husk doll sitting on a shelf is soon splaying in the corner of a room and the wicked of how it got there is plain. Stranger things happen all the time everywhere. You know. I know you know. One question is who is responsible? Another is can you read?54

Rather than providing explication at the beginning of the novel to orient us to this world, Morrison gives us the voice of Florens, a young enslaved woman whose vocabulary is familiar but whose referents are far less so. Seemingly straightforward phrases—​“the blood,” “a dog’s profile plays in the steam of a kettle,” “a pea hen refuses to brood,” “a minha mãe standing hand in hand with her little boy”—​are bewildering. Readers must actively work to build both story and world from Florens’s unwieldy narration. The nonsense of the passage emphasizes the ethical and interpretive challenges it poses: “One question is who is responsible? Another is can you read?” A Mercy’s opening prompts readers to take up the challenge of reading with responsibility but not mastery, asking, in essence: Can you help to put together this story while taking responsibility for your interpretive choices and limitations? Such an

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  241 open and self-​reflexive reading posture is rewarded by a text comprised of numerous and conflicting points of view that readers must navigate. That Morrison’s characters and readers are alike engaged in the development and revision of (always imperfect) reading strategies enriches the novel’s potential as a site for ethical growth, particularly as it pertains to racial literacy. Readers who come to Morrison’s text in possession of a fixed sense of how to “read race” are challenged to revise their own interpretive techniques and to face the persistent misreadings that structure their lives and the lives of Morrison’s characters.

Ethnospeculation in the Classroom As we have been arguing through this chapter, apocalyptic, postapocalyptic, and dystopian speculative fiction contains deep ethical potential for the university classroom. Dystopian narratives invariably present a diffracted vision of the broad spectrum of human experience, frequently taking into account how the large-​scale movements of people and capital (not to mention race, gender, sexuality, inequality, and climate change) shape the lives of individuals. When dystopian narratives are properly “critical,” they plumb in perceptive ways how these social and natural forces organize societies in ways that are palpable, lasting, and troubling. This point was put on dazzling display in Paula’s undergraduate seminar, “After the Apocalypse: Speculative Fictional Narratives at the Turn of the 21st Century,” which brought together fictional and nonfictional dystopian narratives in the service of unearthing and interrogating a wide range of ethical issues. The texts the class read included various representations of how humans treat other humans, nonhumans, and the natural world—​all while implicitly asking and answering the question of “Why?” In discussing St. John’s Revelation, students considered a troubling question with both historical and contemporary resonance: In what situations is someone (or some community) justified in seeking vengeance, in the form of death and destruction, on the communities by which they have been persecuted? In reading the Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico, a nonfictional account of the Spanish conquest written from the perspective of the Indigenous inhabitants of Mesoamerica, students asked other questions: What level of respect or deference does a conquering and colonizing power owe to the beliefs and practices of people whose religion or culture differs radically

242  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin from their own? When, if ever, is it legitimate for one group of people to appropriate, without pay or adequate recompense, the labor of another group of people? In discussing the famous debate at Valladolid in the 1550s between two Spanish members of the Dominican Order, students confronted the Christian theological and natural law theories deployed by philosopher Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda in his attempt to prove that the Indigenous peoples were “barbarians” and “savages” with an inferior culture and no rational faculties. Positing that they inhabit “a natural condition making them suitable for slavery,” he argued that they could be converted only by violence or conquest. But students were also exposed to the way Friar Bartolomé de Las Casas sought to grant Indigenous people a form of contingent humanity—​ but only on the grounds that they could be converted to Catholicism by peaceful means.55 Reading such a powerful account of a past apocalypse provided to students an early lesson in historical strategies of dehumanization. The discussion of these early works not only offered a rich historical and intellectual context for the modern readings that followed, but also invited a practice of rigorous ethical inquiry mediated by the other texts read in the course. Margaret Atwood’s modern dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, for example, prompted a question that animated the imaginations of all of the students, women and men, in the class. Under what circumstances, if any, should one group of people (men, or first-​world would-​be parents) be allowed to appropriate or control the reproductive capacities of another group of people (women, either those forced to bear children they do not want or cannot afford, or those living in circumstances in which the choice to carry a pregnancy to term for someone else is dictated by economic need)? Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower pushed students to think about racial prejudice, economic inequality, and the degradation of our planet, while posing an implicit question about interactions across human difference: how should we treat others unlike ourselves? Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl prompted students to notice a tendency to believe that if someone makes or creates something, one “owns” it. But does, or should, a creator have the right to determine the fate, use, and distribution of a created thing? What if that “thing” is a genetically modified living plant or animal? What if the maker’s poor stewardship ends up devastating the earth’s biodiversity or leads to widespread famine? And what if that “thing” is a sentient, intelligent being—​an Android, Cyborg, or genetically modified human? The Windup Girl also surfaced the question of whether it is legitimate to assume that

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  243 nonhuman animals’ desires and behaviors should always be subordinated to human animals’ desires and behaviors. Finally, George Saunders’s brilliant short story, “Escape from Spiderhead,” pushed students to think about the ethics of incarceration.56 Students were pushed to think about how the delivery of information about a person affects what one is willing to do to them and to meditate on how small the arena of human agency is in situations of constrained neoliberal choice. In a recent contemporary American literature course called “Citizenship Fictions,” Lesley found that practices and concepts of critical speculation are of unique value in literature courses, including those not exclusively devoted to speculative fiction. In “Citizenship Fictions” she brought together works that are overtly science fictional (Octavia Butler’s Kindred), dystopian (Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale), and/​or magical realist (Tony Kushner’s Angels in America and Viet Thanh Nguyen’s “Black-​Eyed Women”) with aesthetically experimental works (Ana Castillo’s The Mixquiahuala Letters, N. Scott Momaday’s The Way to Rainy Mountain, and Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric), realist works (the rest of the stories in Nguyen’s The Refugees), and a personal and political essay (Ta-​Nehisi Coates’s “Letter to My Son”). Many of these works engage real apocalypses: Nguyen addresses the slaughter of civilians during the Vietnam War and the flight of refugees to the United States, Butler the Middle Passage and American slavery, Momaday the attempted genocide of the Kiowa people, Kushner the US AIDS epidemic, Castillo the conquest of the Americas, and Rankine and Coates the contemporary and historical slaughter of Black people by police and civilians. Like the other texts in the class, Atwood’s fictional dystopia draws from real historical and contemporary practices of exploitation and oppression. In explaining her process, Atwood writes: “One of my rules was that I would not put any events into the book that had not already happened.”57 By engaging real, lived dystopias, past and present, the course texts thus engage in the speculative practice of exposing the status quo as oppressive and dystopian, insisting that apocalypse does not belong to the future but, rather, is historical and ongoing. All of these works imagine what it means to be a citizen of apocalypse, a denizen of dystopia. And they either speculate on alternative pasts, presents, and futures or prompt such speculation on the part of their readers. Atwood coins the term “anti-​prediction” to capture her novel’s imaginative and ethical posture—​and its limits: “If this future can be described in detail, maybe it won’t happen. But such wishful thinking cannot be depended on either.”58

244  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin Even so, Lesley did not originally conceive of speculation as a key theme in the class. Rather, she chose “citizenship” as the signal term and asked her students to consider how each text engaged that term in relation to key historical events and forces, such as the rise of resistance and liberation movements designed to expand or critique US citizenship; the demographic shifts that followed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965; and current debates regarding immigration, refugeeism, racism, and sexism. Students were asked at the beginning of the course to generate definitions and proofs of citizenship, drawing from their own experience and the inaugural text, Rankine’s Citizen. Citizenship emerged as a complicated figure for belonging, community, responsibility, or, conversely, exclusion and violence. And its “fictionality” became a subject of sustained concern, as the works studied revealed citizenship to be based always in part on a fiction: the imaginative assertion of belonging and not-​belonging. As historian Benedict Anderson has noted, citizenship is an act of imagination.59 Literature, therefore, is especially well poised to serve as an occasion for imagining and reimagining community. That this work often emerged, in the class, as ethnospeculation is significant, inasmuch as antiracist activism has been one of the most crucial elements of contemporary US social movements. A speculative approach, while not necessary to the thematic and rhetorical links among the texts Lesley taught in her class, does allow for a deeper engagement and, we think, openness to the speculative work such texts seek to perform. By emphasizing the eerie, uncanny, and otherworldly in “the known world,” authors like Rankine, Nguyen, and Momaday stage a reading experience defined by estrangement.60 By doing so, they call into being readers for whom the trappings of the status quo are no longer comfortable, no longer unremarkable. Such readers read differently not only across texts, as we have done in our classes, but also in the world, as they learn, per Coates, “to live within the all of it.”61 Let us end by saying that we, Paula and Lesley, are careful never to tell our students exactly what a text might mean or how they should think or feel about it. We strive to model an engaged response, one that fosters the sorts of values extolled by thinkers and scholars who speak in the traditional vocabulary of virtue: humility, patience, generosity, empathy, understanding, self-​ reflexivity, courage, forbearance, and, of course, love. We also strive to keep in mind that answers to difficult questions can never be settled in advance. Because we live and work in a social world structured by race and related vectors of oppression—​a world in which the devastating reverberations of historical and ongoing apocalypses are subject to continuing acts of erasure

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  245 and disavowal—​ethnospeculation is an urgent interpretive practice. We have discovered that critical postapocalyptic and dystopian speculative fiction—​“bad places” notwithstanding—​is a very fruitful arena within which to explore these vectors and reverberations, and that speculative reading is a critical practice that aligns well with a decolonial pedagogy. Requiring readers to detour through alternative realities, to try on unfamiliar ways of speaking, reading, and being, ethnospeculative practices expose our most deeply held assumptions and allow us to imagine different, and more just, ways of being in the world. When these reading practices guide our interpretations of artistic works and sociopolitical contexts alike, we reorient ourselves to justice and heed the warnings given us to by prophets like Octavia Butler.

Notes 1. January 21, 2017. 2. https://​twit​ter.com/​lind​aurb​anbo​oks/​sta​tus/​822​9220​2791​6988​416 (accessed August 18, 2020). 3. Alexandra Alter, “Boom Times for the New Dystopians,” New York Times, March 30, 2017, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2017/​03/​30/​books/​boom-​times-​for-​the-​new-​dys​ topi​ans.html (accessed January 20, 2021). 4. Avni Majithia-​Sejpal, host, “Global Dystopias, Critical Dystopias: A Podcast with Junot Díaz,” BR: A Political and Literary Podcast, Boston Review: A Political and Literary Forum, October 31, 2016, http://​bosto​nrev​iew.net/​podc​ast/​glo​bal-​dystop​ias-​ criti​cal-​dystop​ias-​podc​ast-​junot-​díaz (accessed August 18, 2020). Díaz draws from Tom Moylan, Scraps of the Untainted Sky (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000), 198–​ 199. See also his editor’s note introducing the special issue Global Dystopias, “To Map, to Warn, to Hope,” Boston Review, September 29, 2017, https://​bosto​nrev​iew.net/​artic​ les/​lit​erat​ure-​cult​ure-​junot-​diaz-​map-​warn-​hope/​ (accessed August 18, 2020). 5. We are currently working on a multiauthored comparative study of contemporary ethnospeculative fiction as a decolonial art form. 6. Toni Morrison, interview by Bessie Jones, “An Interview with Toni Morrison,” in Conversations with Toni Morrison, ed. Danille Kathleen Taylor-​ Guthrie (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1994), 180–​181. 7. Several writers have argued in line with Peter Bergethon that “science fiction is a modeling exercise in which a model of scientific knowledge is internalized and used to simulate change in a society of human interest. This allows an exploration of what is possible and speculative analysis of how these possibilities might play out in a human context.” Peter Bergethon, “Landscapes of Change,” in New Boundaries in Political Science Fiction, ed. Donald M. Hassler and Clyde Wilcox (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2008), 12.

246  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin 8. Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands: The New Mestiza =​La Fontera (San Francisco, CA: Aunt Lute Books, 1999), 5. 9. See Hazel R. Markus and Shinobu Kitayama, “Culture and the Self: Implications for Cognition, Emotion, Motivation,” Psychological Review 98, no. 2 (1991): 224–​253; Hazel R. Markus and Shinobu Kitayama, “Culture, Self, and the Reality of the Social,” Psychological Inquiry 14, no. 3–​4 (2003): 277–​283; Hazel R. Markus and Shinobu Kitayama, “Models of Agency: Sociocultural Diversity in the Construction of Action,” in Cross-​Cultural Differences in Perspectives on Self, ed. Virginia Murphy-​Berman and John J. Berman (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003), 18–​74; Hazel R. Markus, Patricia R. Mullaly, and Shinobu Kitayama, “Selfways: Diversity in Models of Cultural Participation,” in The Conceptual Self in Context: Culture, Experience, Self-​Understanding, ed. Ulric Neisser and David S. Jopling (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 13–​61. 10. See Mark Dery, “Black to the Future: Interviews with Samuel R. Delany, Greg Tate, and Tricia Rose,” in Flame Wars: The Discourse of Cyberculture, ed. Mary Dery (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), 179–​222; Grace Dillon, Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2012); Erika Hoagland and Reema Sarwal, eds., Science Fiction, Imperialism, and the Third World (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2010); Jessica Langer, Postcolonialism and Science Fiction (London: Palgrave McMillan, 2011); Isiah Lavender III, ed., Black and Brown Planets (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2016); Cathryn Josefina Merla-​ Watson and B. V. Olguín, eds., Altermundos: Latin@ Speculative Literature, Film, and Popular Culture (Los Angeles: UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Press, 2017); Alondra Nelson, ed., “Afrofuturism,” special edition, Social Text 71, no. 20 (2002); John Rieder, Colonialism and the Emergence of Science Fiction (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan, 2008); David S. Roh, Betsy Huang, and Greta A. Niu, eds., Techno-​ Orientalism: Imagining Asia in Speculative Fiction, History, and Media (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2015); Ytasha L. Womack, Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-​Fi and Fantasy Culture (Chicago, IL: Chicago Review Press, 2013). 11. Dery, “Black to the Future,” 180. 12. See Bernadino de Sahagún, Arthur J. O. Anderson, and Charles E. Dibble, The War of Conquest: How It Was Waged Here in Mexico: The Aztecs’ Own Story (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1978). 13. See Grace Dillon, Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction (Tuscon: University of Arizona Press, 2012), as well as William Lempert, “Navajos on Mars,” Medium (blog), September 21, 2015, https://​med​ium.com/​space-​anthr​opol​ ogy/​nava​jos-​on-​mars-​4c336​175d​945 (accessed August 28, 2020). 14. Philip J. Deloria, Playing Indian (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 63–​70. 15. Rhiannon Johnson, “Anishinaabe Artist’s New VR Experience Takes an Indigenous Futurist Look at Toronto,” CBC News, April 14, 2018, https://​www.cbc.ca/​news/​ind​ igen​ous/​lisa-​jack​son-​biidaa​ban-​vr-​fut​ure-​toro​nto-​1.4619​041 (accessed August 28, 2020). 16. Roh, Huang, and Niu, eds., Techno-​Orientalism; Lisa Lowe, Immigrant Acts: On Asian American Cultural Politics (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996), 84–​96.

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  247 17. Aimee Bahng, “Extrapolating Transnational Arcs, Excavating Imperial Legacies: The Speculative Acts of Karen Tei Yamashita’s Through the Arc of the Rainforest,” MELUS 33, no. 4 (2008): 123–​144. 18. Anibal Quijano, “Coloniality of Power, Eurocentrism, and Latin America,” Nepantla: Views from the South 1, no. 3 (2000): 533–​580; Walter Mignolo, The Darker Side of the Renaissance: Literacy, Territoriality, and Colonization (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003), and “Delinking: The Rhetoric of Modernity, the Logic of Coloniality, and the Grammar of De-​Coloniality,” Cultural Studies 21, no. 2 (2007): 449–​514. 19. Nelson Maldonado-​ Torres, “Thinking through the Decolonial Turn: Post-​ continental Interventions in Theory, Philosophy, and Critique—​An Introduction,” Transmodernity 1, no. 2 (2011): 1–​15. 20. Nelson Maldonado-​Torres, Against War: Views from the Underside of Modernity (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2008). 21. Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos, “Fourth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle,” in Ya Basta! Ten Years of the Zapatista Uprising: Writings of Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos, ed. Žiga Vodovnik (Chico, CA: AK Press, 2004), 669. 22. Martin Luther King, Beyond Vietnam: A Prophecy for the ‘80’s, ed. Robert McAfee Brown (New York: Clergy and Laity Concerned, 1982), 9. 23. Malcolm X, Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements, ed. George Breitman (New York: Pathfinder, 1965), 40, emphasis added. 24. Such as César Chávez, Mahatma Gandhi, Dolores Huerta, Yuri Kochiyama, Winona LaDuke, Nelson Mandela, Subcomandante Marcos, Léopold Senghor, and many others. 25. The term “usable past” has figured centrally in Black revolutionary writing, resulting in a “counterlinear interpretation of temporality.” Darieck Scott, Extravagant Abjection (New York: New York University Press, 2010), 54. 26. Samuel Delany, “Some Presumptuous Approaches to Science Fiction,” in Starboard Wine: More Notes on the Language of Science Fiction, ed. Samuel Delany (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2012), 26. 27. Delany, “Some Presumptuous Approaches to Science Fiction,” 26. 28. Delany, “Some Presumptuous Approaches to Science Fiction,” 27. 29. Octavia A. Butler, Parable of the Talents (London: Headline Publishing, 2019), 105. 30. Mark Bould, “Come Alive by Saying No: An Introduction to Black Power SF,” Science Fiction Studies 34, no. 2 (2007): 221; Robert Heinlein, “If This Goes On” (1940), in Revolt in 2100 (Wake Forest, NC: Baen, 1981). 31. Ericka Hoagland and Reema Sarwal, introduction to Imperialism, the Third World, and Postcolonial Science Fiction, ed. Ericka Hoagland and Reema Sarwal (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2010), 9; Rebekah Sheldon, “After America,” in The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, ed. Eric Link and Gerry Canavan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 214. 32. Agloro is quoting Alex Rivera’s film Sleep Dealer (Maya Entertainment, 2008) in her essay, “Rasquache Cyborgs and Borderlands Aesthetics in Alex Rivera’s Sleep Dealer,” in This Bridge We Call Communication: Anzaldúan Approaches to Theory, Method,

248  Paula M. L. Moya and Lesley Larkin and Praxis, ed. Leandra H. Hernandez and Robert Gutierrez-​Perez (Washington, DC: Lexington Books, 2019): 257–272. This dynamic is akin to what the poet Langston Hughes memorably called a “dream deferred.” See Langston Hughes, Montage of a Dream Deferred (1951), in Selected Poems of Langston Hughes (Visalia, CA: Vintage, 1990), 221–​274. 33. Alondra Nelson, “Introduction: Future Texts,” Social Text 71, no. 20 (2002): 4. 34. Lisa Yaszek, “Afrofuturism in American Science Fiction,” in Link and Canavan, The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, 58–​69. Black Panther is a recent and popular example of this approach. 35. Also see Chris Harman, Zombie Capitalism: Global Crisis and the Relevance of Marx (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2010). 36. Market speculation is also implicated in contemporary financial (and other) apocalypse. See Aimee Bahng’s Migrant Futures (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2017) and “The Cruel Optimism of Asian Futurity and Reparative Practices in Sony Liew’s Malinky Robot,” in Techno-​Orientalism, ed. Roh, Huang, and Niu 163–​179; Rob Nixon, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), 2. 37. Nixon, Slow Violence, 2. Priscilla Wald has critiqued the tendency of apocalyptic narratives to focus on forestalling dystopian futures without illuminating present structures of exploitation and inequity. See Priscilla Wald, “American Studies and the Politics of Life,” American Quarterly 64, no. 2 (2012): 185–​204. 38. Nalo Hopkinson, “Afrofuturism: Womanist Paradigms for the New Millennium,” Femspec 6, no. 1 (2005): 103. 39. Alondra Nelson, “Making the Impossible Possible: An Interview with Nalo Hopkinson,” Social Text 20, no. 2 (2002): 101, emphasis added. On race as a technique of biopower, see Hortense Spillers, “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: American Grammar Book,” Diacritics 17, no. 2 (1987): 64–​81; Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life (Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998); and Alexander G. Weheliye, Habeas Viscus: Racializing Assemblages, Biopolitics, and Black Feminist Theories of the Human (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2014). 40. Gerry Canavan, “Introduction: If This Goes,” in Green Planets: Ecology and Science Fiction, ed. Gerry Canavan and Kim Stanley Robinson (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2014), 1–​24. 41. Díaz, “To Map.” 42. Seo-​Young Chu argues that all literature exists on a spectrum of science fictionality, depending upon the degree to which a text’s referents are cognitively estranging. See Do Metaphors Dream of Literal Sleep? (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), 9. 43. Delany, “Science Fiction and ‘Literature,’” in Starboard Wine (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2012), 68. 44. Delany, “Science Fiction and ‘Literature.’ ” 45. Samuel Delany, “About 5,750 Words,” in The Jewel-​Hinged Jaw: Notes on the Language of Science Fiction (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2009), 10. 46. Delany, “Science Fiction and ‘Literature,’ ” 68.

Decolonial Virtues of Ethnospeculative Fiction  249 47. Delany, “Science Fiction and ‘Literature,’ ” 80–​81. 48. William A. Calvo-​Quiros, “The Emancipatory Power of the Imaginary Defining Chican@ Speculative Productions,” Aztlan 41, no. 1 (2016): 164. 49. Also see Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in Postmodern Science Fiction (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993), 11–​12; Istvan Csicsery-​Ronay, Jr., The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2008); Hoagland and Sarwal, eds., Science Fiction, 12–​13; and Roxanne Samer, Alexandrina Agloro, and Laurie Ann Carlson, “Beyond the Cyborg Collective Book Review,” Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, no. 3, https://​adan​ ewme​dia.org/​2013/​11/​iss​ue3-​samere​tal/​ (accessed November 18, 2021). 50. Delany, Starboard Wine, 89. 51. Darko Suvin, “Estrangement and Cognition,” in Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre, ed. Gerry Canavan (1979: repr., New York: Peter Lang, 2016), 15–​28. 52. Walidah Imarisha, introduction in Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, ed. Adrienne Brown and Walidah Imarisha (Chico, CA: AK Press, 2015), 3. 53. Paula M. L. Moya, The Social Imperative: Race, Close Reading, and Contemporary Literary Criticism (Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press, 2016), 133–​162; Lesley Larkin, Race and the Literary Encounter: Black Literature from James Weldon Johnson to Percival Everett (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2015), 203–​211. 54. Toni Morrison, A Mercy (New York: Knopf, 2008), 1–​2. 55. Lars Kirkhusmo Pharo, “The Council of Valladolid (1550–​ 1551): A European Disputation about the Human Dignity of Indigenous Peoples of the Americas,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Human Dignity: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, ed. Marcus Düwell et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 95–​100. 56. George Saunders, “Escape from Spiderhead,” The New Yorker, December 13, 2020, https:// ​ w ww.newyor ​ ker.com/ ​ m agaz ​ i ne/ ​ 2 010/ ​ 1 2/ ​ 2 0/ ​ e sc ​ ape- ​ f rom- ​ s pi ​ d erh ​ e ad (accessed August 28, 2020). 57. Margaret Atwood, “Margaret Atwood on What ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Means in the Age of Trump,” The New York Times, March 10, 2017, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​ 2017/​03/​10/​books/​rev​iew/​marga​ret-​atw​ood-​handma​ids-​tale-​age-​of-​trump.html (accessed August 18, 2020). 58. Atwood, “Margaret Atwood on What ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Means in the Age of Trump.” 59. As historian Benedict Anderson puts it: “Communities are to be distinguished not by their falsity/​genuineness but by the style in which they are imagined.” See Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso Books, 1983), 6. 60. Ta-​Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2015), 11. 61. Coates, Between the World and Me, 10–​11.

V

C ONC LU SION

13 Character Education in the University Opportunities and Challenges Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant

The purpose of this volume has been to highlight diverse perspectives on whether and how universities do, should, and can intentionally cultivate virtue. While the last three decades have witnessed a significant increase in interest in character education, especially in primary and secondary schools, only recently has attention turned to the renewal of character education in the university. This volume seeks to catalyze a critical debate about the possibilities and limits of character education in the university and offer both theoretical and practical perspectives on what such education could look like in increasingly global, pluralistic, and intercultural contexts. In this concluding chapter, we synthesize some of the lessons from the volume and gesture toward potential opportunities and challenges for the future of character education within the university.

The University as a Context for Cultivating Virtue Despite the relative lack of explicit attention to virtue in contemporary higher education, the development of character was once a more widely accepted aim of many colleges and universities.1 Julie Reuben and Chad Wellmon share important moments of this history in Chapters 2 and 3. One of their signal contributions is to show how the evolving and complex history of character formation is woven through significant strands of the American and German traditions of higher education. Their accounts highlight that character education was once a central purpose of many universities and give good reason to consider whether it might be a legitimate aim today. If we are to find precedent for a focus on character in universities by looking to the past, however, Reuben’s and Wellmon’s chapters rightly resist

​

​

254  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant any nostalgic call for historical forms of character education that are not attuned to contemporary contexts and the intellectual, cultural, social, political, and economic influences that shape them. The history of virtue in the university is not straightforwardly linear—​either in terms of progress or decline. Rather, it reflects complex social dynamics and the critical contestation that often accompanies efforts to think deeply about how universities shape their students. One benefit of engaging questions of character within universities committed to rigorous analysis and a diversity of perspectives is that the context enables educators to recognize multiple perspectives on student formation and the tensions that arise between competing visions. We hope this volume extends this critical debate and provides additional perspectives within it. A common and persistent tension in this debate is between the intellectual and moral aims of a university. Some commentators focus solely on intellectual aims and the pursuit of knowledge and truth, without any explicit engagement with normative questions of virtue, ethics, or morality. John Mearsheimer, for example, endorses “a clear separation between intellectual and moral purpose” and suggests that, outside of concerns about academic integrity, universities should be “essentially amoral.”2 Others take a position similar to the one that Wellmon attributes to Max Weber in Chapter 3. They acknowledge the importance of virtues but focus primarily on intellectual or epistemic virtues that are more widely part of academic practice, thereby neglecting or downplaying the value of moral virtues.3 Others, like earlier proponents of character education, explicitly call for universities to serve moral purposes, but they tend to tie morality to singular traditions of moral or religious thought or seek to recover more traditional conceptions of why character matters and which virtues are most important. Still others, like many faculty in the 1960s, remain skeptical or resistant to earlier forms of character education, worrying that they impose particular values on students in ways that ignore cultural, moral, and religious diversity and thereby replicate structures of oppression. Many of these commentators instead emphasize neutrality in the classroom, explicitly seeing any effort to cultivate virtue or character as inappropriate or paternalistic. To use a distinction that Reuben draws in Chapter 2, the “neutrality” they often commend is understood as “tolerance,” respect, or inclusion of many diverse perspectives.4 Yet, if this view may seem opposed to the promotion of virtue in the university on the surface, beneath it is often a deeper commitment to a particular moral vision and accompanying set of virtues that focus on justice. For universities

Character Education in the University  255 to hold up the values of justice, respect, and equity as more than aspirations, they require the critical development of virtues and capacities that integrate aspiration and action. An equitable university is one in which the virtues of justice, courage, empathy, and humility are cultivated and practiced. In Chapter 3, Wellmon gestures toward a position that might offer a way between competing visions. Like other contributors, he recognizes that the intellectual enterprise, even of research universities, is not value-​neutral but assumes and embeds specific goods, values, and virtues within its culture and practices. While Wellmon tends to emphasize intellectual virtues, he also challenges the strict opposition between the pursuit of knowledge and the formation of character, suggesting that even the “research university, rightly understood, inculcates virtues by maintaining distinct practices oriented toward clear internal goods.”5 The goods the university pursues and promotes, however, are proximate rather than ultimate. “Universities,” he argues, “may not be able to impart comprehensive visions of the good, but they are uniquely positioned, given their own practices and traditions, to sustain encounters between traditions and help students develop capacities to engage in debates and conversations that take their deepest and oftentimes conflicting values seriously.”6 Wellmon’s suggested vision of shared but incomplete consensus around proximate goods aligns with Cass Sunstein’s ideal of “incompletely theorized agreement,” which recognizes that diverse members of communities can find consensus around proximate values, goods, or purposes while holding different ultimate values, reasons, or commitments.7 This practical consensus allows them to work together toward common purposes, including the development of specific virtues and the recognition of shared values such as the pursuit of knowledge and cultivation of a just and virtuous campus community. Whether implicit or explicit, however, this consensus is not permanent or settled. It remains partial and incomplete. To use a phrase from Nigel Biggar in another context, this consensus remains “tense,” reflecting a shared but provisional agreement subject to ongoing deliberation, disagreement, and contestation.8 On this conception, a university might identify and promote particular proximate goods, values, and virtues that its members deem vital to realizing its specific institutional mission and promoting flourishing, but such a consensus will be subject to ongoing consideration, contestation, and negotiation in light of the perspectives of diverse members that the university makes the space to engage openly.9 Such a vision could encourage the cultivation of specific virtues related to an institution’s particular ethos and

256  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant mission (which might differ from institution to institution) while making room for ongoing critical reflection, engagement, and adaptation in light of diverse perspectives and evolving intellectual, social, political, and cultural influences.10 Such an approach aligns with another key insight of this volume: colleges and universities are always in the process of forming student character, either explicitly or implicitly, intentionally or unintentionally. Even if character development is absent from formal teaching and institutional activity, it forms part of a “hidden curriculum” that inevitably shapes students in formative ways.11 As Brian Williams puts it in Chapter 4, universities are “thickly webbed” moral communities, where embodied practices, institutional narratives, and enacted examples of faculty and staff carry a certain set of values, norms, and commitments.12 Whether or not these are held or passed on overtly, the process of learning and living in such communities is inherently formative. The question is how critically and intentionally universities shape the character of students, not whether they do so at all.13 As a result, Nigel Biggar argues in Chapter 6 that it is better for universities to own and acknowledge their inevitable formative effect on students so they can be self-​aware, critical, and intentional about their influence rather than allowing the unexamined values of the status quo—​including potentially an unjust status quo—​to form and condition students without recognition or, potentially, resistance.14 An acknowledgment of this influence is especially relevant given that most university students are in a critical period of moral formation and identity development during emerging adulthood.15 A further reason to cultivate virtue in universities is to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. Contrary to those who might assume that character education is necessarily opposed to contemporary efforts to advance justice, this volume highlights forms of character education that can support the critical and urgent work to make universities more just, equitable, and inclusive. Although academic and popular discussions of character education and diversity, equity, and inclusion have often been part of separate discourses, there are ways they can come together to be mutually supportive. If virtue is aimed not only at individual but communal flourishing, efforts to cultivate and exercise virtue should be directed toward ensuring the flourishing of all members of a community, not just some. Justice is a key virtue of character in this regard. It is the virtue required to give others what they are due—​whether that be respect, recognition, or equality. Efforts to integrate

Character Education in the University  257 character education in the university should come to recognize the value of prioritizing justice as a core virtue of character. If character education can promote diversity, equity, and inclusion, then work to advance these values can in turn aid efforts to develop virtue. Since communities and cultures condition the formation of individual character, the moral quality of a society or institution can have a significant influence on what kind of character is formed within it. More just, equitable, and inclusive communities provide more supportive conditions for the cultivation of justice and other relevant virtues. Our own empirical analysis of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative supports this point. We found, for example, that an intentional emphasis on diversity and inclusion, including the intentional inclusion of participants of different nationalities, genders, races, ethnicities, cultural backgrounds, academic disciplines, political affiliations, and philosophical and religious commitments, was one of the most formative aspects of our efforts to develop leadership and character.16 Participants spoke explicitly about the beneficial effects of diversity, and our qualitative analysis revealed that participants shifted from “the focus on diversity as a challenge to be overcome to understanding it as a catalyst for personal growth.”17 Character education and the promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion can also be mutually supportive in other ways. Recently, scholars have shown how explicit attention to character can foster and support the “critical consciousness” needed to “analyze, navigate, and challenge oppression.”18 In our work with the Oxford Character Project and Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest, we are operationalizing such insights by integrating efforts to educate character with explicit attention to diversity, equity, and inclusion in our courses and programming as well as in our research and public engagement. In a 2021 conference on “Character and the Professions,” for example, we co-​organized a session on “Diversity, Character, and the Professions,” which included a panel of scholars and practitioners speaking on the relation between character and diversity, inclusion, and equity work across a variety of sectors, traditions, and cultural backgrounds.19 The session also included a keynote address from Stephanie Creary, a leading expert on diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace, who described how six virtues of character taken from the Values in Action framework—​wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence—​can support efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion.20 Paula Moya and Lesley Larkin’s discussion of teaching “decolonial virtues” in Chapter 12 offers another relevant example. They highlight how teaching

258  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant dystopian, apocalyptic, and postapocalyptic texts from decolonial thinkers can not only challenge the status quo (including some traditional accounts of ethics that contributed to colonial oppression) but also “illuminate how familiar Western virtues, such as courage, truthfulness, justice, charity, and love, have been transformed by and imbue decolonial projects.”21 They acknowledge the necessary and transformative power of critique yet recognize that even the most vigorous critiques often contain implicit normative arguments and moral visions of how the world ought to be. By engaging these visions critically, their chapter suggests that rigorous social critique can support constructive efforts to encourage justice and virtue. Colleges and universities committed to promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion on their campuses or in their curricula can find valuable resources to achieve that vision within critical and capacious accounts of character education.

Institutional and Cultural Barriers to Cultivating Virtue Onora O’Neill and Nigel Biggar highlight additional opportunities and challenges in Part II. O’Neill widens the aperture to think about the ways cultural, political, and intellectual trends create barriers to cultivating virtue in the university. Drawing on her historical perspective and philosophical expertise, O’Neill highlights how cultural shifts have led to the marginalization of virtue, owing, in part, to the decline of duty and a narrow focus on a particular set of rights that have shifted core ethical questions from what we ought to do to what we ought to receive.22 While she acknowledges that many people still affirm the importance of “values,” such “values” are often conceived as the mere expression of personal preferences. These developments have reduced “matters of justice to respect for individual rights” and “ethical questions to the satisfaction of subjective preferences.”23 Paired with the increasing individualism and consumerism that other contributors diagnose in Europe and the United States,24 these cultural shifts have created a context where questions of virtue and duty—​once a central focus of many universities—​recede in importance. Yet if a perceived decline in moral values creates challenges, it also generates opportunities for universities to respond. For many people, the significant and consequential lack of character in leaders in both the public sphere and the private sector has fueled an increased desire for colleges and universities to play a more ethically formative role in the education of future

Character Education in the University  259 leaders and citizens. Anecdotally, we have seen increased interest in our work to cultivate virtue in the university from faculty, staff, administrators, trustees, parents, alumni, and the general public who are disturbed by the ethical failures of prominent leaders in recent years. The COVID-​19 crisis further revealed the dangers of leaders who lack good character as well as the value of those who embody wisdom, empathy, and compassion.25 The conspicuous lack of character in some prominent leaders—​and the visible presence of it in others—​has created more openness among faculty who previously were skeptical of efforts to cultivate virtue in the university. In this way, a similar “fear for the future of democracy,” which, according to Reuben in Chapter 2, contributed to a “revival of moral education” in the mid-​ twentieth century, may contribute to a similar revival in the twenty-​first.26 Universities can not only be the beneficiaries of such a shift but can also play an active role in effecting it. Through research, teaching, and public engagement, faculty and staff shape public opinion and thought, producing insights that can transform public perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors. Moreover, universities educating emerging adults who will become the next generation of leaders and citizens.27 Since universities provide one of the last significant chances to formally educate many students before they enter adulthood and the workforce, they are vital to the process of personal formation and cultural transformation, offering an opportunity to return questions of justice, ethics, and virtue to the center of contemporary discourse. Yet, as O’Neill and Biggar emphasize, the structure and norms of universities themselves create additional challenges to fulfilling this social role. O’Neill, for example, highlights the effects of “regulatory and funding systems that use intrusive and laborious research and teaching metrics” to incentivize faculty and universities in the United Kingdom. This incentive structure necessitates competition for recognition and funding, which is often accompanied by “frequently intrusive and time-​consuming” requirements to ensure accountability.28 According to O’Neill, “These proliferating demands have inevitably altered relations between academics and students and diverted time and energies that were once available for less structured activities in which both participated.”29 Similar demands on faculty in the areas of research, teaching, and service create related difficulties in other countries, making it harder for faculty to spend additional time engaging with students inside and outside of the classroom, and harder still to develop new courses or modules that integrate character.

260  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant These demands are compounded by the rising costs of higher education, which incentivize universities to place more demands on existing faculty to reduce costs and encourage students (and their parents) to see themselves as “consumers” who need to secure a viable return on an increasingly expensive investment.30 As a result, many students and their families now see a university education primarily through the lens of career advancement. They view attending university less as an opportunity to learn how to live and more as a necessary step to securing the knowledge, skills, and credentials needed for employment. A survey of entering first-​year undergraduates in the United States provides stark evidence of this shift. In 1967, over 85 percent of incoming students identified “developing a meaningful philosophy of life” as an “essential” purpose for attending college.31 Fifty years later in 2017, it had dropped to 48 percent, a trend almost directly inverse to the increase in students who now see the purpose of college primarily as getting a job.32 Developing a meaningful philosophy of life and getting a job are not mutually exclusive, and as Biggar emphasizes in Chapter 6, many universities, from their medieval origins onward, have been driven to respond to both public and private demands, including those of the market.33 But the rise of consumerism and the subordination of higher education to professional advancement create a context in which educating character might be more difficult. This challenge, however, presents another opportunity to integrate character in significant ways. For the large number of students and families who see undergraduate, graduate, or professional education partly as a means of securing meaningful work, a focus on character can provide a valuable component of such education.34 Not only would an explicit focus on character help students develop important virtues that would equip them to flourish both personally and professionally across their lifespan, but it would also make them more attractive to potential employers and graduate schools. In one study, 81 percent of employers ranked “ethical judgment and decision-​ making” as “very important” when hiring new employees, putting ethical decision-​making only slightly behind communication and teamwork as the capacities most attractive to employers.35 Recently, scholars from numerous professions and fields have affirmed that character can be conducive to professional success, engagement, and flourishing.36 This view was on full display at our 2021 conference on “Character and the Professions,” where influential scholars and practitioners emphasized the importance of character in business, engineering, law, medicine,

Character Education in the University  261 public life, and religious leadership and discussed the need for universities to emphasize character as an essential aspect of education and professional preparation.37 That over 2,300 people from forty-​seven countries registered for the virtual conference highlights the international interest in this work. Of course, some may worry that instrumentalizing character to serve professional purposes may distort or undermine the cultivation of virtue for its own sake. This concern is valid and encourages vigilance to ensure that an emphasis on character is not being co-​opted to serve nonvirtuous purposes. Yet the fact that particular virtues of character align with specific professional aims does not itself undermine the possibility of good character. After all, we want professionals to possess virtues such as wisdom, justice, humility, courage, and compassion, and as Biggar emphasizes in Chapter 6, societies often incur the damaging social and civic costs when leaders and citizens lack virtue.38 So, if many students pursue higher education for at least partly professional reasons, explicit attention to character as part of their education might make them more virtuous than the neglect of it. Moreover, if virtues are acquired, in part, through the habituation of virtuous thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and actions, then acquiring virtues initially for instrumental purposes has the potential to lead to the cultivation and exercise of more complete virtue for its own sake, as Nancy Snow has argued.39 Developing virtues instrumental to a particular role (such as “good employee”) may, over time, lead an individual to shift from seeing virtue as primarily instrumental to recognizing the constitutive value of its contribution to flourishing and the intrinsic value of acting virtuously for its own sake.40 Such a strategy may have similar effects for a university as a whole. A university that adopts an emphasis on character education may, through the process of educating students to be more virtuous, recognize the value of character education apart from any connection to its instrumental value for professional preparation or employment. Indeed, one advantage of character education is that it challenges approaches to higher education that assume the purpose of education is purely instrumental or professional. In this way, colleges and universities committed to educating the “whole person,” serving the common good, or producing cutting-​edge research can find character education compatible with their educational aims and aspirations. And those that place a higher priority on professional preparation can find character education congenial to their pursuits, even as it fundamentally challenges them to redefine professional excellence in terms of moral excellence. Properly conceived, the two can go hand in hand.41

262  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant Here, the example that Joanna Collicutt presents in Chapter 9 is instructive. Collicutt, a clinical psychologist specializing in helping patients in rehabilitation after serious brain injury or trauma, notes how the rehabilitation center originally prioritized efficiency and the elimination of problems, which created an ethos that was “professionally driven” rather than “patient-​ centered” and focused more on “instrumental task performance” than “social role and personal identity.”42 Drawing on positive psychology and the research she had conducted with patients in the unit, Collicutt and her team shifted the culture dramatically, making it “goal-​directed, person-​centered, and interdisciplinary,” leading to a more “holistic and individualized” approach to healing, learning, and instruction.43 They found that framing rehabilitation in terms of social roles and personal identity and focusing on the emotional and spiritual needs of patients rather than simply their cognitive or physical impairments changed the culture of the unit and yielded more positive outcomes in patients. Collicutt argues that a similar approach—​ centered on the cultivation of virtues and attuned to personal identity and the social roles that students, faculty, and staff inhabit—​could effect a similar transformation in a university. In particular, a holistic focus on character could help universities resist the reduction of teaching and learning to the performance of instrumental tasks and approach them instead as essential to the development of the whole person, encouraging universities and all of their members—​students, faculty, and staff—​to see higher education as a pursuit of higher purposes, including the flourishing of both individuals and communities. Unfortunately, many colleges and universities are not organized to approach learning in holistic ways. Their structure owes, in part, to the social, political, and economic pressures that several of our contributors highlight in this volume, but it also reflects the increasing demands placed on faculty and the ways that faculty are incentivized to contribute to the institutional mission. Given increasing disciplinary specialization, the strong connection between research and institutional reputation, and the way that much funding is driven by research grants and the comparative evaluation of research outputs, many universities place an unbalanced emphasis on research, which incentivizes faculty to focus on research sometimes to the neglect of teaching and mentoring.44 An unbalanced emphasis on research has three related effects. First, because demands on faculty in all areas continue to increase, including in research, faculty have less time or incentive to spend time designing new

Character Education in the University  263 courses, learning new content, or developing new skills, making it harder to develop new ways to educate character in their teaching. Many might also worry that adding more content to courses already full of disciplinary or technical content might burden their syllabus or require a complete overhaul of their courses or curriculum. Such challenges are especially daunting for contingent or adjunct faculty who are often hired to teach multiple courses without significant job security or competitive compensation. Second, because most faculty are trained to do research, often in increasingly narrow and specialized ways, they rarely receive instruction on how to teach the whole student beyond focusing on disciplinary knowledge. Though many graduate students are required to teach as part of their doctoral programs, they often receive very little training in pedagogical design, particularly in the context of teaching their own courses or using interdisciplinary methods to teach an interdisciplinary topic such as character. This means that many faculty might feel uncertain about how best to educate character, even if they desire to do so in practice. Finally, some faculty informed by a deep commitment to research who judge teaching by scientific standards may worry that character education is not sufficiently rigorous or research-​based, and that there is no way to assess student learning or development of qualities as intangible as virtues. It might seem much easier to assess students’ ability to do complex math problems, write a persuasive argument or interpretative essay, or complete an exam that shows what they learned from a course. These concerns are legitimate, especially given the cultural, intellectual, and institutional barriers that many of our contributors have identified. But recent developments in the field of character education show that these issues can be addressed. The chapters in Part III offer implicit responses to many of these common concerns.

How to Cultivate Virtue in the University Chapter 7 on research-​based strategies of character development highlights how character education can be designed and delivered with both theoretical and empirical rigor. In particular, it identifies seven strategies supported by interdisciplinary insights from education, philosophy, and psychology: “(1) habituation through practice, (2) reflection on personal experience, (3) engagement with virtuous exemplars, (4) dialogue that increases

264  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant virtue literacy, (5) awareness of situational variables, (6) moral reminders, and (7) friendships of mutual accountability.”45 These strategies (and others like them) provide practical guidance to faculty, staff, and administrators who are uncertain of how to educate character in an effective, research-​ based way. Moreover, the fact that these strategies are based in rigorous academic research (and are being tested through empirical measurement) helps to address faculty concerns that character education is not evidence-​ based. Scholarly advances in virtue ethics, character education, and positive psychology over the last three decades have now created a broad, deep, and interdisciplinary field of character science that provides theoretical and empirical grounding for character-​directed pedagogy.46 Chapter 7 also shows that the classroom is not the only site of character formation in a university. The Oxford Global Leadership Initiative at the center of the chapter is an example of a voluntary, extracurricular program that does not require class time or onerous levels of faculty engagement. The character-​infused well-​being program at the University of Worcester that Morgan and Gulliford describe in Chapter 9 is another example.47 The possibilities of extracurricular and cocurricular programming highlight how colleges and universities, especially of the residential variety, can provide holistic contexts where moral development can happen both inside and outside the classroom, on campus and beyond. It also shows how staff, and not just faculty, can have valuable influences on student formation, not only by creating structured programming and learning opportunities for students but also by serving as mentors, counselors, and role models who offer guidance, support, and care. The role of staff is important to recall, particularly given that some critics of moral education focus only on faculty in the classroom and ignore the vital ways that staff and students in residence halls, student organizations, athletics, and other social, intellectual, and religious communities can shape emerging adults.48 Recognizing the possibility of formation outside of the classroom might alleviate concerns from faculty who feel unequipped to cultivate virtue or do not see clear ways to do it given their disciplinary expertise or the content of their research and teaching. The fact that virtue can be cultivated outside the classroom, however, does not mean that character education has no place within it. The same seven strategies highlighted in Chapter 7 can also be integrated into academic courses or modules focused on character. At Wake Forest University, for example, faculty and postdoctoral fellows from the Program for Leadership and Character have applied these seven strategies in courses on leadership

Character Education in the University  265 and character in communication, education, entrepreneurship, environmental studies, humanities, law, politics, and theology. The program has also worked collaboratively with the Department of Engineering to infuse character throughout their four-​year curriculum and offered course development grants and workshops to equip faculty in other fields to educate character in their courses. In the first two years of the grants, over fifty faculty from across the university—​including in business, computer science, economics, history, law, literature, foreign languages, mathematics, medicine, philosophy, politics, psychology, and theology—​designed new courses or modules to integrate leadership and character into their disciplines or professional fields.49 That the program is able to support diverse faculty and departments, including in STEM fields where faculty are not typically trained in the study of character, provides a model of how to equip faculty to teach character in a way that advances their specific learning objectives. Other chapters in Part III provide further evidence of such integration in new or existing courses across disciplines, including in courses that are not focused solely on character or part of a specific character education program. In Chapter 9, for example, Morgan and Gulliford present an example from the University of Worcester where a focus on gratitude was integrated into a module for first-​year undergraduates in an “Introduction to Psychology” course. This case study shows how virtue can be introduced into existing modules and courses in ways that align with intended learning objectives.50 Chapters 11 and 12 demonstrate that opportunities for such adaptation are not limited to psychology. In Chapter 11, Jessica Richard shows how intentionally engaging both the content and form of a classic novel, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, can teach students important lessons about the presence and “elusiveness” of virtue, the importance of humility, and the dangers of attributing virtue or vice too quickly.51 Richard’s example demonstrates that one does not even need to introduce an entire module on a virtue to make steps toward cultivating it in the classroom; simply calling attention to how texts relate to virtue can catalyze a conversation about character without needing to add new material or forfeit precious class time. Further, Richard’s chapter shows how engaging texts through the lens of virtue and making them relevant to local cultures and contexts, such as the “door-​holding” culture of manners at Wake Forest, can make textual analysis and class discussion more interesting and relevant to students.52 Moya and Larkin’s discussion of “ethnospeculative fiction” in Chapter 12 provides further examples of how to cultivate virtue critically and creatively.

266  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant Recognizing literature as “a privileged space for ethical inquiry” that can enable us to explore “what it means to be a virtuous human being in a particular time and place,” they highlight how dystopian, apocalyptic, and postapocalyptic texts can help to teach “decolonial virtues,” the virtues needed to recognize, resist, and redress unjust social arrangements shaped by colonial oppression and to foster more just and equitable ways of life.53 The examples of their classroom practice reveal how they contextualize and interrogate ethical ideas and possibilities to elevate new and varied ways of being in the world. They show how a critical, even seemingly apocalyptic, stance toward contemporary social, political, and economic realities can illuminate opportunities for ethical transformation, modeling an imaginative engagement that “fosters the sorts of values extolled by thinkers and scholars who speak in the traditional vocabulary of virtue: humility, patience, generosity, empathy, understanding, self-​reflexivity, courage, forbearance, and, of course, love.”54 All of these examples highlight how questions of virtue can be introduced into existing courses and modules in ways that align with the learning objectives of specific disciplines. Educating character does not require the complete overhaul of a course but can be accomplished through thoughtful, critical, and intentional adaptation. Moreover, faculty do not have to be experts in character education or scholars of virtue ethics to do this work effectively. Critical intentionality, aided by a basic knowledge of ethics and character that can be gained through reading, research, or targeted workshops, is enough to begin educating character in the classroom in ways that can help faculty and students achieve their desired learning goals within and beyond their disciplines. Another potential benefit of intentional engagement with character and virtue is that some faculty and staff might become more intentional about modeling the kind of character they hope to elicit from their students. Such engagement could not only contribute to faculty and staff ’s own flourishing but foster a stronger culture of character in the university, providing members of the community with access to ideas and examples that can inspire moral improvement. One of the key insights of this volume is that role models and exemplars of character can play a significant role in forming the character of students who admire and emulate them.55 Faculty and staff engagement with character education might help them recognize their inevitable role as examples in the classroom, which can have long-​term effects even beyond the conclusion of a course. Since faculty, staff, and administrators are

Character Education in the University  267 “the long-​term foundations of the university” and “powerful influences on the characters of students,” as Miller argues in Chapter 8, investing in the personal and pedagogical development of faculty, staff, and administrators might provide yet another way to cultivate virtue in the university.56 In addition to showing that virtue can and perhaps should be cultivated in the university, the chapters in Part III also offer insights into how, practically, character can be educated. The seven strategies surveyed in Chapter 7 provide the most sustained treatment of specific methods, but the other chapters in Part III offer valuable insights, too. Morgan and Gulliford, for example, highlight why it is important to understand virtues as “multicomponent” capacities involving “cognitions, emotions, attitudes, and behaviors.”57 While their multicomponent approach is aimed primarily at measurement, they emphasize its pedagogical implications, suggesting that effective development of specific virtues involves engaging all components in a holistic and integrated way. Just focusing on fostering grateful feelings, for example, might not be enough to cultivate gratitude as a virtue, which requires also attending to grateful cognitions, attitudes, and actions. This is why Morgan and Gulliford suggest that a “particularly useful starting point, especially in higher education, is a critical consideration of what gratitude is and when it is due.”58 Miller makes a similar point about honesty, suggesting that clarifying the concept of honesty and exploring what it means to be an exemplar of honesty can be an important place to start in educating the virtue.59 Both chapters stress the importance of virtue literacy as a strategy of moral formation.60 The multicomponent approach also entails that virtue literacy and conceptual understanding alone are not sufficient to cultivate a virtue. Other practices and strategies will be needed to foster the proper attitudes, emotions, and behaviors that accompany, inform, and reflect virtuous cognitions. Our own experience in the Oxford Character Project supports this point. In our initial three-​year pilot program, students overwhelmingly reported that the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative helped them to “develop, increase, or strengthen” their sense of vocation (73 percent), commitment to service (83 percent), humility (82 percent), and gratitude (90 percent).61 But in quantitative surveys, students only reported statistically significant growth on two of the four vocal virtues: gratitude and a commitment to service. While one reason might relate to limitations of the available scales to measure vocation and humility, our qualitative data also revealed another potential explanation: students showed the most development on virtues, such as gratitude

268  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant and a commitment to service, when the program provided tools to connect conceptual aspects of the virtue with their practical attempts to develop it. The program presented humility and a sense of vocation primarily through conceptual engagement, which gave students fewer opportunities to operationalize or practice them.62 These results highlight the need to integrate the conceptual and the practical into the cultivation of character. This integration is especially important in a university setting where many faculty, by the nature of their discipline and training, might be tempted to prioritize conceptual analysis and neglect the more embodied, affective, and practical methods needed to cultivate multicomponent virtues. Of course, the need to educate virtues holistically—​in all their component parts—​might make it more difficult to cultivate a large set of virtues in the same module or course, particularly if educators want to avoid a superficial treatment of each. This is one reason why Christian Miller suggests focusing on a select number of virtues rather than trying to educate them all, which is not possible given limited amounts of time and resources and the heavy demands already placed on faculty, staff, and administrators.63 Focusing on a few virtues most relevant to a particular institution, or the college years, might be most effective. As evidenced in Chapter 7, the Oxford Character Project has applied this approach in its programming, focusing on focal virtues most aligned with the developmental needs of emerging adults aspiring to be ethical leaders in pluralistic contexts.64 The selection of four virtues provided a valuable focus to an initial three-​year pilot program, particularly since the virtues chosen—​such as vocation and service, on one hand, and gratitude and humility, on the other—​are mutually reinforcing, allowing the cultivation of one to strengthen the other. After the first three years, the Oxford Character Project recognized the need to add further virtues—​including honesty (given the rise of a “posttruth” culture and the lack of honesty in public and private life) and practical wisdom (a metavirtue needed to exercise any other virtues in the right ways and circumstances). Our own experience suggests the need to be sensitive to emerging cultural trends and developments (as for honesty) and to recognize how specific virtues (such as practical wisdom) support the development, exercise, and maintenance of other virtues, an idea that scholars describe as the “unity” or “interconnection” of the virtues.65 Our current research seeks to identify virtues of particular importance for leadership in the professional sectors in which many students will pursue careers.

Character Education in the University  269 The interconnection of the virtues has at least two important implications for pedagogy. First, it entails that educators need to consider how to incorporate other virtues that might support the primary virtues they most want to form; otherwise, they might not be as successful in cultivating their preferred virtues. For example, if a faculty member wants to cultivate courage but does not help students develop the practical wisdom needed to discern relevant moral considerations and make good judgments about how best to respond to fear, students might not know how to exercise courage in particular situations, or they might respond to fear in ways that are rash. The interconnection of the virtues prompts educators to consider how best to support the holistic development of many virtues. Yet, if this implication seems to put more demands on educators, the interconnection of the virtues also has a second, more salutary implication: efforts to educate one virtue are likely to have a positive effect on others. Research, for example, shows that interventions to increase gratitude also increase humility, and vice versa, leading to an “upward spiral” of the virtues.66 And empirical research on a course on character at Wake Forest has shown that a holistic approach to educating specific target virtues with the seven strategies identified in Chapter 7 can also lead to increases in reports of nontargeted virtues as well.67 Other virtues are likely to have similarly reinforcing relationships, though more empirical work is needed to explore exactly what these relationships are and how they function.68 The possibility of measuring growth in one or more virtues highlights a signal development in the field of character education over the last twenty years. Thanks to the groundbreaking work of scholars and the support of major foundations focused on character, experts have now developed a wide range of measurement tools to assess character, from comprehensive inventories of multiple virtues or character strengths (such as the Values in Action [VIA] survey referenced in Collicutt’s and Miller’s chapters) to psychometric scales of single virtues (such as the multicomponent gratitude measure [MCGM] discussed in Chapter 9).69 Alongside quantitative scales, a number of scholars have also advanced valuable qualitative work to assess growth in character. As our own work has shown, a mixed-​methods approach that incorporates qualitative methods is particularly valuable since quantitative surveys do not always capture the complexity or extent of student development.70 The result of all this research is that the field of character science has increasingly refined the theoretical and empirical tools to assess aspects of character and the development of particular virtues.

270  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant These developments not only contribute to more rigorous scholarship on virtue and character but also provide valuable pedagogical resources to help educators assess the impact of their courses and programs, improve those interventions based on the research, and share the results with wider communities of scholars and educators, all of which can provide a boost to faculty, staff, and administrators who want to integrate character education creatively into their institutions. Taken together, this research also helps to address one of the primary concerns about that effort, namely, that character cannot be accurately measured, assessed, or isolated from other factors that influence college students. This research shows that it is possible to assess the effects of curricular and extracurricular efforts to cultivate virtue in a university setting, and this research is only likely to expand as the field of character education continues to advance. Concerns about the measurement of character, however, provide an important note of caution. Given the inherent difficulty of assessing virtues that combine cognitions, emotions, attitudes, and behavior, and given that research on character in the context of colleges and universities is still emerging, we should maintain appropriate humility when analyzing the results of specific program assessments. If much good work has been done, still more is needed. The importance of character development in higher education and the need for reliable and well-​evidenced methods provide further impetus for scholars and educators to produce research that analyzes the potential impact of efforts to educate character.71

Conclusion The same spirit of humility and hope should extend to the larger prospects of character education in the university. If most people do not possess either complete virtue or vice but some mixture of positive and negative traits, as Miller emphasizes in Chapter 8, and if the development of virtues demands difficult and intentional effort over the long term, then most students will likely not leave university with fully formed virtues, particularly given what Williams shares about emerging adults’ psychological and neurological development in Chapter 4.72 The fact that emerging adults (and later, adults) remain in an ongoing process of formation should chasten any presumption that positive character development, even with a flawlessly designed syllabus or program, is guaranteed. Yet the fact that emerging adulthood itself remains

Character Education in the University  271 a critical period of moral development for most people also reminds us that character formation is possible and that, when done critically, intentionally, and practically, colleges and universities can play a vital role in helping students become more virtuous in ways that promote their flourishing and the flourishing of their communities. Our humble hope is that this volume might continue to foster critical dialogue about character within higher education and encourage more faculty, staff, and administrators to embrace the opportunities and challenges of cultivating virtue in the university.

Notes 1. For example, see Julie A. Reuben, The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996); L. W. B. Brockliss, The University of Oxford: A History (New York: Oxford University Press), 334–​ 335; and James Arthur, “Student Character in the British University,” in Citizenship and Higher Education: The Role of Universities in Communities and Society, ed. James Arthur and Karen E. Bohlin (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2005), 8–​32. For an insightful analysis of the decline of attention to ethics within the university and its emerging revival, see Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 3–​26. 2. John J. Mearsheimer, “Aims of Education Address,” University of Chicago (1997), https://​coll​ege.uchic​ago.edu/​stud​ent-​life/​aims-​educat ​ion-​addr​ess-​1997-​john-​j-​ mear​shei​mer (accessed June 7, 2021). 3. Some of Stanley Fish’s writing can imply this view. See, e.g., Stanley Fish, “Save the World on Your Own Time,” The Chronicle of Higher Education (January 23, 2003), https://​www.chroni​cle.com/​arti​cle/​save-​the-​world-​on-​your-​own-​time/​ (accessed June 7, 2021). For a thoughtful reply to Fish, see Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben, “Aim High: A Response to Stanley Fish,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 57–​75. 4. Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume), 33–​38. 5. Wellmon, Chapter 3 (this volume), 45. 6. Wellmon, Chapter 3 (this volume), 54. 7. Cass R. Sunstein, “Practical Reason and Incompletely Theorized Agreements,” Current Legal Problems 51 (1998): 267–​298. 8. Nigel Biggar, Behaving in Public: How to Do Christian Ethics (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2011), 25–​61. 9. As J. Donald Moon argues, even when a consensus about common goods is difficult to achieve, members of a university community might be able to forge a consensus

272  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant around resisting “common bads,” those forms of injustice, violence, or vice that require an active moral response. See J. Donald Moon, “The Possibility of Moral Education in the University Today,” in Debating Moral Education: Rethinking the Role of the Modern University, ed. Elizabeth Kiss and J. Peter Euben (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), 267–​282, at 275. 10. For a similar approach, see Anne Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” in Bringing in a New Era in Character Education, ed. William Damon (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2002), 149–​171, at 155–​162; and Michael Lamb’s comments in David Henreckson and Michael Lamb, “Character in Crisis: The Challenges of Moral Formation in Higher Education,” Comment (Spring 2021): 61–​64. 11. For expressions of this view, see Brooks, Lamb, and Brant, Chapter 1 (this volume), 4–5; Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume), 105–​106; Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 161. On the effects of a “hidden curriculum,” see Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 152–​155; Kiss and Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” 14, 17; Karen E. Bohlin, “Character Education at the University: A Worthy Purpose,” in Citizenship and Higher Education: The Role of Universities in Communities and Society, ed. James Arthur and Karen E. Bohlin (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2005), 97, 111. 12. Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume), 68–69. 13. Kiss and Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” 14, 17; Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 152–​155, 168–​169. 14. Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume). Cf. Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 152–​155, 168–​ 169; Kiss and Euben, “Debating Moral Education: An Introduction,” 14; Lamb, in Henreckson and Lamb, “Character in Crisis,” 61. 15. See Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume); cf. Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 115–116. 16. See Edward Brooks, Jonathan Brant, and Michael Lamb, “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character? Insights from a Leadership and Character Development Program at the University of Oxford,” International Journal of Ethics Education 4 (2019): 167–​182. 17. Brooks, Brant, and Lamb, “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character?,” 172. 18. See, e.g., Scott Seider, Jalene Tamerat, Shelby Clark, and Madoura Soutter, “Investigating Adolescents’ Critical Consciousness Development through a Character Framework,” Journal of Youth and Adolescence 46 (2017): 1162–​1178. See also Larry Nucci and Robyn Ilten-​Gee, Moral Education for Social Justice (New York: Teachers College Press, 2021). 19. The panel included Noorain Khan, Director of the President’s Office at the Ford Foundation; Eboo Patel, founder of the Interfaith Youth Core; Stephanie Pinder-​ Amaker, Chief Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity Officer at McLean Hospital and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School; and José Villalba, Vice President of Diversity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer at Wake Forest University. A video recording is available at https://​lea​ders​hipa​ndch​arac​ter.wfu.edu/​eve​nts/​charac​ter-​in-​ the-​prof​essi​ons/​.

Character Education in the University  273 20. Stephanie Creary, “Holding onto the Virtues in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Work in the Professions,” Character and the Professions Conference, Wake Forest University, March 19, 2021, https://​lea​ders​hipa​ndch​arac​ter.wfu.edu/​eve​nts/​charac​ ter-​in-​the-​prof​essi​ons/​ (accessed June 7, 2021). 21. Moya and Larkin, Chapter 12 (this volume), 233–234. 22. O’Neill, Chapter 5 (this volume), 87. 23. O’Neill, Chapter 5 (this volume), 95. 24. See Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume), 40–41; Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume), 67–68; Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume), 102; and Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 190. 25. For one example of the value of character during a crisis, see Nicolai Chen Nielsen, Gemma D’Auria, and Sasha Zolley, “Tuning In, Turning Around: Cultivating Compassionate Leadership in a Crisis,” McKinsey.com (May 1, 2020). https://​www. mckin​sey.com/​busin​ess-​functi​ons/​organ​izat​ion/​our-​insig​hts/​tun​ing-​in-​turn​ing-​ outw​ard-​cult​ivat​ing-​compas​sion​ate-​lea​ders​hip-​in-​a-​cri​sis (accessed June 7, 2021). 26. Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume), 41. 27. See, for example, Brooks, Brant, and Lamb, “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character?” 28. O’Neill, Chapter 5 (this volume), 84. 29. O’Neill, Chapter 5 (this volume), 84. 30. On consumerism in higher education, see Reuben, Chapter 2 (this volume), 40–41, and Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 190. See also Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 149–​150. 31. Kevin Egan, Ellen Bara Stolzenberg, Joseph J. Ramirez, Melissa C. Aragon, Maria Ramirez Suchard, and Celia Rios-​Aguilar, The American Freshman: Fifty-​Year Trends, 1966–​2015 (Los Angeles: Higher Education Research Institute, UCLA, 2016), 83. 32. Ellen Bara Stolzenberg, Kevin Egan, Melissa C. Aragon, Natacha M. Cesar-​ Davis, Sidronio Jacobo, Victoria Couch, and Celia Rios-​Aguilar, The American Freshman: National Norms Fall 2017 (Los Angeles: Higher Education Research Institute, UCLA, 2019), 40. 33. Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume), 98–​99. 34. Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 165–​166. 35. Hart Research Associates, “Falling Short? College Learning and Career Success” (2015), 4, also cited by Derek Bok, Higher Expectations: Can Colleges Teach Students What They Need to Know in the 21st Century? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2020), 58. 36. On character across a number of professions, see, e.g., Phillip Blond, Elena Antonacopoulou, and Adrian Pabst, In Professions We Trust: Fostering Virtuous Practitioners in Teaching, Law and Medicine (London: ResPublica, 2015); Christopher Megone, “Formation and Virtue, Academic and Professional,” in Universities, Ethics, and Professions: Debate and Scrutiny, ed. John Strain, Ronald Barnett, and Peter Jarvis (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2009), 57–​68; Justin Oakley and Dean Cocking, Virtue Ethics and Professional Roles (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001); Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharpe, Practical Wisdom: The Right Way to Do the

274  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant Right Thing (New York: Riverhead Books, 2011); and Rebecca L. Walker and Philip J. Ivanhoe, eds., Working Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary Moral Problems (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). On character in business, see, e.g., Robert Audi, “Business Ethics from a Virtue-​ Theoretic Perspective,” in The Routledge Companion to Virtue Ethics, ed. Lorraine Besser-​Jones and Michael Slote (New York: Routledge, 2015), 529–​542; Taya R. Cohen and Lily Morse, “Moral Character: What It Is and What It Does,” Research in Organizational Behavior 34 (2014): 43–​61; Taya R. Cohen, A. T. Panter, Nazli Turan, Lily Morse, and Yeonjeong Kim, “Moral Character in the Workplace,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 107, no. 5 (2014): 943–​963; Eugene Heath, “Virtue as a Model of Business Ethics,” in Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics, ed. Christoph Luetge (New York: Springer, 2013), 109–​129; Fred Kiel, Return on Character: The Real Reason Leaders and Their Companies Win (Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2015); Lily Morse and Taya R. Cohen, “Virtues and Vices in Workplace Settings: The Role of Moral Character in Predicting Counterproductive and Citizenship Behaviors,” in Handbook of Virtue Ethics in Business and Management, ed. Alejo José G. Sison (New York: Springer, 2015), 1–​11; Peter J. Rea, James K. Stoller, and Alan Kolp. Exception to the Rule: The Surprising Science of Character-​Based Culture, Engagement, and Performance (New York: McGraw-​ Hill Education, 2017); and Alejo José G. Sison, Happiness and Virtue Ethics in Business: The Ultimate Value Proposition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). On character in engineering, see, e.g., Charles Harris, “The Good Engineer: Giving Virtue Its Due in Engineering Ethics,” Science and Engineering Ethics 14 (2008): 153–​ 164; William Jordan, “A Virtue Ethics Approach to Engineering Ethics,” 2006 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition (2006), https://​ strat​egy.asee.org/​a-​vir​tue-​eth​ics-​appro​ach-​to-​engi​neer​ing-​eth​ics; Jessica Koehler, Olga Pierrakos, Michael Lamb, Alana Demaske, Carlos Santos, Michael D. Gross, and Dylan Franklin Brown, “What Can We Learn from Character Education? A Literature Review of Four Prominent Virtues in Engineering Education,” 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference & Exposition (2020), peer.asee.org/​what-​can-​we-​ learn-​f rom-​character-​education-​a-​literature-​review-​of-​four-​prominent-​virtues-​ in-​engineering-​education; Olga Pierrakos, Mike Prentice, Cameron Silverglate, Michael Lamb, Alana Demaske, and Ryan Smout, “Reimagining Engineering Ethics: From Ethics Education to Character Education,” 2019 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (2019), https://​iee​expl​ore.ieee.org/​docum​ent/​9028​690; and Shannon Vallor, Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). On character in law, see, e.g., Robert Araujo, “The Virtuous Lawyer: Paradigm and Possibility,” SMU Law Review 50, no. 2 (1997): 433–​492; Robert F. Cochran, Jr. “Lawyers and Virtues: A Review Essay of Mary Ann Glendon’s A Nation Under Lawyers: How the Crisis in the Legal Profession Is Transforming American Society and Anthony T. Kronman’s The Lost Lawyer: Failing Ideals of the Legal Profession,” Notre Dame Law Review 71, no. 4 (2014): 707–​730; Mark L. Jones, “Developing Virtue

Character Education in the University  275 and Practical Wisdom in the Legal Profession and Beyond,” Mercer Law Review 68 (2017): 833–​875; Michael McGinniss, “Virtue Ethics, Earnestness, and the Deciding Lawyer: Human Flourishing in a Legal Community,” North Dakota Law Review 87, no. 1 (2011): 19–​58; Deborah L. Rhode, Character: What It Means and Why It Matters (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019); and Lawrence B. Solum, “Law and Virtue,” in The Routledge Companion to Virtue Ethics, ed. Lorraine Besser-​Jones and Michael Slote (New York: Routledge, 2015), 491–​514. On character in medicine, see, e.g., Patrick Gardiner, “A Virtue Ethics Approach to Moral Dilemmas in Medicine,” Journal of Medical Ethics 29, no. 5 (2003): 297–​302; Michael Hawking, Farr A. Curlin, and John D. Yoon, “Courage and Compassion: Virtues in Caring for So-​Called ‘Difficult’ Patients,” AMA Journal of Ethics 19, no. 4 (2017): 357–​363; Ben Kotzee, Agnieszka Ignatowicz, and Hywel Thomas, “Virtue in Medical Practice: An Exploratory Study,” HEC Forum 29, no. 1 (2017): 1–​19; G. Michael Leffel, Ross A. Oakes Mueller, Sandra A. Ham, Kyle E. Karches, Farr A. Curlin, and John D. Yoon, “Project on the Good Physician: Further Evidence for the Validity of a Moral Intuitionist Model of Virtuous Caring,” Teaching and Learning in Medicine 30, no. 3 (2018): 303–​316; Aisha Malik, Mervyn Conroy, and Chris Turner, “Phronesis in Medical Ethics: Courage and Motivation to Keep on the Track of Rightness in Decision-​Making,” Health Care Analysis 28, no. 2 (2020): 158–​175; James A. Marcum, The Virtuous Physician: The Role of Virtue in Medicine (New York: Springer, 2012); Justin Oakley, “Good Medical Ethics, from the Inside Out—​and Back Again,” Journal of Medical Ethics 41, no. 1 (2015): 48–​51; Rebecca Walker, “Virtue Ethics and Medicine,” in The Routledge Companion to Virtue Ethics, ed. Lorraine Besser-​Jones and Michael Slote (New York: Routledge, 2015), 515–​528. 37. Character and the Professions Conference, Wake Forest University, March 18–​20, 2021. Essays from the conference keynote addresses are currently being compiled into an edited volume, tentatively entitled “Character and the Professions.” Video recordings of the keynote addresses and panel discussions are available at https://​lea​ ders​hipa​ndch​arac​ter.wfu.edu/​eve​nts/​charac​ter-​in-​the-​prof​essi​ons/​. 38. Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume), 104. 39. Nancy E. Snow, “From ‘Ordinary’ Virtue to Aristotelian Virtue,” in The Theory and Practice of Virtue Education, ed. Tom Harrison and David I. Walker (London: Routledge, 2018), 67–​81. 40. Snow, “From ‘Ordinary’ Virtue to Aristotelian Virtue.” 41. Biggar, Chapter 6 (this volume); Colby, “Whose Values Anyway?,” 165–​166. 42. Collicutt, Chapter 10 (this volume), 201, 205. 43. Collicutt, Chapter 10 (this volume), 204, 202–203. 44. Bok, Higher Expectations, viii–​ix. 45. Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 116. 46. See, e.g., Marvin Berkowitz, “Toward a Science of Character Education: Frameworks for Identifying and Implementing Effective Practices,” Journal of Character Education 13, no. 1 (2017): 33–​51. 47. Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 188–189.

276  Michael Lamb, Edward Brooks, and Jonathan Brant 48. Kiss and Euben, “Aim High,” 67–​68, cite the holistic context of cocurricular, extracurricular, and community life in a university to challenge Stanley Fish’s narrow focus on knowledge production and dissemination in his critique of moral education. 49. See the website of the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University: https://​lea​ders​hipa​ndch​arac​ter.wfu.edu/​what-​we-​do/​acade​mic-​cour​ses/​. 50. Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 187. 51. Richard, Chapter 11 (this volume), 214–215, 224. 52. For similar illustrative examples of the use of literature to further character development in universities, see Edward Brooks, Emma Cohen de Lara, Álvaro Sánchez-​ Ostiz, and José M. Torralba, eds., Literature and Character Education in Universities (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2021). 53. Moya and Larkin, Chapter 12 (this volume), 227–​228. 54. Moya and Larkin, Chapter 12 (this volume), 244. 55. See especially Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 124–128; Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 173–174; and Collicutt, Chapter 10 (this volume), 206–208. Cf. Bok, Higher Expectations, 66; Bohlin, “Character Education at the University,” 98. 56. Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 163. 57. Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 191. 58. Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 191. 59. Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 168. 60. On using dialogue to increase virtue literacy, see Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 128–​130. 61. Jonathan Brant, Michael Lamb, Emily Burdett, and Edward Brooks, “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates: An Empirical Study of the Oxford Global Leadership Initiative,” Journal of Moral Education 49, no. 4 (2020): 415–​435, at 425–​426. 62. Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates,” 428–​429. 63. Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 166–​167. 64. Lamb, Brant, and Brooks, Chapter 7 (this volume), 117–​118. 65. See, e.g., Liz Gulliford and Robert C. Roberts, “Exploring the ‘Unity’ of the Virtues: The Case of an Allocentric Quintet,” Theory & Psychology 28, no. 2 (2018): 208–​226. 66. Elliott Kruse, Joseph Chancellor, Peter M. Ruberton, and Sonja Lyubomirsky, “An Upward Spiral Between Gratitude and Humility,” Social Psychological and Personality Science 5, no. 7 (2014): 805–​814. 67. Michael Lamb, Elise M. Dykhuis, Sara E. Mendonça, and Eranda Jayawickreme, “Commencing Character: A Case Study of Character Development in College,” Journal of Moral Education (2021), doi: 10.1080/​03057240.2021.1953451 68. See Gulliford and Roberts, “Exploring the ‘Unity’ of the Virtues.” 69. Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman, eds., Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), cited by Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 160, and Collicutt, Chapter 10 (this volume), 199; Morgan and Gulliford, Chapter 9 (this volume), 183–185.

Character Education in the University  277 70. Brant et al., “Cultivating Virtue in Postgraduates,” and Brooks et al., “How Can Universities Cultivate Leaders of Character?” 71. Bok, Higher Expectations, 58–​79. 72. Miller, Chapter 8 (this volume), 165; Williams, Chapter 4 (this volume).

Index For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–​53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. Page numbers followed by f indicate figures. academic development, 8–​10 academic freedom, 33–​34 debates over (the boundaries of), 31, 32 neutrality and, 31–​34 violations of, 31 accountability friendship of, 135–​38 GLI and, 138 and moral development, 135–​36 African Americans, 229–​30, 231. See also Black people Afrofuturism, 235–​36 agapē, 197, 198 agency, 88–​91 alcohol use, 59, 68 Alter, Alexandra, 226–​27 Ambrose of Milan, 198 Annas, Julia, 120 Anscombe, Elizabeth, 5–​6 apocalypse, 241–​45 “Apocalypse” (Díaz), 236 apocalyptic and post-​apocalyptic fiction, 226–​27, 228, 236–​37, 241–​45 Aristotelian approaches to dialogue, 128 to gratitude, 179–​81 to practical wisdom, 123 to strategies of character development, 116–​39 Aristotle, 57–​58, 116–​17, 123–​24 vs. Aristotelian, 141n.8 Blaine Fowers and, 61–​62, 63–​64 character traits and, 179–​80 on exemplars, 124 on experience, 122–​24

on friendship, 135–​36 on habituation, 119–​20 on personal tendencies, 131 on prudence/​phronesis, 57–​58, 59, 122–​ 23, 124 on teaching vs. practice, 119–​20 on virtue literacy, 129 on virtues, 119, 120–​21, 122–​23, 131–​ 32, 179 wisdom literature contrasted with, 100 Arnett, Jeffrey Jensen, 64–​65, 66–​67 artist(s), 126–​27 decolonial, 232–​33, 237 ethnospeculative, 228–​29, 232–​33, 234 role of, 97 Asian Americans, 231–​32 Asian immigration to U.S., 231–​32 Association of University Professors (AAUP), 33–​34 attentiveness, 208, 209 Atwood, Margaret, 242–​43 Austen, Jane, 213–​15 Pride and Prejudice, 213–​24 Aztlán, 238 biases, 134 situational, 131–​33, 134 Bible, 109–​10, 196–​97, 207. See also New Testament Bidabaan: First Light (film), 231 Bildung (moral formation), 46 Wissenschaft and, 44–​45, 46, 50–​51, 52 Black people, 36–​37, 229–​30, 234–​36, 243. See also African Americans Bok, Derek, 8, 11–​12 Bosnian War, 103

280 Index Bould, Mark, 234–​35 Buddhism, 159, 199 Butler, Octavia A., 226, 234–​35, 242–​43 bystander effect, 131–​32, 136–​37 Calvo-​Quirós, William A., 238 Carr, David, 140n.6 character, 4–​5, 165, 165f defined, 116–​17 dispositions of (see dispositions) good character as rewarding, 162 character development, 115–​16 programs for, 168, 169 strategies for, 116–​39 character gap, 164, 164f, 165 character strengths, 159–​61, 187–​88, 199. See also Values in Action; virtue(s) character traits, 167, 188–​89, 191–​92. See also dispositions; virtue(s); specific traits Aristotle and, 179–​80 charity, virtue of, 8–​9, 105–​7, 108–​9, 110, 197, 233–​34, 257–​58 cheating, 9, 170, 172–​74 Christian Miller on, 169–​70 moral reminders and, 134–​35 studies of, 9, 170–​72 Chicanx literature, 238 China, 107–​8, 231–​32 Christian ethics gratitude, 185 morality, 50, 200 values, 39, 203 virtue in the Christian tradition, 196–​98 virtues, 107, 203, 207, 208, 227, 233–​34 Christianity, 100, 200, 203, 206–​7, 209, 241–​42. See also Jesus Aristotle and, 100 Christians, 208 Christian studies, 108 Christian theology, 26n.46, 108–​10, 197–​ 98, 199–​200, 203. See also theology citizenship, 244 as an aim of moral education, 7–​ 8, 34–​39 general education and, 34–​35 “Citizenship Fictions” (literature course), 243–​44

civil liberties, 37. See also freedoms; liberty rights civil rights movement, 36–​37 cognitive estrangement, 238–​39. See also estrangement coloniality, 232. See also decoloniality common good. See also public good working toward the, 118, 203 communism, 34, 35–​36 communitarian contributions to virtue ethics, 93–​94 compassion, 3, 7–​8, 124–​25, 158–​59, 167, 179, 187–​88, 189, 202–​3, 208, 258–​ 59, 261 compliance, 9–​10, 84, 90, 94–​95, 169, 169f, 200–​1 Confucianism, 159, 199 conscience, 50 freedom of, 102 consensus, neutrality as, 31–​34, 37–​38 conservatism, 35–​36, 39, 101, 256–​57 consumerism in higher education, 40–​4 1, 67–​6 8, 98–​9 9, 190, 258, 260 counterfactual models, exemplars as, 124–​ 25, 126 courage, 3, 7–​9, 20–​21, 106, 110, 124–​25, 149n.91, 187–​88, 197, 198–​99, 233–​34, 244, 257–​58, 261, 265–​ 66, 269 COVID-​19 pandemic, 188–​89, 258–​59 Creary, Stephanie, 257 creativity, 3, 160–​61 critical attitude, 47 critical consciousness, 257 critical methods. See historical-​critical (textual) methods critical self-​reflexivity, 239 critical thinking, 8 critique, 48 definition and nature of, 48 as virtue, Weber on, 51–​54 Culture Wars, 39, 40–​41 curiosity, 3, 8–​9 Curzer, Howard, 180–​81 on centi-​virtues, 181 on deci-​virtues, 180–​81

Index  281 Dartmouth College, 35–​36 decolonial aesthetics, speculative quality of, 240 decolonial ethos in ethnospeculative fiction, 232–​34 decoloniality, 234 definition and nature of, 232, 233–​34 goal of, 232–​33 virtue and, 227, 233–​34 decolonial projects, 233–​34 decolonial thinkers, 227, 232–​33, 237 decolonial turn, 232–​33 decolonial virtues, 227 Delany, Samuel, 234, 237–​39 democracy future of, 34, 41, 226–​27 prerequisites for, 92–​93 Rawls and, 92 democratic values, 38–​39 Dery, Mark, 229–​30 dialogue role in moral formation, 128–​29 that increases virtue literacy, 128–​30 Díaz, Junot, 226–​27, 236–​37 dispositions. See also character traits; habituation; virtue(s) character as set of, 3, 116–​17 negative, 116–​17 virtues as, 3, 4, 6, 8–​9, 63–​64, 116–​17, 141–​42n.15, 158–​59 diversity equity and inclusion, 38–​41, 134, 256–​58 moral, 3–​4, 106–​8, 117, 159, 254–​55 religious, 159, 254–​55 divinity schools, 108–​9. See also theology duty(ies), 85, 86, 91 counterpart (negative), 89, 90 criticism and questioning of, 85–​ 87, 90–​91 first-​ and second-​order, 89–​90 gratitude and, 182, 190–​92 imperfect (incomplete), 85, 87–​88, 89, 90–​91, 96n.16 perfect (complete), 85, 90–​91 political philosophy and, 91, 92 reversing perspectives on, 87–​88 rights and, 85, 87–​88, 89–​92

virtues and, 85, 87–​88, 89 war and, 86 dystopian fiction, 226–​28, 230, 231–​32, 236–​37, 241–​45 Eckhart, Meister, 204–​5 education, general. See general education El Akkad, Omar, 226–​27 elevation (emotion), 125, 126, 161 emerging adulthood (life stage) dark side of, 66–​67, 69 definition and nature of, 115–​16 features that characterize, 65, 115–​ 16, 118 feeling in-​between during, 64–​65 and identity exploration, 65, 66–​67, 115–​16, 118 instability in, 65, 115–​16 and moral formation in academic institutions, 8, 15, 70–​73, 115–​16, 256, 268, 270–​71 possibilities in, 65 psychology and sociology of, 64–​70 emotional reactivity, 59–​60 empathy, 3, 49, 59, 179, 187–​88, 189, 244, 254–​55, 258–​59 ends directing one’s actions toward morally good, 120–​21 means and, 63 epistemic ideals, 47–​48 epistemic virtue(s), 54, 254–​55 epistemic value and, 48 ethical shape of philology and, 47–​50 equality, 13–​14, 37, 38–​40, 41 equity, 254–​55, 256–​58 estrangement, 238–​39, 240, 244 ethical exploration, 227–​29, 240 Ethical Practice in Brain Injury Rehabilitation, 202–​3 ethnospeculation, 228 in the classroom, 241–​45 critical potential of, 237–​38 as a reading practice, 237–​41 ethnospeculative aesthetics, 228–​30 ethnospeculative fiction, 228–​32 decolonial ethos at the heart of, 232

282 Index ethnospeculative lens, reading decolonial texts through a, 237, 238 ethnospeculative temporalities, 234–​37 eudaemonic well-​being, 188–​89, 191–​92 eudaimonia (human flourishing), 61–​ 62, 72–​73 evolution of moral sense and, 61–​64 goods constitutive of, 67 goods to be pursued for the sake of, 61–​62 exemplar(s) engagement with, 124–​28 forms taken by, 125 in Homer’s Odyssey, 71–​72 of honesty, 173–​74 Jesus as, 206–​8 as part of cultures, 68 pedagogical functions served by, 124–​25 research on their importance for moral development, 125 ways GLI provided access to, 126–​28 faith, 49–​50, 53, 198 and moral function, 7, 162 faith traditions. See also theology and cultivating virtue, 162 Faust, Drew Gilpin, 53–​54 Fish, Stanley, 54, 271n.3, 276n.48 flourishing. See also eudaimonia as an aim of higher education, 3, 6, 7–​8, 105, 255–​56, 262, 270–​71 as an aim of virtue and character, 4, 64, 117, 256–​57, 260–​61 evolution of moral sense and, 61–​64 goods constitutive of, 67 goods to be pursued for the sake of, 61–​62 gratitude and, 180 Foot, Philippa, 5–​6 Forster, E. M., 86 forthrightness, 168 Fowers, Blaine J., 61–​64 Aristotle and, 61–​62, 63–​64 Franklin, Benjamin, 121, 133, 138, 159 freedoms, personal, 37–​38, 89, 102. See also liberty rights

friendship(s) Aristotle on, 135–​36 as an intentional practice of leadership., 137–​38 of mutual accountability, 135–​38 as strategy of character development, 135–​38 ways GLI encourages meaningful, 137 frontal lobes, 59–​60 function (ergon), 62 human flourishing and, 61–​62 funding systems that universities are subjected to, 84 futurism (literature), 226–​27, 230–​31, 234, 235–​36 Garton Ash, Timothy, 101–​2 general education citizenship preparation within, 34–​35 courses, 35–​36 defined, 34 historical perspective on, 34 programs, 34–​35, 38–​41 requirements of, 39–​41 George, Stefan, 52 getting the word out, 131–​34, 160 Gewirth, Alan, 96n.16 Global Leadership Initiative (GLI), 116, 257. See also Oxford Character Project effectiveness, 138–​39, 267–​68 overview and nature of, 116 strategies of character development employed by, 116–​39 virtues cultivated by, 117–​19 ways of providing access to exemplars, 126–​28 gratitude, 141–​42n.15, 178–​79 Aristotelian approach to, 179–​81 attitude toward, 180 barriers to cultivation of, 162–​63 components of, 179–​80, 181, 183, 184 measuring multiple, 181–​83 (see also multicomponent gratitude measure) conceptual grammar of, 129 cultivation of, 121, 126, 129–​30, 185–​90 duty and, 182, 190–​92

Index  283 as focal virtue of Oxford Global Leadership Initiative, 117 humility and, 118 supererogation and, 182, 190–​91 in universities, 162–​63, 185–​90 virtue literacy and, 129 “Great Issues” (course), 35–​36 group effects, 131–​32, 136–​37 habits, intelligent vs. routine, 120 habituation, 64, 119–​22, 261, 263–​64 Harvard University, 35–​36, 45, 53–​ 54, 161–​62 Harvard Flourishing Program at, 7, 72–​73 helping behavior, 125. See also bystander effect Hinduism, 199 historical-​critical (textual) methods, 48–​49 honesty, 3, 7–​8, 9, 17–​18, 29, 110, 137–​38, 158, 161–​62, 167, 168, 169. See also cheating Christian Miller on, 168, 169, 267 cultivation of, 173–​74 elements of, 168–​69 honor codes, 134–​35, 171, 172, 173–​74 hope, 8–​9, 66–​67, 68, 160–​61, 198, 202–​3, 236–​37, 238 Hopkinson, Nalo, 236 human rights duties and, 89–​92 as moral vs. political rights, 88–​89 political liberalism and, 91, 92 Rawls and, 91, 92 human rights claims, 88 human rights instruments, 87, 88–​90 human rights movement, 89–​90 Humboldt, Wilhelm von, 46, 47 humility, 3, 7–​9, 29, 105–​8, 126, 138, 141–​42n.15, 160–​61, 197, 208, 244, 254–​55, 261, 265–​ 66, 267–​71 Benjamin Franklin on, 138 cultivation of, 126 GLI and, 117, 121 gratitude and, 118, 126 Husain, Ed, 102–​3

identity exploration (in emerging adulthood), 65, 66–​67, 115–​ 16, 118 Imarisha, Walidah, 238–​39 incentives, institutional, 131, 132–​34 for faculty and universities, 259, 260, 262–​63 inclusion, 13–​14, 216–​17, 254–​55, 256–​58 Indigenous people, 230–​32, 241–​42 integrity, 8, 9–​10, 160–​61, 221–​22, 254–​55 intellectual rectitude Max Weber on, 46, 48, 50, 54 Nietzsche and, 50 purpose of universities as the cultivation of, 46 Wissenschaft and, 46, 52, 54 “Intellectual Work as Vocation” (Weber), 44, 45–​46. See also Weber, Max International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), 89–​90 International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), 89–​90 Ireland, 97–​98 Islam, 159, 162, 199 Islamism, radical, 102–​3 Jesus, 107–​8, 109–​10, 203, 206–​7 as exemplar, 206–​8 John Henry Newman on, 206 principles and character (traits), 200, 207–​8 teachings, 196–​98 Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues, 6 Judaism, 162, 199 justice as aim of moral education, 7–​8, 9, 95, 209, 254–​55, 256–​57, 259, 261 democracy and, 92–​93 duties of, 85, 90–​91 ethnospeculative fiction and, 228–​30, 236–​37, 238–​39 as good to be pursued, 61–​62, 99, 196 principles of, 88, 91–​93 Rawls’s theory of, 91–​92 virtue of, 3, 7–​9, 63, 106, 197, 199, 233–​ 34, 255, 256–​58, 261

284 Index Kahler, Erich, 52–​53 Khan, Mohammed Sidique, 101 knowledge, nature of, 47 Kristjánsson, Kristján, 128 Latin America, 241–​42 Latinxs, 230–​31, 238 law democracy and, 92–​93 and order, 99 leadership. See also Global Leadership Initiative effective vs. ethical, 121 exemplars of, 126–​28 and followers, 122 friendship and, 137–​38 good and bad, 126 practices of, 122, 126 virtues and, 117–​19, 123, 160–​61 leadership skills, 118–​19, 121 Lee, Chang-​rae, 231–​32 liberal arts education, 38, 40–​41 liberal education, 70–​71, 106–​7 liberalism, 94. See also political liberalism liberal society, 101–​2, 106, 107 liberal virtues, 106–​7 liberation, 70–​71 libertarianism, 94 liberty rights, 37, 89, 90–​91. See also freedoms; rights London suicide bombings of July 7, 2005, 101 Lost in Transition: The Dark Side of Emerging Adulthood (Smith et al.), 66–​68 Löwith, Karl, 46

Mexicans, 230, 238, 241–​42 Midgley, Mary, 5–​6 Mill, John Stuart, 85 Miller, Christian B., 7, 131–​32, 134–​ 35, 266–​67 on cheating, 134–​35, 169–​70 on getting the word out, 131–​34, 160 on honesty, 168, 169, 267 on mixed character, 165 on selecting situations, 132 on situationism, 131 on virtues, 268 mixed character, 165 modernity, 232–​33 Max Weber and, 45–​46 Mommsen, Theodor on critique, 48 Wissenschaft, universities, and, 50–​51 moral development, 125, 128–​29, 135–​36. See also character development moral formation. See also Bildung; character development in academic institutions, 70–​73 morally good ends, directing one’s actions toward, 120–​21 moral reminders, 116, 124–​25, 133, 134–​ 35, 172, 173 moral sense, evolution of, 61–​64 moral sensitivity, 180 Morrison, Toni, 227–​28, 240–​41 Multi-​Component Gratitude Measure (MCGM), 18, 181, 183–​ 85, 269–​70 Mumbo Jumbo (Reed), 235–​36 Murdoch, Iris, 5–​6 music and musicians, 97, 119–​20

MacIntyre, Alasdair, 69 Mandel, Emily St. John, 226–​27 Mandela, Nelson, 126, 133 marriage, 64–​65 McBride, Damian, 103–​4 means–​ends framework, 63. See also ends; morally good ends Mearsheimer, John, 254–​55 medieval universities, 98–​100 Mercy, A (Morrison), 240–​41 Merton, Thomas, 202, 205

Nelson, Alondra, 235–​36 neuroscience of emerging adults, 58–​61 of friendship, 136–​37 neutrality academic freedom and, 31–​34 arguments against, 37, 106–​7 arguments in favor of, 32, 106, 107 and citizenship education, 38 as consensus, 31–​34, 37–​38 Culture Wars and, 39, 40–​41

Index  285 definitions and meanings, 29–​30, 31, 33–​34, 37–​38, 254–​55 (see also consensus) and freedom of speech, 37–​38 institutional autonomy and, 32 vs. moral guidance, 32–​33 objectivity and, 32–​33 and tolerance, 106–​7 as tolerance, 36–​38, 39, 40–​41 and virtue, 254–​55 Newman, John Henry, 206 New Testament, 197, 203, 207 Nicomachean Ethics (Aristotle), 57, 119, 124, 129, 179–​80. See also Aristotle Nietzsche, Friedrich duty and, 85–​86 intellectual rectitude and, 50 and the limits of critique, 50–​51 philology and, 50 on virtues, 107–​8 Wissenschaft and, 50–​51 Nixon, Rob, 236 objectivity, 32–​33 O’Connor, John, 96n.16 open-​mindedness, 3, 8–​9 order, law and, 92–​93 Oxford Character Project, vii, 17, 116, 141–​42n.15, 257, 267–​68. See also Global Leadership Initiative patriotic duty, 86 Peter of Blois, 99 Peterson, Christopher, 159–​61, 198–​99 philologists, 46–​50 philology as autonomous, 47 epistemic virtues and the ethical shape of, 47–​50 Friedrich Ritschl and, 47, 50 Nietzsche and, 50 phronesis, 57. See also prudence; wisdom political liberalism, 91–​93. See also liberalism Political Liberalism (Rawls), 91 political philosophy, 91–​94 positive psychology, virtue in, 5–​6, 72–​73, 198–​200, 263–​64 positivists, 87

Power Trip: A Decade of Policy, Plots, and Spin (McBride), 103 prefrontal cortex, 59–​60 Pride and Prejudice (Austen), 213–​24 Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest, vii, 257, 264–​65 promises, fidelity to, 169 property, being respectful of, 168 prudence (phronesis), 67, 124. See also wisdom Aristotle on, 57–​58, 63, 122–​23, 124 Psychology of Christian Character Formation, The (Collicutt), 200 public good. See also common good character development and, 7–​8 race and racism, 36–​37, 38–​39, 228–​36, 239, 240, 244 Rawls, John, 91–​92 human rights and, 91, 92 Reed, Ishmael, 235–​36 reflection and community building, 124 exemplars and, 125–​27 Global Leadership Initiative (GLI) and, 122, 123, 126–​27, 135, 137–​38 (see also Global Leadership Initiative) on gratitude, 185–​86 moral, and the brain, 59, 60 on personal experience, 122–​24 virtues and, 126, 186–​87 and wisdom, 122–​23 reflective equilibrium, 91 reflective exercises, 123–​24 reflective practice, 123 rehabilitation practice, 200–​3 compared with higher education, 204 religion, 26n.46, 162. See also theology; specific religions research, knowledge as, 47 research universities, 44–​45, 70–​71 American, 31 ethical practices and resources, 54 German, 45, 50–​51 Gilpin Faust on, 53–​54 neutrality and, 31 rapid rise of, in U.S., 45 regulation of, 84

286 Index Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC), 37–​38 responsibility of the artist, 97 ethic of, 14–​15, 47 intellectual, 8–​9, 11 public, 97, 98, 99 teaching, 36, 38 of universities, 7, 9–​10, 11, 16–​17, 59, 98, 99, 101, 104 as virtue or characteristic, 36, 38, 66, 240–​41, 244 rights, individual, 88, 89. See also human rights; liberty rights counterpart rights, 87–​88, 89 democracy and, 92–​93 duties and, 85, 87–​88, 89–​92 elementary rights of the person, 92–​93 manifesto rights, 89–​90 Ritschl, Friedrich, 46, 47, 50 Roberts, Robert C., 182, 190 role models. See exemplars rule of law, democracy and, 92–​93 scholarly conscience, 50 scholarly method, 49–​50 scholars, 32, 46, 47, 48–​49 scholarship. See also specialized scholarship/​specialized knowledge; Wissenschaft as a form of life, 45–​46 science, 32–​33. See also Wissenschaft Max Weber on, 52, 53 “Science as Vocation” (Weber), 45–​ 46, 51–​52 science fiction, 234–​35, 236–​39. See also apocalyptic and post-​apocalyptic fiction; dystopian fiction; futurism Sedgwick, Eve, 213 selecting our situations, 132–​34 self-​focus (in emerging adulthood), 65, 118 self-​interest pursuit of, 118, 162, 172 virtues and, 118, 158, 161–​62 self-​reflexivity, critical, 239 Seligman, Martin, 159–​61, 198–​99 service, commitment to, 141–​42n.15

situational variables, awareness of, 131–​34. See also getting the word out skills in academic development, 4–​5, 8–​9 Aristotle on, 119–​21 virtues and, 8–​9, 118–​19, 120–​21 Smith, Christian, 66–​67, 69, 70. See also Lost in Transition Snow, Nancy E., 120 social imaginary, 66 social interaction, 178–​79 social nature of humans, 61–​62 Soviet Union. See Zhdanov, Andrei Spear, Linda P., 59 specialized scholarship/​specialized knowledge, 3, 45–​46, 48, 50–​51. See also Wissenschaft speculative fiction (SF), 226–​28, 233–​40, 241–​45. See also ethnospeculative fiction speculative imaginary, 230 Stanford University, 39–​40 Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), 36–​37 subjunctivity, 237–​38 suffering, 208. See also compassion supererogation, 190–​91 duty and, 182, 190–​92 gratitude and, 182, 190–​91 virtue ethics and, 93–​94 survivance, narratives of, 231 Taoism, 199 Taylor, Charles, 69, 102 temperance, 7–​8, 29, 106–​7, 149n.91, 197, 199, 257 theology, 99, 108–​9, 264–​65 law and, 99 meanings and uses of the term, 108–​10 morality and, 108–​10 philology and, 47 positivism and, 87 psychology and, 196, 199–​200 virtue and, 99, 108, 109–​10, 162 Tower Hamlets College, 102 Trinity College Dublin, 97–​98 truthfulness, 168. See also honesty

Index  287 unification challenge for virtue and its subvirtues, 169, 169f Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 87, 89–​90 universities. See also research universities; virtue in universities changing, 83–​84 University of Chicago, 45 Divinity School, 108–​9 University of Oxford, 4–​6, 12, 49, 99, 104, 116, 118–​19, 157, 206 “values,” 87–​88, 110, 258–​59. See also specific topics individual, 94 revaluation/​devaluation of, 94 Values in Action (VIA), 160–​61, 199, 204–​ 5, 208, 257 vice(s), 4, 73, 106, 107–​8, 110, 116–​17, 131, 132, 159, 186, 265 spectrum between virtue and, 116–​17, 165, 165f Virchow, Rudolf, 47, 51 virtue ethics, 5–​6, 7, 115–​16, 157, 187, 263–​64 supererogation and, 93–​94 virtue in universities, 94–​95, 204–​6. See also specific topics efforts to educate student virtue since 1980s, 38–​41 how to cultivate, 11–​12, 115–​39, 166–​ 74, 263–​71 institutional and cultural barriers to cultivating, 258–​63 marginalizing virtue, 84–​85 reasons for cultivating, 7–​11, 161–​62. university as context for cultivating virtue, 4–​6, 253–​58 university students and virtue, 29 virtue literacy, 267–​68 defined, 129 dialogue that increases, 128–​30 virtue(s). See also specific topics Aristotelian and other multicomponent approaches to, 116–​17, 179–​81 cardinal, 198 categories of, 6 centi-​, 181

conceptions of, 178 deci-​, 180–​81 definitions of, 4, 6, 116–​17, 158–​ 59, 214–​15 epistemic, 47–​50, 54, 254–​55 features of, 159f, 159 intellectual, 3, 4, 8–​9 liberal, 106–​7 moral, 3, 4, 8–​9 nature of, 158–​59, 233–​34 scholarly, 50 spectrum between vice and, 165, 165f of thought vs. character, 119 virtuous character, 6, 199, 202–​3. See also specific topics vs. actual character, 164f (see also character gap) of Jesus, 200, 206–​8 virtuous lives/​virtuous living experienced by students as admirable and inspiring, 161 make the world a better place., 161–​62 New Testament descriptions of, 197 vocation, 118, 128, 205 intellectual work as, 44, 45–​46 Max Weber on, 44, 45–​46, 51–​52 readings on, 126 sense of, 117, 118, 267–​68 vocational majors, 38 vocational programs, 34, 38, 40–​41 Wake Forest University, 5–​6, 12, 138–​39, 173, 216–​17, 257, 264–​65, 269 war and duty, 86 Weber, Max, 53–​54 on critique as virtue and intellectual rectitude, 51–​54 on intellectual rectitude, 46, 50, 52, 54 “Intellectual Work as Vocation,” 44, 45–​46 moral education and, 44–​46, 51–​ 52, 53–​54 on science, 52, 53 “Science as Vocation,” 45–​46, 51–​52 on vocation, 44, 45–​46, 51–​52 Wissenschaft and, 44–​46, 52–​53 well-​being. See eudaemonic well-​being Whately, Richard, 213

288 Index Wilamowitz-​Moellendorf, Ulrich von, 49 wisdom (phronesis), 3, 7–​8, 123, 204–​5, 208. See also prudence defined, 204–​5 practical, 120, 122–​23 wisdom literature, 100, 197 Wissenschaft Bildung and, 44–​45, 46, 50–​51, 52

intellectual rectitude and, 46, 52, 54 Max Weber and, 44–​46, 52–​53 Nietzsche and, 50–​51 Women’s March (2017), 226 Yeats, W. B., 86 Zhdanov, Andrei, 97, 100–​1 “zombie capitalism,” 236