392
LEO BERSANI
significant without saying anything. I don't know what "liberal"
"in
the broadest sense" means. I would like to know what the relation
is between "structural congruence" and other kinds of congruence–
say, moral congruence. I would
also
like to know what the condi–
tions are which prevent "very conSiderable strain and conflict" from
spoiling the "mutually supportive" relation between the university
and society. What are the boundaries of "permissible" variation
in
questions of university involvement with outside interests? What is
it exactly that makes the issue of contracts for classified research
"parallel" to the ROTC issue? How negotiable is "somewhat" nego–
tiable? What are the occasions on which students
should
have the
"one deciding voice" on such issues (since "usually" they shouldn't)
?
Parsons will never tell. Most of the questions I have just asked
at least assume the possibility of a real incompatibility between the
university and society. But since the closest Parsons comes to a state–
ment is to write that the academic system has a "stake" in remain–
ing similar to the social system
in
which it is placed, the "strain and
conflict" are really not strain and conflict at all, but rather conform
to the expectations of a "pluralistic" society. The university's
"dif–
ferentiation within" that society, given Parsons's premise of "struc–
tural congruence" between the two, is
part of
its integration. The
most important word in the paragraph is "seems": it is used so bizar–
rely - for the most innocuous observations - that, instead of func–
tioning as a sign of uncertainty, it detaches itself from what follows
it and operates as an absolute value in itself. Why "may" in: "Thus
some institutions may prefer not to have ROTC programs"? Is
this
the permissive "may"?
If
so, on what basis is Parsons allowing
"some institutions" (which ones?) not to have ROTC programs?
1£
it is not a permissive "may" (I don't think it is), it is of course su–
perfluous: some institutions simply
do
prefer not to have ROTC
programs. Superfluous, but crucial: "may" and "seem" define "plu–
larism" as a mode of nonexistence, a system of ontological torpor in
which the self drugs all human choices into a state of pure possibility.
In Parsons's world, the university is society's spiritual hench–
man, for it de-realizes what society does, thereby avoiding any judg–
ment of the consequences
of
acts by translating acts into categories
of classification. This is the sacred function which the sociologist
invites us to protect: "Within the academic community itself," Par-
