Cracks in the Ivory Tower ― The Moral Mess of Higher Education

Ideally, universities are centers of learning, in which great researchers dispassionately search for truth, no matter how unpopular those truths must be. The marketplace of ideas assures that truth wins out against bias and prejudice. Yet, many people worry that there's rot in the heart of the higher education business.

In Cracks in the Ivory Tower, libertarian scholars Jason Brennan and Philip Magness reveal the problems are even worse than anyone suspects. Marshalling an array of data, they systematically show how contemporary American universities fall short of these ideals and how bad incentives make faculty, administrators, and students act unethically. While universities may at times excel at identifying and calling out injustice outside their gates, Brennan and Magness contend that individuals are primarily guided by self-interest at every level. They find that the problems are deep and pervasive: most academic marketing and advertising is semi-fraudulent; colleges and individual departments regularly make promises they do not and cannot keep; and most students cheat a little, while many cheat a lot. Trenchant and wide-ranging, they elucidate the many ways in which faculty and students alike have every incentive to make teaching and learning secondary.

In this revealing exposé, Brennan and Magness bring to light many of the ethical problems universities, faculties, and students currently face. In turn, they reshape our understanding of how such high-powered institutions run their business.

Jason Brennan is the Flanagan Family Professor at Georgetown University. He is the author of ten books, including When All Else Fails and In Defense of Openness.

Phillip W. Magness is a Senior Research Fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. He is the author of two books and over a dozen scholarly articles on a diverse array of topics, including the economics of slavery, the history of international trade, federal tax policy, economic inequality, and the economic dimensions of higher education.