The current turmoil on college campuses is complex to interpret as protests, polarization, intimidation, and anger abound without clear reasons for these reactions. According to higher education reporter Douglas Belkin in his Wall Street Journal article, the root cause of this unrest could be a lack of community among students today compared to their predecessors decades ago. Research shows that college students nowadays are lonelier, less resilient, and disengaged from university communities that appear socially fragmented, diminished, and less vibrant than before. Belkin’s article highlights the possibility that this loss of community has led to more distrust, sharper disagreements, and anger among students who encounter each other as strangers during protests for the first time.
In contrast, Fareed Zakaria recalls his college experience decades ago when political debates were intense but civil discourse prevailed despite Reagan’s defense secretary being disrupted by protesters on campus. The author notes that while it may seem romanticized to remember the past this way, the majority of students at Yale in those years filled classrooms and meeting halls enthusiastically with no signs of decline until a decade ago when community life seemed thinner than before. Covid-19 has accelerated the trend towards social isolation on campuses by decimating communal activities while leaving buildings intact.
The concept of declining social capital, or bonds that sustain communities, is not new as Robert Putnam discussed in his seminal essay “Bowling Alone” over two decades ago. The title refers to the fact that more Americans were bowling but fewer and fewer people participated in leagues due to television’s impact on private versus communal activities allowed by technology. Similar issues arise off-campus as well, where small towns see a decline of community with the disappearance of mom-and-pop stores, corner arcades, local movie theaters, and churches that are increasingly empty.
The big metro centers provide communities defined functionally rather than spatially around professional peer groups instead of neighborhoods due to work’s all-consuming nature in these places. Journalist Nicholas Lemann notes this deficiency in social capital for Cambridge and Washington compared to his previous experiences living in five American cities, where community was more prevalent despite job changes affecting membership status.
In conclusion, college campuses today are still exciting but lack the communal spirit that existed decades ago as students encounter each other anonymously during protests instead of engaging in civil discourse. This trend is not unique to campus life and reflects broader American society’s weakening community structure due to technological advancements promoting private over communal activities. To overcome these trends, policymakers could look back on what has contributed to the decline in social capital historically as they search for ways of rebuilding it.
Leave a Reply