A victim of vocabulary

The meaning of 'university' has been debased, and with it the place itself, argues Andrew Oswald

The term "university" is becoming increasingly debased. New Labour, whose University of the Labour Party is launching this autumn, is guilty. But it is not unique. Anyway, words are just collections of symbols and lots of concepts get debased. It is not the end of the world if the British people use the word university in ways that get more and more misleading.

But it is not sensible to allow indefinite broadening of the notion of a university. A reason to care about linguistics is that when words lose their exact meaning it can presage a blurring of the role and usefulness of the objects to which they attach. In other words, if we ruin the word university, then that may one day help ruin the physical university.

Indeed, this is actually happening. Bit by bit, the strength of our universities is being reduced, and one of the reasons is a dilution of the intellectual standards required of an organisation for it to be allowed to call itself a university. Of course, it is unfashionable to say this. It is unfashionable to stick up for standards and anything that smacks of elitist taxonomy. The fashion in 2002 is to be inclusive, not exclusive. Unfortunately, when everything is included in a category, you no longer have a category. You have an inefficient, all-encompassing blandness.

Real universities are research institutions. They are primarily places for discovering how our world works. Real universities are not, repeat not, primarily places of teaching. This is why promotion in universities has always been based on research ability.

People who object to this view usually fall into two groups. One is politicians, who have little idea of what universities are for. Deep down, they view universities as giant, greying high schools. The second is those who work in teaching institutions, including high schools, who, very naturally, have not usually given much thought to where knowledge comes from and who are, in some cases, threatened by the implication that what they do - teaching rather than discovery - might be viewed by some as of lower status than they desire. We all aim to protect our self-esteem, often without realising that that is what we are trying to do.

I expect my view will upset some. I am sorry for that. But it is not my job to minimise people's upset or maximise their internal feeling of certainty or self-esteem. My job - the job of everyone who works in a university - is to stick up for what is true. Real universities are vital for teaching. Real universities' ideas fill the textbooks that everyone else reads.

It follows immediately from all of this that the university of life, the university of new Labour, the university of industry and all the rest, are at best a watering down of the clarity of the English language. At worst, they distort people's understanding.

First, universities are in the truth business. This matters enormously. Every other organisation in a society has axes to grind and propaganda to sell. Real knowledge is almost always discovered first in a university. True, the average person in Britain has never given this a thought. So we have to go out and stick up for the idea of a university.

Second, universities are in the excellence business. They must choose the best students and teachers. Again, this is likely to upset politicians, who usually prefer egalitarianism to meritocracy.

Third, universities are in the freedom business. They are part of the checks and balances that hold together democracies. Freedom is important but frightening.

Fourth, universities are in the elegance business. Although it will frustrate politicians from now to eternity, university researchers pursue beauty and symmetry out of instinct, not because they are searching for something useful.

All these things make it clear why Britain needs independent universities. It is too dangerous to have our universities controlled by the public sector. The last thing a politician wants is truth, excellence, freedom and elegance. A politician wants practicality, soundness, well-behaved citizens and cheapness.

Andrew Oswald is professor of economics at Warwick University.