Save Middlesex Philosophy

29 April 2010

Dear Ed Esche

I have heard that the Centre for research in modern european philosophy at Middlesex is to be closed.

This strikes me as more than strange. It is one of the most interesting ventures of the last years.

Concerning art and philosophy, it is also one of the more credible links, which really brings thinkers and artists together on springing points of their work.

I won’t go further, you probably know all this as well as I do. So what on earth could motivate an anti-intellectual, anti-art move such as closing a whole center on short notice? What will become of the students, the teachers, the collective work?

In my country, France, we admire the Centre for its rigour and coherence, we read the review Radical Philosophy with great interest, we sometimes wistfully think we could do as well.

I would therefore like to ask you to back down on this unjust decision and consider again what is to be done in the coming years.

You know the American joke:

He ‘s a Harvard man
Yeah but that’s all he is.

The people I know at Middlesex are great scholars…..

Sincerely yours

Antonia Birnbaum
Department of Philosophy

University of Paris 8 (Vincennes),

1 May 2010

Dear Sirs, Madam,

Birkbeck UCU notes with dismay the decision of the Dean of the School of Arts and Education at Middlesex University to close the university’s renowned philosophy department. The reaction of colleagues and students across our College has been one of shock and disbelief that a department, widely considered to be vital to the fabric of intellectual life in this county, should be closed in this way.

Birkbeck UCU deplores this decision, which appears to be as ill-judged as it is confrontational. We pledge unstinting support for our colleagues at Middlesex.

Yours,

Laura Salisbury

Birkbeck UCU Joint Committee
Birkbeck, University of London

Dr Laura Salisbury
School of English and Humanities
Birkbeck College
0207 0790693

29 April 2010

Dear Vice-Chancellors and Dean of School,

I write to express my astonishment and indignation at the recent news of the imminent closure of philosophy at Middlesex.

As someone who has taught literary theory and continental philosophy in the UK for 20 years and in the USA for the last 10, I think I am reasonably well-placed to point out that the department you are planning to close has a truly international reputation as one of the relatively rare philosophy departments where serious work in continental philosophy is being pursued.  As you must be aware, the research done by your department over the years has not been a narrow disciplinary affair, but has had repercussions across the Humanities more generally, to the extent that I would venture to suggest that if your University has any national and international visibility in the Humanities, it is because of the eminence of such figures as Peter Osborne, Peter Hallward and Eric Alliez.  Through their varying mediations of continental (and especially French) thought to a wider anglophone audience, these and other scholars in the department have rendered an inestimable service to students and scholars in the English-speaking world, and contributed to vibrant ongoing debates that are of the essence of a democratic and progressive intellectual life.

Even if one were to imagine that the philosophical positions defended and advanced by members of the department were perceived by your university administration to be inimical to certain current trends in higher education, so that these scholars might correctly be thought to belong to an international community of colleagues in the Humanities that tends to be critical of such trends as the corporatization of the University, the application of quantitative measures to work that is fundamentally inimical to such measures, the commodification of knowledge more generally, and the often vapid language of “excellence” used to assess what we do – even in that case, it might be recognized that according to the questionable standards of assessment thus imposed, the department has performed extremely well, and indeed outperformed other departments not picked out for closure.  When an administration targets a unit that that administration’s own measures should rationally recognize as being excellent, one can only assume that it is acting out of other, altogether more questionable, motives or, to put it bluntly, that this is a politically motivated action that does not in fact have the higher interests of the University at heart.

There is a great deal with which I disagree in the detail of the philosophical positions defended by the Middlesex philosophers.   But I recognize the quality of their work and its importance in current world-wide debates in which such disagreements are aired and discussed.  I believe that the reputation of your institution around the world will be severely tarnished if you proceed with this planned closure.  I am confident you will receive many letters such as this, and trust that you will be at least somewhat gratified to realize the reputation you are putting at risk.  I am very happy to add my voice to the many I am sure will be urging you to reconsider this disastrous decision.

Yours sincerely,

Geoffrey Bennington, MA, DPhil (Oxon)
Asa G. Candler Professor of Modern French Thought
Chair, Department of Comparative Literature
Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322.
Tel: +1 404-727-2262
http://www.comparativelit.emory.edu
http://www.french.emory.edu

1 May 2010

Dear Professor Driscoll,

This is a letter that follows up from the email that, together with my colleagues Professors Ansell-Pearson and Houlgate, we sent you yesterday.

The more I think about your decision, the more I find it incomprehensible and, frankly, contrary to the very interests and mission of your university.

The impression it gives is one of an institution that, so long as the economic situation is favourable, is happy to support a whim, which looks good and gives it intellectual credibility, but that is willing to sacrifice it at the drop of a hat as soon as the situation deteriorates.  But the question is: should philosophy and the humanities in general be seen as disposable luxuries, or should they be recognised as central to our heritage, our social, political and cultural life? Do we measure the state of our education only on the basis of numbers and profit, and do we educate the youth only to provide them with the necessary skills to be competitive on the job market?  Or do we also educate citizens, critical minds, and free thinkers?  Can such goals be measured?  I believe they can.  But not immediately, and not only financially.  Their reward is reaped further down the line, and in ways that could never have been anticipated.

From its inception 2500 years ago, philosophy has been the most extraordinary laboratory of human thought, and generated the ideas, the values, and the aspirations that govern our lives today, in Britain and across the world.  In my view, the Centre for Modern Thought at Middlesex is part of that history.  It is itself a dynamic and innovative laboratory, to which students flock year after year.  I myself have visited the Centre for Modern Thought on a few occasions, and have always been struck by its extraordinary energy, commitment, and acute sense of responsibility to the local community, the philosophical community, and the wider political community.  I can say with confidence that there isn’t a single Philosophy Department in the country that is more in tune with its social, political, and cultural environment.  Its intellectual influence cannot be underestimated.  Over the years, it has generated debates that have rippled across the Channel, the Atlantic, and beyond.  The philosophers at Middlesex are as excellent and inspirational as they get.

Closing down the Philosophy Department amounts to nothing less than the decapitation of an intellectual force in its prime.  It isn’t an innocent closure, but an assassination.  It will (and already is) also perceived as an attack against philosophy in the UK.  On both counts, it is a disatrous decision, and I urge you to reconsider it.

Yours truly,

Prof. Miguel de Beistegui
Department of Philosophy
The University of Warwick

30 April 2010

Dear Michael Driscoll, Waqar Ahmad, Margaret House & Ed Esche,

Your decision to close the philosophy department and the CRMEP at Middlesex is inexplicable and disgraceful.

For decades philosophy at Middlesex has been reknowned not simply as excellent, but exceptional, standing on an at least equal footing with departments at older and more established universities such as Essex, Warwick and Sussex. When I chose to do my MA, and subsequently my PhD at Middlesex, having studied mathematics at Cambridge, I did so quite simply because it was the best place in the country to study and research the kind of philosophy I was interested in.

Building on the reputation established by the philosophy department, the CRMEP has over the last decade or so created a vibrant, vigorous, innovative research environment that attracts post-graduate students from all over the world, regularly gets world-class scholars to attend and address its conferences and seminars, has a proven track record of winning large scale funding from the AHRC, and consistently out-performs not just philosophy but other humanities’ UOAs from new and many old universities in the RAE. Not bad for a new university, frankly.

But none of this, apparently, can be measured.

And, of course, in one sense you are absolutely right. The contribution of philosophy not just to the reputation of Middlesex, but to the objective reality of it as an academic institution, has been immeasurable. You should be proud of what has been achieved. But above all you should be grateful to the staff in the philosophy department and the CRMEP who have worked tirelessly and against the odds to secure this unique achievement of which you have been the chief beneficiaries. It simply beggars belief that you cannot see this. All I can say, as someone who now works for one of your equally struggling competitors, is thank you – thank you for levelling the playing field.

In another sense, of course, you are completely wrong. What is perhaps most outrageous about the Dean of Humanities reported statement that the CRMEP and its research excellence made no “measurable” contribution to the university is not the contempt it displays for academic values, nor the worrying implication that senior management simply do not know what a university is or what it is for, but the fact that it is quite patently false.

The RAE is a measure, an objective and officially sanctioned measure. Does the Dean of Humanities statement, therefore, indicate that the management of Middlesex University no longer recognise the legitimacy or validity of the RAE? If so, will they be withdrawing the university from all subsequent RAEs? And since apparently the senior management of the university, who have now publicly admitted that they cannot or do not know how to measure the contribution of academic units to the university, refuse to accept a measure kindly provided by central government at its own cost, does this indicate that the university no longer recognises the government’s authority nor its right to assess and measure the performance of the university? Perhaps, HEFCE should be informed.

What is more the RAE is a measure to which money – yes, money! – is tied. None of this money, nor any from student fees or AHRC grants, would have been received by the university if the philosophy department and the CRMEP had not existed or their staff had not worked their socks off to obtain it. This is cold, hard quantifiable cash. Certainly more quantifiable than any pie-in-the-sky dreams about band B students. (By the way, does anybody actually know the relative margins on band D, C and B students? I would have thought that the continual grumbling from the Russell Group would suggest that the margins at the high end are not good – but what do I know?)

The fact that the Dean of Humanities does not consider any of this money a measurable contribution to the university can only mean that he and other senior management do not consider the academic units to actually be part of the university, that the only money that measurably contributes to the university is the money that is raked off by the central adminstration – in short that the central administration is “the university” and if you fail to keep up your “contributions” to “the university” then they will come round and burn your place to the ground.

Yours Sincerely

Adam Beck
Senior Lecturer in Philosophy
London Metropolitan University
(PhD Middlesex 2002)

Dear Professors Driscoll, Ahmad, House and Esche,

We the undersigned are stunned to hear of the decision by Middlesex University to close the CRMEP.  The research produced by CRMEP scholars has been invaluable in the field and far reaching. Among Australian philosophers the CRMEP is widely recognised as one of the most important centres for the study of modern European philosophy. The work carried out at CRMEP has been a major influence on our own research and on the style and form of its transmission. The educational force of CRMEP is extensive, and the integrity of its research unquestionable. Its closure further attests to the contemporary fetish for the appearance of education whose price is, as always, the wilful betrayal of its reality.  This decision by the administration puts it in line with that sorry tradition, dating back to philosophy’s founding, which seeks to put an end to any truly educational program lest it be an example to others. With this decision Middlesex surrenders its claim to be one of the important intellectual institutions of our time.

Dr Adam Bartlett, University of Melbourne.

Dr Justin Clemens, University of Melbourne.

Helen Johnson, Artist/Lecturer, RMIT.

Dr Chris van Rompaey,  Deakin University.

Mairead Phillips, PhD Candidate, University of Melbourne.

Dr Alex Ling, University of Melbourne.

Jessica Whyte, Monash University.

Peter Eade, PhD Candidate, University of Melbourne.

Nicholas Heron, University of Melbourne.

Dr. Julian Meyrick, La Trobe University.

Darshana Jayemanne, University of Melbourne.

Dr Hélène Frichot, RMIT University.

Antonia Pont, PhD Candidate, University of Melbourne.

To the right honourable Chancellors and Dean of Middlesex University, London (UK)

Paris, April 28, 2010

Chancellors and Dean,

With utmost surprise I learn that Middlesex University has decided to close all its Philosophy programmes. I deplore this decision and ask you to reverse it. The closure of these programmes is a matter not only of national but also of international concern. If confirmed, it would  represent a startling stage in the impoverishment of Philosophy provision in the UK.

I have participated in events organised by the Philosophy group at Middlesex or under its auspices (most recently at the French Cultural Institute in London on Postwar Philosophical Trends « From structure to Rhizome »), and I can testify to the significant and distinctive contribution it makes to philosophy in the UK – more generally in Europe. From what I understand, its set of MA programmes is currently the largest in the UK. Philosophy is the most prestigious and highest research-rated subject at Middlesex University. It is now widely recognised as one of the most important centres for the study of modern European philosophy anywhere in the English-speaking world.

With other scholars from several countries, I call on Middlesex University and you personally to reverse this damaging and ill-judged decision, and to renew its commitment to widening participation in education and to excellence in research.

Etienne BALIBAR

Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Université de Paris-Nanterre (France)

Distinguished Professor of Humanities, University of California, Irvine (USA)

Dear Vice-Chancellor, Deputy Vice-Chancellors, and Dean,

I am writing to register my profound concern and disbelief at the news that Middlesex University is to close its programmes in Philosophy. I find it hard to believe that an institution avowedly committed to ‘research excellence’ would choose to destroy a successful area of the university with such an excellent reputation for research and innovation. I am not a philosopher, but I am well aware of the global standing of Philosophy at Middlesex; what you have — and what you are curiously proposing to axe — is something unique and with striking international influence.

I have acted as External Examiner at your institution (at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and in different disciplines) in the past. I would be ashamed to be associated with Middlesex University in the future if this savage cut goes ahead.

Yours sincerely,
Neil Badmington

Dr Neil Badmington
Reader in English Literature
School of English, Communication & Philosophy
Cardiff University
Humanities Building
Colum Drive
Cardiff. CF10 3EU.
United Kingdom.

Personal webpage:
http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/encap/contactsandpeople/profiles/badmington-neil.html

30 April 2010

Dear Vice-Chancellor

As members of the international philosophical community, and as the Executive Committee of the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy, we write to express our dismay at the decision by Middlesex University to close its Department of Philosophy.

The Department is widely recognised throughout the world as a centre of international standing for its work in the area of European philosophy. Members of the Department play a leading role in defining the framework within which topics in contemporary aesthetics as well as political philosophy, to name just two areas, are discussed.

It is almost incredible to those outside the UK that a Department of such remarkable standing could have its future jeopardized in this way. It is clear that its capacity to recruit and train graduate students is exceptional by both national as well as international standards. Rather than the University threatening the existence of the Department it should be seeking ways to develop it. On the basis of any criteria of evaluation – research, scholarship, graduate and undergraduate training etc., – the Department operates at the highest level. This has been recognized by internal assessment systems such as the RAE, as well as by external professional and peak bodies like the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy. Moreover, as the leading centre for research in the area in the UK, the Department also offers important opportunities for international collaboration; indeed the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy frequently welcomes distinguished visiting scholars.

On behalf of the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy we ask you to reconsider your decision to close this vital and important centre for the study of philosophy. Although it may seem like a reasonably small department in the context of the tens of thousands of philosophers who are employed worldwide, its closure would have some significant repercussions for philosophy around the world (and the decision to do so, has already generated a remarkable furore). This could not be said about many departments and is testimony to the international reputation and significance of its members.

Yours sincerely,

Prof. Andrew Benjamin (Monash University)
Dr Simone Bignall (University of New South Wales)
Dr Richard Colledge (Australian Catholic University)
Dr Simone Drichel (University of Otago)
Dr Joanne Faulkner (University of New South Wales)
Dr Fiona Jenkins (Australian National University)
Dr Marguerite La Caze (University of Queensland)
Dr Jack Reynolds (La Trobe University)
Dr Matheson Russell (University of Auckland)
Dr Robert Sinnerbrink (Macquarie University)

30 April 2010

Dear Vice-Chancellor,

I was appalled to learn that Middlesex University plans to close its Philosophy Department. Middlesex in general does not rate highly in the minds of humanities academics and students throughout the world, but there is an exception: its Philosophy Department, one of the most enterprising and innovative in the country, and one that is respected internationally for the work of its members. When a colleague and I recently planned a volume, to be published by Routledge, on the most important theoretical developments in the humanities, with an international team of 20 contributors, we invited not one but two members of the Middlesex Philosophy Department to be among them. This is only one small instance of the major part played by the Department in current humanities research, going well beyond the discipline of philosophy.

You perhaps don’t realise the damage you have already done to the University’s reputation. I appeal to you to reverse this decision as soon as you are able.

Yours sincerely,

Derek Attridge

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Professor Derek Attridge, FBA
Department of English and Related Literature
University of York
Heslington, York YO10 5DD
United Kingdom