The meaning of the university: the power of influence

In the continuum of recent abusive power plays in the United States, we should celebrate one piece of good news: the return of the university as an influential civic institution. The blackmailing actions of the anti-democratic Trump administration have brought back the university's original purpose: to guide society and offer responses to the autocratic tendencies of rulers in constitutional democracies like the United States and some European ones. All of us who dedicate our professional lives and our vocation to public service must get involved and remain vigilant.

Very symbolically, the term university comes from Latin universities, which means "total," "universal," "of the entire world." However, the term in its medieval origins did not designate the space of study as we understand university institutions today, but rather those groups, guilds, or unions—that is, civil society—that protected a higher common interest: the profession of knowledge. The name "university" comes from the idea of a knowledge-generating institution. alma mater: that immaterial force that, through thought and science, nourishes and transforms human beings.

It all began a year ago with the wave of student revolts against the abuses of the State of Israel in Gaza at Columbia University (New York) and spread to so many other universities in the country and everywhere. A year later, the change in political color in the presidency highlights that the historic state-university alliance in the United States has broken down in patches after decades of going hand in hand. Through coercion against institutions like Columbia, Harvard, Cornell, and so many others, the State renounces knowledge. Consequently, it resigns from leading the country toward the future and toward the vanguard through science and thought, as it had done since World War II.

But only the power of influence can overcome the power of coercion. This is the lesson we've learned from the ongoing conflict between the Trump administration and Harvard, which last week took less than 72 hours to reject Trump's demands and this week has denounced the administration for violating the universities' autonomous statute. Under the pretext of combating anti-Semitism, government officials are demanding to decide on international hiring and admissions policy, to eliminate any program that favors the DEI triad (diversity, equity, inclusion), and to have a say in curricular decisions, as Senator Joseph McCarthy attempted more than half a century ago.

But who has the power to exert influence with a simple no? Against the demands of an autocratic government like Trump's, which does and undoes around the world with unprecedented arrogance, only a 389-year-old university, with more than 100 Nobel Prize winners and hundreds of professors who signed a combative document in defense of academic freedom, stands up. Influence, which for sociologist Max Weber consisted of being a driving force of understanding and social action, is only freely exercised by the privileged like Harvard. Very few, through intangible factors such as culture, institutional exemplarity, or moral authority, modulate social action by influencing the decisions of individuals and become mirrors for the world.

Since last Monday, other leading institutions have joined the resistance, such as Princeton, MIT, and Columbia—the latter just days after kneeling before Trump. It is no coincidence that these are four of the richest universities in the world, with almost insulting financial strength that allows them to renounce millions of dollars under threat from the Trump administration. Harvard, the oldest and most prestigious university in the country, is also the richest in the world, with a budget greater than that of almost 100 countries in the world, more than 53 billion dollars, and above all with a powerful network of alumni or alumni, the vast majority of whom are members of an economic and social elite who perpetuate their financial power. But exclusivity empowers, as its name suggests, only a powerful minority can afford it.

Behind this capacity to exert influence lies a virtuous—and simultaneously vicious—circle of money, self-righteous elitism, and the private sector model in the education sector. Thus, Harvard, a university more accustomed to producing presidents than challenging them, is resuming its status as an influential force, embarking on a path of change. Unfortunately, this change is expected to come in dribs and drabs, because while tradition has historically granted it access to influence, in contemporary times, the economic resources, which the vast majority lack, are the negotiating element.

But in academia, we cannot make excuses. Solidarity, unity, and solidity in defense of the universal and global function that the university has performed for a thousand years in the Western tradition are non-negotiable and a factor of strength today that is more effective than it was a few months ago. In a time of commodification of knowledge in the form of skills and know-howThe totalitarian threat renews the original purpose of those universities in medieval European cities: to protect knowledge and tradition among all social groups and guilds. It's in our hands.