Much the same can be said about capitalism. The free market has become perhaps the most powerful institution in the world and with its growth, it has brought unprecedented freedom, wealth, and mobility to people. But a consumer mentality has moved out of the market place and become a dominant cultural logic, transforming inherited frameworks of moral meaning and social obligation. And so it goes. Thus for all the achievements of modernity, there is also now a profound uneasiness that marks our time.
Few places have modernity's hopes and contradictions played out more sharply than in the academy.
On the face of it, higher education in America is second to none in the world. It is intellectually fertile, technologically advanced, organizationally strong, and globally influential. Yet, as an institution, it is largely bereft of a clear sense of direction or coherent sense of purpose. Indeed, the Enlightenment quest for certainty has led to a ubiquitous skepticism that has called into question the core ideals of academic inquiry. It is not just that words like truth, knowledge, reason, academic freedom, and academic community have lost their resonance but the very terms of disciplinary study are in question.