CORES: Committee for Open Research on Economy & Society

Critique: What we have in CORES is a typical case of “sour grapes”: a group of jealous scholars out to curtail the success of their colleagues, to equalize weakness rather than encourage strength at the University.

Response: The Milton Friedman Institute is currently conceived at a scale unprecedented in the history of the Humanities, Social Sciences, and professional schools at the University of Chicago. The University has pledged significant land, institutional resources, and seed funding to realize its project. Supporting the MFI at this scale does more than merely suggest the University’s preference for the ideology the Institute has pledged to advance: it represents a wholesale tilting of University resources toward that ideology.

All the while, many departments are fighting for increased funding and faculty lines. Concerns for equity do not suggest “sour grapes.” At stake is the expansion and development of one subdiscipline’s intellectual project over many others. Additionally, were the MFI’s funding comparable to existing committees, centers, and area studies programs, CORES would not oppose its existence.

Critique: CORES argues that the proposed MFI poses a threat to “free speech” on campus, claiming that an institute committed to advancing research in free-market economics will silence those who adhere to alternative economic ideologies and practices. However, in its effort to thwart the MFI project, CORES violates its own stated commitment to “free speech,” censoring those who subscribe to the free-market approach. Shouldn’t all positions, including free-market economics, be able to compete in the university marketplace of ideas?

Response: CORES has never argued that the MFI represents a suppression of “free speech” or “free inquiry” on campus. The dissent to the MFI has absolutely nothing to do with wanting to vanquish legitimate academic research or modes of thought. The Milton Friedman Institute aims not to be merely one of many small interdisciplinary centers, but would dominate the atmosphere and resources of the University where the study of economics and society is concerned. If there is going to be a massive university investment in “economics and society,” CORES supports a conversation that would foment contact and debate among contesting positions.