A bunch of us had a contentious discussion the other day about institutional neutrality, apropos of my then-upcoming talk about it at the Heterodox Academy conference. One topic that came up was how institutional neutrality relates to curricular decisions. Is there an institutionally neutral way of deciding, say, whether a given topic or discipline merits inclusion within the curriculum of a given institution of higher education? Or a neutral way of deciding whether a program, department, division, school, or university itself ought to set aside the resources to make something a formal subject of study? Since not everything can be studied, decisions have to be made about what gets included and what doesn’t. Can those decisions be made “neutrally”?

I rarely consult administrators on matters of consequence, but there’s one university administrator whose judgment I do respect. His name was Aristotle, and he ran a “university” called the Lyceum. Consider a quick sketch of an Aristotelian argument against institutional neutrality.

At Nicomachean Ethics I.2, Aristotle tells us that politics, or politike, is “the most controlling science.” Politics studies the human good in all of its social dimensions, and for that reason prescribes what disciplines (epistemai) are to be studied in cities. Since politics gets its bearing from the good, and doing so is the exact opposite of neutrality, Aristotle’s view of curricular decision-making can’t be an instance of institutional neutrality. Just the reverse.

At Nicomachean Ethics VI.13, Aristotle tells us that practical intelligence (phronesis), makes prescriptions for the sake of theoretical wisdom (sophia) without prescribing to it. In other words, phronesis issues prescriptions so as to create the optimal conditions for sophia’s actualization without dictating its content. Since phronesis is essential to politics, and politics is a major domain in which phronesis is exercised, this is as much as to say that politics creates the conditions for the actualization of theoretical truth-seeking without dictating the content of any theoretical inquiry.

If we substitute “university” for “city,” we get an unorthodox conclusion, at least by contemporary standards. On Aristotle’s view, the ideal university is not just structured around a substantive conception of the good, but around an explicitly political one. Justice is an essential part of politics, and politics is an essential part of the good. If we grant even a weak sort of transitivity there, it follows that justice is an essential part of the good, so that its promotion should be part of the mission of the ideal university.

That might make it sound as though the Aristotelian university is a Maoist indoctrination factory, a Taliban-run madrasa, or a latter-day version of Calvin’s Consistory. If politics structures the university, how can it avoid violating the autonomy of its members—students, faculty, staff, visitors? A fair question, but one that’s answered by the second part of Aristotle’s view. Politics structures the university without dictating the content of any given inquiry that takes place in it.

Multicultural opponents of institutional neutrality, Athenian Solidarity Encampment, Italy 

This sounds paradoxical, but isn’t. The structure of the university is not neutral, and neither is the activity of maintaining that structure. Executive or managerial or even political decisions are made with a view to promoting a substantive conception of the good. But “aiming at a substantive conception of the good” doesn’t by itself entail the need for violations of autonomy. It depends what the conception is. If the conception in question is one that values autonomy—and it could–there’s no reason why its institutionalization should require the violation of autonomy. Just the reverse.

I know that Aristotle has a terrible reputation as a paternalist, as do his successors, particularly his medieval religious ones, but this is a highly contested matter even on textual grounds. There are good textual reasons for thinking that Aristotle valued autonomy (see this and this, among many other worthwhile discussions). But those textual arguments are somewhat beside the conceptual point. Assume the worst-case scenario for Aristotle. Call him the worst paternalist ever. The fact remains: the degree of autonomy permitted by an Aristotelian ethic depends on the extent to which autonomy is given a place in the human good. If it’s given little place, autonomy will have relatively little value. But if it’s made constitutive of the human good as such, autonomy will have over-riding value. Both of those are live options. Neither can be dismissed out of hand.

I can’t, of course, settle this issue here; it’s the beginning of a long inquiry. But however that inquiry ends up, we can’t assume from the outset that “aiming at a certain conception of the good” entails that an Aristotelian conception of the good—whatever it is—of necessity gives little value to autonomy. That begs the question. A conception of the good might do the reverse. If it’s good for self-moving organisms to move themselves, perhaps it’s good for self-ruling organisms to rule themselves. Just as cages are bad for animals, intellectual prisons are bad for people. If so, we have a “novel” conceptualization that the advocates of institutional neutrality might want to think about: there is such thing as a non-neutral, even perfectionist, rationale for autonomy. That rationale can be the basis of an institutionally non-neutral, but autonomy-respecting university.

A university, then, can be committed to a substantive conception of the good and value autonomy. Such a university can not only host, but invite controversy, including controversy regarding its own theoretical foundations or its own philosophical commitments. It won’t alter those foundations or abandon those commitments unless they’re conclusively refuted, but it can keep them in place without demanding adherence to them by every member of the faculty, students, and staff.

Granted, the institution might have to demand adherence to its conception of the good from administrators or at least some subset of them. But that’s true of institutional neutrality, as well. Administrators of a university that adopts institutional non-neutrality are obliged to follow and promote that doctrine, but administrators of a university that adopts institutional neutrality are obliged to follow and promote that. Those facts aren’t objections to either view; they’re truisms.

It’s an irony that many of the advocates of institutional neutrality, like Jonathan Haidt, regard themselves (and are regarded by others) as Aristotelians. Whatever the warrant for that label in other domains, it doesn’t apply here: institutional neutrality is a straightforwardly anti-Aristotelian doctrine. Institutional neutrality tells us that the university must avow silence on matters of public controversy. Aristotle’s normative theory tells that curricular decisions can’t be made on neutral grounds, and insists that such decisions are profoundly worthy of public discussion.

Princetonians for Free Speech Brunch, Nassau Inn, Princeton, May 24, 2026 (photo courtesy of Princetonians for Free Speech)

It strikes me as obvious that curricular decisions—what to teach, what not to teach, how to teach, why, and with what resources–are highly controversial, and always have been. Institutional neutrality entails that, as matters of public controversy, universities ought to remain silent about these issues even when they’re making controversial decisions about them. Aristotle’s view, like Socrates’s, entails just the reverse: that we gain by public discussion of matters of public controversy, including dialectical engagement with the people making a given decision, particularly educational decisions.

Like the sophists Socrates pursued, university administrators and Boards of Trustees are perfect candidates for dialectical examination: power-wielding talkers who know far less than they let on. It’s instructive to read the most aggressively anti-sophistical Platonic dialogues in this light, and think of their protagonists as prototypes of modern university administrators; the Euthyphro, Euthydemus, Protagoras, Gorgias, and Republic I are, I think, profitably read in this way. It’s even more instructive to try to imagine actually conducting a Platonic dialogue in the C-suite of an institutionally neutral university campus, assuming you could get the words out before you were arrested. “So tell us, President Smith: How does neutrality bear on complicity?” Some of us don’t have to imagine.

Like the sophists Socrates pursued: Princeton University president Christopher Eisgruber in “conversation” with Louise Sams, New York City, April 16, 2026

In short, institutional neutrality institutionalizes concealment; Aristotelianism institutionalizes candor. The question is whether candor should override concealment, or the reverse. Aristotle’s view is clear enough, but good luck getting an institutionally neutral college president to weigh in on the matter, no matter how much empty lip service they pay to “the Western Tradition.” And prepare for an uphill climb if you do. Institutional neutrality is, after all, a blueprint for dodging questions, not answering them. By the time you get an answer, the president in question will long since have retired. At that point, the answer he gives won’t matter to anything, which is precisely why he’ll feel free to give it. And also why there’ll be no point if he does.

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Thanks to the folks in my MTSP discussion group, who discussed institutional neutrality with me at such length, but particularly to Roderick Long, who discussed my Aristotelian addendum with me, adding an insightful one of his own:

Incidentally, it’s always worth remembering that Plato and Aristotle were both teachers in and administrators of educational institutions; the Academy and the Lyceum each had aspects of both the university (teaching students) and the think tank (providing info to the broader community). (Both the Academy and the Lyceum were consulted, for example, in the drawing up of laws and constitutions for new colonies; they were actually politically engaged and had some influence.)

See this paper by Roderick as well.

Thanks also to the folks in my Symposium Great Books Institute discussion on Newman’s Idea of a University, but particularly to Reynaldo Miranda, who generously wrote up pages of comments on a paper of mine on Newman.

The impetus of the basic idea behind this post came from a conversation I had thirty-five years ago with John Cooper about NE VI.13. I wish he was here to talk about it.