Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
In response to my article on citations as a measure of faculty quality, several Ricochet members rightfully commented that this approach could allow the liberal bias in universities to entrench themselves. Liberal academics might boost their numbers by choosing to cite each other -- you often cite things you agree with, and one could strategically cite only other liberals to advance their careers and one's own.
This might be going on, and I tended to doubt it. That was, until I read this post by David Lat over at Above the Law, which shows a deliberate liberal bias in a leading law journal in selecting articles. Lat posts leaked emails between the student editors that seem to show a rejection of an author because of his conservative c.v. If true, this only shows yet again that the system for hiring and promotion at law schools, which is based primarily if not exclusively on publications, suffers from an intentional, conscious bias against conservatives. (Of course, this might be a good reason for law, like most other scholarly disciplines, to have journals where other professors select the articles, rather than students -- but this might also make the bias worse).
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Comments:
Feb '11
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
By nature, I am not a radical or an "anti-establishmentarian" and I have an ancient line of "pillars of the establishment" in my family tree. But the corruption, stupidity, short-sightedness, dishonesty, vacuousness, and meddling dominance of the current stupid-liberal establishment has brought me to the conclusion that a wholesale cleaning of the Augean stables of the establishment is in order. I would prefer that the corrections be incremental to avoid radical disruptions in our social order, but they need to be constant and significant.
I don't know enough about the Law to suggest specific solutions in this case, but the status quo is untenable.
Edited on September 13, 2012 at 7:30pmJun '12
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
I'm shocked, SHOCKED to find liberal bias in academic publications!
May '10
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
Hello! Welcome to the party. The National Association of Scholars produced an 80-page documentation of this at UC, finding that it is questionable whether it is even possible to get a good education there anymore in certain fields. An article about the report in the Chronicle of Higher Ed. is here: http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/politics-education-and-more-politics-nass-new-report-on-the-university-of-california/32125 and the article has links to the the full report. But I would expect that law school would be at least as biased as the Humanities, if not more so, for structural and pragmatic reasons.
Edited on September 14, 2012 at 4:14amNov '10
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
As a member of the bar in two states for 35 years I know of my own knowledge and experience that the legal profession is overwhelmingly liberal in its outlook, that my law school is most certainly even more liberal, and I believe most other law schools are liberal, and I also know that a tenant of liberalism is that conservatives are scoundrels not to be tolerated, so how possibly could it be otherwise than that law reviews are most certainly biased against conservatives? Someone who wants nothing more than to make you shut up won’t want to publish what you write.
May '10
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
John, do you feel there is a bias in the legal profession generally? When I was applying for jobs, I know I always deliberately left Federalist Society participation off any c.v. for fear that it would result in dismissal or, at the very least, antipathy from liberal attorneys. Fellow members recommended the same. I don't believe this self-censorship is true for liberal legal groups (especially groups tied to identity politics).
May '10
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
Let me qualify the question by saying I am addressing the margins. Of course the cream of the crop, liberal or conservative, will not find any issues in the profession. All else being equal, however, does being conservative put you at a disadvantage?
May '10
Re: Are Law Reviews Biased Against Conservatives?
To even ask the question seems, to me, to evince an amazing level of insularity and credulousness. Even more so for someone at a UC institution. Amazed.