COMMITTEE ON THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY | Treat University Critics Like Reviewer #2

This is a moment of challenge for universities. Critics abound and public trust is low. Responding to criticism is challenging, especially when it does not appear to be in good faith. What’s the right way to respond? How do we avoid ‘capitulating’ to unreasonable demands without stonewalling useful criticism? I believe the answer is to draw on our principles and experience as scholars — in particular, our experience in responding to Reviewer #2.

The U.S. Secretary of Education’s Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education states that in order to foster an “intellectually open campus environment,” universities must “commit themselves to transforming or abolishing institutional units that purposefully punish, belittle, and even spark violence against conservative ideas.” I, too, am concerned about our support of diverse viewpoints, conservative and otherwise, but accusations that entire units are purposefully punishing conservative views is insulting and demeaning. To take this demand seriously feels like a fake confession to placate and capitulate to someone in power. 

While reading the compact (and similar critiques), I felt anger and frustration. But this unpleasant feeling was familiar. It was the same feeling I get when reading an unfair, biased peer review of my work: the review from so-called ‘Reviewer #2.’ For those unfamiliar with academic slang, ‘Reviewer #2’ refers to an unreasonable, unfair manuscript reviewer. This is the reviewer who blithely suggests you redo your entire study or that your argument ‘isn’t new’ as a way to dismiss it out of hand. Sometimes they even accuse you of doing harm.

Reading a review from Reviewer #2 is unnerving. You want to punch a wall, or to write back in ALL CAPS – “No, I am not misunderstanding, YOU ARE MISUNDERSTANDING!” But this isn’t effective, and it’s not scholarly either.

My first encounter with Reviewer #2 was as a graduate student. When we received reviews on my first first-author manuscript and were asked to revise and resubmit, I was incensed that one review felt so unprincipled, unaccountable, unscientific. It felt like the reviewer was bullying me, and the editor was allowing it. I wanted to fight back!

My senior co-authors counseled restraint. “No,” they said. “We are not fighting back. Read each comment, line by line. Where the criticism is valid, revise in response. Where it is not valid, explain precisely and specifically why not.”

“What a ridiculous solution!” I remember thinking. Why am I, the one who is rigorous, principled and correct, indulging and respecting them, the one who is cavalier and cruel? But I was a graduate student, I had no other first-author papers and thought maybe these senior scholars knew something I didn’t.

Indeed they did.

I learned that there is more than one way to resist what feels like coercion. Of course, one way is direct combat — to pit your raw strength against your opponent’s. But there is another way that not only helps you to resist, it improves your work. 

Instead of waging war, focus on unwavering principles. Don’t yield to critics, yield to principle. If principle compels you to accept their points, do so. If it doesn’t, don’t. I don’t exclude relevant variables from my analysis just because an aggressive reviewer demands it, but I also don’t include them just to curry favor. What makes my work worthwhile is precisely that it adheres to ideals that are beyond my control, ideals that sometimes require me to admit I’m wrong or to do things I don’t want to do. 

Commitment to rigorous, principled analysis is the spirit of scholarship. It guides you through the narrow strait between the Scylla of stonewalling and the Charybdis of capitulation. It deprives the reviewer of their power. The reason I make a change in a manuscript is never because the reviewer said so. It is because the suggestion adheres to what I have already committed to.

Commitment to rigorous, principled analysis also builds trust. In the struggle between author and reviewer, or between university and critic, what is ultimately at stake is trust from a third party: the editor, the public. Earning trust demands an affirmative burden. It is not enough to show that your adversary is acting in bad faith. With rigorous, principled analysis, we earn trust by demonstrating that we make good on our commitments, even when they don’t serve our immediate interests. 

I’ve also learned that with rigorous, principled analysis, I am not giving up as much as I might fear. Yes, I have exposed my work to valid suggestions from others, and thus am no longer in full control. But if I am doing my work well, I have already given up this control by yielding my personal beliefs to principles. When I go through a review line by line, the review rarely scores significant victories. And if it does, that means I didn’t do my job the first time.

Responding this way not only helps me get my work published, but it helps me interact with others, particularly in tense moments. When someone criticizes me, I try to put on my ‘scholar’ hat. It doesn’t always work, but it works better than retaliating in kind.

This is why we became scholars: the belief that we can improve our own understanding, and by extension the world, by applying rigor to our thoughts. This is what we teach our students.

We at universities would benefit from this strategy in engaging with our critics. We don’t — and shouldn’t — have the ability to simply sideline criticisms from the government and the public. But neither do we want to be compelled to do things that violate our mission. We must have an open mind about whether our own efforts, the current draft of our manuscript so to speak, really adhere to the principles we claim. And where they do not align, we should revise.

This is what we are doing as the Committee on the Future of the American University. We invite you, critics and supporters, to share your feedback with us as we evaluate the present and envision our principled future.

Drew Margolin is a Member of the Committee on the Future of the American University and an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication. He can be reached at dm658@cornell.edu.

The Sun is interested in publishing a broad and diverse set of content from the Cornell and greater Ithaca community. We want to hear what you have to say about this topic or any of our pieces. Here are some guidelines on how to submit. And here’s our email: opinion-editor@cornellsun.com.

---