The attacks of October 7, one year ago today, touched off a new chapter of violence in the Middle East that becomes more heartbreaking every day. That day’s events and the larger war that followed also ignited a different kind of conflagration in our own country — one centered on college campuses and their diversity programs.
A lot of ink has been spilled on why so many university officials, after years of implementing sensitivity training for other minority groups, did not utter even the most basic statement of care for Jews in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas attack on Israel.
The simple answer, and one I’ve written about multiple times on these pages, is that too much diversity work in America, whether at charities, universities, or businesses, separates people into convenient binaries: oppressor and oppressed, villain and victim, wicked and wounded, privileged and marginalized, racist and antiracist.
People who subscribe to this diversity paradigm typically consider it progress when those in the oppressed part of the binary shame, knock down, or even destroy those in the oppressor part. Jews, it turns out, were characterized as oppressors in many campus diversity trainings, and thus viewed as fair game for confrontation.
This year of tumult, however, may be giving way to a more hopeful approach to diversity work. I’ve seen a growing acknowledgment by university leaders that their campuses need to embrace diversity programming that facilitates respect for diverse identities, relationships between communities, and cooperation for the common good. In other words, an approach based on the American intellectual tradition of pluralism.
A Shift Toward Pluralism
I’ve heard from leaders at higher education pluralism groups such as Search for Common Ground, BridgeUSA, and the Constructive Dialogue Institute who have been on the road nearly nonstop giving talks and running college workshops on how people with diverse identities and ideologies can learn from one another and work together. In just the past year, Raj Vinnakota, president of the Institute for Citizens and Scholars, has built a network of more than 90 college presidents committed to civic pluralism work.
Harvard University offers a particularly striking example of this shift. Last fall, Harvard was sharply criticized when 34 student groups signed a statement placing the entire blame for the unfolding violence on Israel — just one day after October 7. Several groups withdrew their signatures when challenged, with many claiming that they had not read the document.
But today hope is in the air at Harvard. At a Harvard Divinity School event in May honoring retiring professor Diana Eck’s leadership of its Pluralism Project, a powerful case was made for why pluralism should be the defining paradigm for diversity work at America’s most famous university. And why the oppressor-oppressed model in vogue the last several years should not.
Since 1991, the Pluralism Project has taught Harvard students, faculty, and many others how to build relationships among people who deeply disagree with one another. That, after all, is what makes diversity challenging, and interesting. Diversity is not just the differences we like. It’s not just samosas and sushi. It’s also the differences we don’t like.
Ali Asani, a professor of Middle Eastern studies at Harvard, has been affiliated with the Pluralism Project since its inception. His vision is to spread its respect-relate-cooperate ethic across the university. “The dream is to introduce a course, required of all Harvard students, regardless of the faculty, using the pluralism case method,” he told the audience at Eck’s retirement event. Asani wants to provide students with “the tools and frameworks to engage with and understand difference” — something he believes any Harvard graduate should be able to do.
A couple of years ago, at the height of the oppressor-oppressed era, Asani might have been met with eye rolls for talking about cooperation across difference. But this past May, after months of ugly division on campus, he received enthusiastic applause.
Like many universities, Harvard has launched separate presidential-level task forces on both antisemitism and Islamophobia. But I’m far more excited about the university’s recently created Joint Subcommittee on Pluralism, co-chaired by University Professor Danielle Allen and Asani. Let me state the obvious: I’m absolutely opposed to antisemitism and Islamophobia, but I don’t think we should be spending the lion’s share of our energy on the things we want to stop. Instead, we should focus on the things we want to improve.
As with similar committees on antisemitism and Islamophobia, the Joint Subcommittee on Pluralism will have the ability to offer recommendations, including making pluralism courses widely available to all Harvard students. In my view, diversity work on campus needs to be led by faculty and established in academic coursework to have a real impact.
Beyond Harvard
Yes, I know. Harvard is the elite of the elite and not at all representative of America. I have no formal affiliation with the university, but it is where I learned about the intellectual tradition of pluralism. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, when Interfaith America (then called Interfaith Youth Core) was just getting off the ground, I met with Eck and Asani several times to discuss how theories of pluralism could be woven into the intellectual foundation of our work and integrated throughout our programming. They invited me to give talks at Harvard even in those early days.
Since that time, I’ve developed relationships with other Harvard academics who focus on pluralism, including Danielle Allen and Emeritus Professor Robert Putnam.
Knowing how to engage positively with those who have different views and beliefs should be an attribute of every college graduate, not just those who attend Harvard. I see momentum in this direction. Already this fall, I’ve spoken about pluralism and bridge building at four colleges — George Washington University, the University of Utah, American University, and Hollins University.
It’s clear to me that the incoming freshman are hungry for a new approach. One longtime college president told me recently that this is the first class she’s seen in years that is more interested in engaging productively despite differences than in callouts and cancellations.
If Harvard can get this right, I’m confident others will join.
As Allen writes in her book Talking to Strangers, the American motto e pluribus unum should not be taken to mean “Out of Many, a Sameness” but rather “Out of Many, a New Wholeness.” The nation’s universities have an opportunity to show all of us what that looks like.
