Labaree, David F. A Perfect Mess: The Unlikely Ascendancy of American Higher Education. (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2017).
This book gives an extremely useful (and readable) historical perspective on the evolution of higher education from its inception in colonial America to the 21st century. According to educational historian David Labaree, the structure of higher education developed not from any top-down plan but in response to the grassroots needs of multiple constituencies. As a result, the US higher education system comprises a complex hierarchy of private and public colleges and universities that is simultaneously populist, practical and elite. The capacity to serve these multiple functions, Labaree contends, emerged from “four central tensions that run through the system—between the liberal and the professional, between access and advantage, between college as a public good and college as a private good, and between the public college and the private college.” After more than two centuries, the form of higher education in the US has come to embody several defining elements: institutional autonomy, sensitivity to consumers, a broad array of constituencies, ambiguity, and organizational complexity. The last two elements are particularly disconcerting to those whom Nassim Nicholas Taleb would characterize as fragilistas; those for whom order and efficiency are prized above all else. In contrast to those who want to make higher education more transparent, structurally streamlined, and financially efficient, Labaree argues that such “reforms” would undermine the very elements that have allowed the system to grow, adapt, and serve both the public and private good. His concluding thought is, “Why ruin a perfect mess? In order to enjoy its benefits, we need to leave it alone.”