In my last
post, I began a breakdown of the recent For
Love or Money conference at Wash U, which I continue below.
In Testing as Commodification,
Kate
Silbaugh (Boston University, Law) argues that debates within the
standardized testing literature represent a split similar to the one witnessed
in traditional debates on the commodifying effects of market exchange: those who extol the virtues of a common
metric by which to make comparisons and evaluations, on the one hand, versus
those who argue that test scores have swallowed other notions of the public
good in education. Because Kate is
special, she had two discussants: Kieran
Healy (Duke University, Sociology) and me.
Healy argued that the U.S. education system has been dysfunctional
for some time, and questioned whether standardized testing has really been the
problem for public education that Silbaugh contends. He focused instead on other social and organizational issues
that contribute to problems in the standardized testing movement and, indeed,
in U.S. public education more generally.
I invoked the “dark side” of commodification arguments, contending that
they may be: (1) a catch-all, in that not all of the objections to markets (or
standardized testing) that are packaged under the commodification rubric are
necessarily about commodification, nor the inevitable result of market exchange
or standardization; (2) political, in that they are sometimes raised by
constituencies in pursuit of a self-interest that is at odds with broader social
goals, and (3) elitist, in that the freedom to ponder the value of social goods
other than individual economic betterment is a luxury not available to all. We both questioned whether most of the
objections to standardized testing are really of the commodification variety.
The next
morning, Larry
Ribstein (University of Illinois, Law) and commenter Bob Ellickson (Yale
University, Law) discussed Ribstein’s paper, Incorporating the Hendricksons, which argues that differences
between domestic and business associations suggest that using the same types of
standard forms for both types of relationships can cause the forms to lose much
of their coherence and therefore value, which would hurt both marriage and
business law. Ribstein’s paper was prompted by
specific proposals to apply the law of business associations to the family,
especially non-traditional families, including a recent paper
by conference participant Adrienne Davis
(see below). I thought that Ribstein
and Ellickson (who, as most readers know, has written extensively on private
ordering, both within the
family and in other close-knit
communities) agreed on more things than they disagreed on. Importantly, both felt that the laws
governing business associations were a poor fit for family relationships,
disputes, and dissolutions.
Finally, Susan Appleton
(Washington University, Law) and Susan Stiritz (Washington
University, Women, Gender, & Sexuality Studies) presented “Money Can’t Buy Me Love”: Sex Therapy in the Age of Viagra,
which examines the history of sex therapy and its contemporary practice in the
age of Viagra. I could tell you
more, but none of it would be as effective as this video, shown by the two Susans
(as I had begun to refer to them by the end of the weekend) as part of their
presentation:
Discussant Adrienne Davis
(Washington University, Law) took issue with the particular views of sex,
equality, intimate relationships, and sex therapy envisioned by the paper,
arguing that it reflected a particular normative view of acceptable sex and
sexual relationships that was not universally shared.
That’s all,
folks! Since no one would want to
have to follow the highly animated Viagra discussion, we closed the show
there. All of this, of course,
doesn’t even address the most meaningful aspect of the conference – the discussions
among the participants. The event
was specifically designed to engender active discussion and, especially,
cross-disciplinary discussion. And
thanks to our wonderful group of participants, who diligently read in advance
and came prepared with interesting questions and comments, I think we
accomplished that. Thanks to all
for their efforts, and especially to Marion and the other Wash U folks, who
really made the whole thing come together.
Above Image: The Love of Money, By: Rein Nomm