Valuing Philosophy Differently

Ludwig Kirchner - Scene at a café (Rawpixel)

A Pew Research Centre study looking at Americans and meaning in life, conducted between 2017 and 2021, found a decline in answers related to material possessions and a rise in philosophically-aligned values, such as freedom, independence, society, places, and institutions. In the UK, in 2022, the UPP Foundation on higher education stated that despite 22% of respondents seeing a degree as a waste of time, 77% suggested that universities are important for research and innovation. The British Social Attitudes Survey (especially in BSA36 for 2019) also continuously shows that, in the UK, there is a forever shifting public perception of religion, identity, and gender. All these surveys suggest that at a social level, philosophically-aligned discussions and debates frequently inform the navigation of life, place, and identity, and there is a positive reflection on the value of higher education; and yet, the reception from the top-down–from governments and economists–has been increasingly negative. It is precisely the reception from the top-down (governmental) rather than bottom-up (social) that calls for a comparison between the ancient times and today, to see where current worries may arise and whether we should value philosophy differently.

I must note that a lot has happened in the world of philosophy, and the world in general, since antiquity. However, the enduring popularity of ancient philosophy both within and outside academia makes it a particularly interesting and familiar point of reference for exploring how philosophy is valued today. We can see whether such philosophical questions and the increasingly negative top-down attitudes towards philosophical education are points of relevant concern for a much wider population that goes beyond just academic circles. What I will not be doing is romanticising antiquity–it is behind us for better or worse–but I hope to highlight where we are now in order to strive for the best going forwards and avoiding remnants of the past that could harm institutional and intellectual progress.

The Context

The context surrounding this topic is a global one, but I will begin with a close-to-home example to myself. In the United Kingdom, former Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, repeated suggestions of clamping down on ‘Mickey Mouse degrees’, though what these degrees actually are still remains a mystery. This vagueness does not help philosophy graduates or aspiring graduates know where they land in this definition. As much as I would like to hope that philosophy is excluded from this list (we cannot forget that the ‘P’ in PPE, which many politicians graduate with, stands for philosophy), I still cannot be sure. It does not feel like a far-reaching claim to suggest that the criteria of a ‘Mickey Mouse degree’ is based on some sort of utilitarian model; by looking at the average salaries earned from certain degree holders, valuable degrees are, simply, economically productive degrees. It is not uncommon to find that philosophy is either never in the top 10 best paying degrees or floats in an ambiguous space.

With the Office for Students declaring that 40% of English universities expect to run budget deficits, and some potentially facing closure, after experiencing a drastic decline in interest from international students (who play a large role in the financial upkeep of universities), there is reason for concern. Regardless of changing governance, an international and domestic decline in enrolment due to not seeing an economic return in the same way as STEM degrees would make events such as the axing of Kingston University’s philosophy centre be an unsurprising possibility for other institutions.

This trend is not just confined to the United Kingdom, and something similar seems to be occurring across the globe, jeopardising philosophical education and the humanities as a whole. Fudan University in China announced in March of 2025 that it will mirror Peking and Tsinghua University in drastically cutting their admissions into humanities for similar STEM-like reasons. Leiden University in the Netherlands has had to make spending cuts in the humanities. The United States is set to see cuts to the National Endowment for the Humanities, some universities in the past have had to axe their departments amidst financial strain, and some universities are set to face federal funding cuts. Across the world, a competitive market for scientific and technological progress, a turbulent global economy, and a focus on the financial value of degrees seems to put pressure on the upkeep of higher philosophical education.

The Ancient

To immediately snuff the flame of nostalgia, I will go over a few instances where the state simply did not respond well to the names that we are familiar with. Socrates was sentenced to death on the charges of impiety and corrupting Athenian youth, inspiring a disrespect towards state leaders. Anaxagoras’ views in favour of a materialistic understanding of the universe proved to be an objection to accepted Athenian godly views, resulting in his exile. Fundamentally, leaders would want to maintain control and it is entirely possible that philosophers, such as Socrates and Anaxagoras, would threaten this–we can see something similar in the case of the Slovakian culture ministry including the works of Slavoj Žižek in their risky literature list.

Despite this, it would be near impossible to claim that philosophy had no valuable function in the state, and we can see this in the way philosophy found its way into high society in antiquity. The Sophists had a keen relationship with the bourgeoisie of their time, with their education tailored to the aristocrats of society, promoting their teachings as a guiding tool for the young men of wealthy families in learning life skills that would boost their social and political prominence. Although critical of the Sophists, Plato, himself born into an aristocratic family, formed an academy that attracted the privileged, but also individuals of varying backgrounds, to seek a more exclusive education. Not much has to be said on Plato’s The Republic, but its impact throughout Western philosophical thought is irrefutable. The decades-long running of the Platonic Academy, paired with the historical efforts to preserve Plato’s works, is telling of the value such philosophical institutions have had for the state and society. What I am not advocating for here is a return to an academic elitism for philosophy; rather, that philosophy was valuable enough to the elites that would possess the most social influence indicates a wider social value. One of the great developments today is the growing accessibility in academia allowing for a diverse range of epistemes (ways of understanding/sources of knowledge) to be included, broadening our horizons and bringing historically repressed voices to the forefront. However, the risk is that if philosophy’s value is diminished from the top-down, and we begin to close departments, especially in areas of lower income, we may return to such academic elitism with accessibility restricted to more equitable institutions that a limited number of people could afford to attend.

As for philosophy and leadership, accounts of its success do vary (the events between Dionysus II of Syracuse and Plato were turbulent), but there was still a willingness to approach philosophers. Alexander the Great was tutored by Aristotle at the command of his father, Philip II of Macedon, with many of Alexander’s positions derived from Aristotelian influence (good and bad). The extent to which Aristotle’s influence reaches in Alexander’s historical success can be debated, but it is at least telling of a value in philosophical education if his father appointed a philosopher to tutor his son. Moving beyond Alexander the Great into the Hellenistic period, Stoicism was able to cast a wide net, aristocratic and beyond. We can look at Marcus Aurelius as emperor with his Meditations still widely read today, Seneca filling the roles of politician and philosopher, or Epictetus having started life as a slave yet still being a prominent philosopher–all characteristic of philosophy’s potential to transcend class boundaries.

The New

I would confidently argue that, today, philosophy can still meaningfully contribute to higher social functions and play an important role in government and policy-making. I will go over some examples of contemporary themes and thinkers and how they can contribute in ways that the top-down would benefit from at least considering, but before doing that I will express what my worry is. My worry is that punishing degrees, on the basis of economic productivity, will prevent the upwards stream of diverse new thought into politics to help create meaningful change. With the philosophy of today also being intersectional with other degrees, like classics, social sciences, humanities and arts, if these are also considered not economically productive degrees, then they face the same potential threat. This intersectionality reminds me of the passages of Philo of Alexandria, articulating philosophy as a way of life, to have an unbroken curiosity, prying into everything and a reluctance to leave anything. To strike down on degrees based on economic productivity would kill this attitude.

Here, I will provide just a few examples of some ideas that rely on diverse academic backgrounds, lived experiences, and have the potential for meaningful contributions. For example, the likes of Glen Coulthard, with a focus on indigenous people and postcolonial thought, would require interactions with the works of anthropology graduates, history graduates, and indigenous voices themselves. In his work Red Skin, White Masks, we can encourage new moves in understanding the relationship between the nation-state and indigenous relations to place, and how liberal politics can be inadequate for a decolonial project, offering an alternative politics of revaluing currently held values. Or, Rosi Braidotti’s explorations of new materialism that could draw from, and inform, the work of gender studies and, possibly, media studies by looking into the questions of the visual representation of women, stemming from her rethinking of prominent 20th Century French philosophers that sought to rethink Early Modern philosophers themselves. A more recent example would be her 2021 book, Posthuman Feminism, engaging with the new injustices of the contemporary world and the new ways feminist action responds, with an analysis of the conditions in which the contemporary world has entered. Even ethical considerations beyond humans, responding to anthropocentrism or environmental questions, would require interactions with geography and environmental sciences graduates in addressing global issues, informed by global academic and scientific research working together–broadly speaking, philosophy also has a large intersection with the very science that is seen as economically productive! 

Overall, it seems that these ideas, and beyond, engage with the things that those like the respondents of the Pew Research Centre study are finding more valuable in life. By being reflective of the concerns of the people, such intellectual work ought to be taken into consideration by those in power in the decision making process. Regardless of where you may stand in the debates of such ideas, the debates cannot be had in the first place if the opportunity to enter this world of thought is restricted; thus, we will enter a phase of stagnation. To slightly borrow from Nietzsche, it will perform an intellectual castration. Consequently, what is further lost is the possibility for such academic work to find its way in informing important discussions and political considerations.

Closing Thoughts

Where philosophy was once regarded as a valuable discipline politically, the same cannot be said today. With the rise of anti-intellectualism, perpetual scientism underpinning discussions of value and funding, combined with the rhetoric from politicians deeming certain academic pursuits to be financially counterproductive, puts the position of philosophical education and its social potential at risk. The threat is also shared with other disciplines that share interdisciplinary value to further open discussions to provide alternatives and highlight potential problems. It is these discussions that have a rich history of shifting general discourse and present the opportunities for change. This isn’t a call to look to the past and find the philosopher-kings of today to be rulers, but that politicians need to really take philosophy seriously and protect the institutions. If unprotected, a decline of broader accessibility to such an education risks excluding students of historically repressed backgrounds (be it gender, race, or class) at a point where such wider contribution is needed in understanding the world we find ourselves in. This implicitly favours one stream of thought and development over others, as the opportunity to present them is closed.

History has repeatedly shown that there is no one fixed perfect state, but has also shown that an openness to value philosophy allows for new perspectives to highlight potential issues in a way the status quo may miss. Rather than a reluctance to change, we should move beyond the assumption that the current condition of the world is the best it can be and should continue as is, with economic value and scientism leading the discussion. It is time to view the value of philosophical education and thought in a different, yet just as important, way.