Word: good
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...radical treatment of the question of proper university activities often consists of a dogmatic classification of the "good" and "bad" activities, judging them too heavily on the basis of whether they help or hinder a given end. In some cases. This could lead to assaults on activities vital to a university's educational function, which also give some vague support to an end radicals attack...
Rather than making such quick classifications of "good" and "bad" activities, one may envisage a court of continuum, with fine gradations from activities largely incompatible with a university's humanist nature to activities compatible with that nature though disagreeable to some individuals. Even the Seven Demands of the NAC, for example. though advanced as a minimum program, cover a wide range of this continuum...
HOWEVER, for liberals who believe that significant transformations are possible without revolution, an easy acceptance of the use of violence is not possible. Political morality entails more than merely having good intentions. The abolition of ROTC, a more sensitive University attitude toward its surroundings, and a separation between the defense establishment and the University in both the natural and social sciences are all desirable objectives. However, the commend-ability of these aims does not automatically establish a normative justification for any action carried out to achieve them. Political morality requires that an action be effective not merely well-intentioned...
There is a good reason to seek a separation between the university and the government. A society is more likely to reform itself if it has several centers of influence and an intellectual community which is not committed to an official policy which it may have played a part in concocting. However, this is not to say that the university's refusal to service certain outside groups would deprive them of any essential output. Action against the university may lighten the burden of the soul, but it will have only a limited effect in achieving wider change...
...Actions must be efficacious as well as good. In America in 1969, violence against the university is counterproductive. Changes within the university can be secured without violence: changes in the society cannot be achieved by student violence alone...