This is part of a 3-part series on the referee crisis in philosophy. You can find the first two posts here and here.

Refereeing in the Neoliberal Age

In my last two posts, I argued that the referee crisis is related to neoliberalism, a system of exploitation and oppression that confiscates wealth from workers and the poor through privatization, deregulation, and austerity. Under neoliberalism, education is defined as a commodity that generates profits for the rich (thereby entrenching social inequalities), rather than a public good, democratic public sphere, or vehicle for social justice. Hence, university departments are only valuable insofar as they attract enrolment, tuition revenues, grants, philanthropic donations, and other sources of capital that enrich the university’s shareholders, donors, and corporate ‘partners.’ (While nonprofit universities are supposed to be part of the public sphere, they increasingly outsource services to private contractors, allowing them to capitalize on student housing, dining, parking, recruitment, retention, marketing, and more). In addition, the neoliberal university markets education as ‘job training,’ thus producing a docile workforce, subservient to the dictates of the neoliberal economy. In this climate, professors are positioned as propagandists, expected to teach and publish ideas conducive to neoliberalism under the guise of objective, unbiased knowledge. 

This explains many trends in academia, including the cutting of departments that do not attract external funding or provide “clear career pathways”; the hiring of philosophers who bring enormous grants and burnish donors’ reputations; the publishing of ‘commonsense’ papers that comply with neoliberal market principles; and the adjunctification of higher education through the conversion of salaried positions to fixed-term contracts that do not offer benefits, provide job security, or pay for professional service. In the new gig economy, there are fewer and fewer people paid to referee papers, and those who are paid for professional service are increasingly beholden to billionaire donors, neoliberal bureaucrats, and incentive structures that reward obedience to authority. As Peter Fleming puts it, “academic praxis is now about obedience to bureaucratic authority and adding to the institution’s financial prosperity. Hence why many feel like overworked subcontractors rather than public educators dedicated to advancing human knowledge and cultural progress” (2021: 101). Referees beholden to neoliberal bureaucrats will approve of papers that comply with neoliberal principles, ensuring a higher publication rate for ideologically centrist papers.

In short, the referee crisis is not just about the dearth of referees (largely due to adjunctification). It is also about the dearth of diverse referees and of diverse ideas under neoliberalism. Neoliberalism produces thinkers and thoughts conducive to its own interests. People who kowtow to rich donors and bureaucrats win jobs, grants, and gatekeeping positions. This is why I said in my last post that the solution to the referee crisis cannot be piecemeal reform, i.e., changes that fit with a “liberal, rights-based framework, which focuses on incremental reform within the current system” (Chapman 2024: 7). While some critics have suggested that we can solve the referee crisis by assigning referee jobs exclusively to academic elites who are paid for professional service, this policy would do nothing to address the structural problems of adjunctification, epistemic oppression, favoritism for neoliberal ideas, and other effects of neoliberalism – indeed, it would make many of these issues worse. This is why we need to think outside of the reformist paradigm, moving toward post-neoliberal imaginaries that center the interests of marginalized groups.^[1]

I am not the first to observe that neoliberalization has harmed higher education by, for example, “stifling creativity, diversity, and dissent,” while “creating unbearable working conditions” and “forc[ing academics] to publish in so-called top-tier journals” that specialize in analytic Anglo-American philosophy from the Global North (McKeown 2022: 19). Here, I want to elaborate on why I think that referee practices in the gig economy suppress epistemic diversity and promote (what I have called) Sad Beige Philosophy (SBP), the hegemonic standpoints of an elite few. Sad Beige Philosophy, like Sad Beige Interior Design, is seemingly uncontroversial, marketable to the undifferentiated masses, and a signifier of “class” and “sophistication.” SBP identifies itself as reasonable and civilized, in contrast to the “ideological” slant of revolutionary politics (Demrbroff 2021), whose practitioners indulge in ‘virtue-signaling,’ ‘moral grandstanding,’ and other types of epistemic obfuscation. 

In their book on moral grandstanding, which received funding from the Koch Foundation (a charity associated with the Koch family, owners of Koch Industries, America’s second-largest private company by revenues), Justin Tosi and Brandon Warmke say, “we found that people who hold more extreme political views (whether right or left) are more likely to grandstand for prestige than centrists,” though “there is roughly the same amount of dominance grandstanding across the political spectrum” (2020: 32). How convenient for Koch Industries that anti-capitalist activists are just as epistemically harmful as White Nationalists! The most credible philosophical speech happens to be the very type that appears in Moral Grandstanding: bland, beige, centrist ideas that appeal to billionaire donors and cash-strapped hiring committees.^[2] While Tosi and Warmke are interested in clocking moral grandstanders, I am more interested in identifying Sad Beige Philosophers. Annette Dula observes that “powerful political and economic forces” have a “vested interest” in publishing corporate propaganda as ‘news’ and ‘research’ (2007: 48). Following this, we can describe Sad Beige Philosophers as people who support the vested interests of powerful political and economic forces by publishing corporate propaganda as balanced arguments.

Image of 6 beige color swatches with the heading COLOUR COMBO and the subtitle NEUTRAL.

Gatekeeping Philosophy Papers: Content, Tone, Emotions, and Language 

Aside from being centrist, what is ‘commonsense’ philosophy? Dembroff argues that the “pretheoretical concepts and terms” that constitute “philosophically legitimate commonsense” are taken to be those that “align with the commonsense of the culturally powerful” (2020: 403). In contrast to the ‘legitimate commonsense’ of the privileged, “the commonsense of the racialized, poor, queer, transgender, or disabled is considered philosophically irrelevant ‘ideology,’ ‘activism,’ or ‘delusion’” (2020: 403). This places marginalized philosophers under a heavier burden of proof than others, as “their perspectives are automatically placed in… the ‘realm of justification,’” where they confront “an unmeetable epistemological burden” (ibid). Consequently, it is harder for marginalized philosophers to publish their work, and even if they do, it is “brushed aside as politically motivated” – as virtue-signaling or grandstanding, perhaps – “unlike the objective and rational perspective of cisgender philosophers” and other members of dominant groups. 

In this way, oppressed philosophers’ perspectives are epistemically smothered. But this isn’t the only type of epistemic oppression that marginalized philosophers endure. To be sure, marginalized people’s ideas are gatekept out of philosophy journals, especially ‘top-tier’ ones. But so are our voices, the way we express our ideas, the way we speak and write.  

If our ideas seem ideological, extreme, and dramatic, then so does our tone. Compare two descriptions of the same phenomenon: whereas a centrist might describe neoliberalism as a system of “market-oriented reform policies… such as deregulating price controls and lowering trade barriers,” a critical race anti-capitalist like Cedric C. Johnson would describe it as a system of “economic exploitation and nation state repression directed at African Americans [and other minorities] in the aftermath of the modern Civil Rights and Black Power movements,” which continues to exert “a traumatic impact on the material and symbolic worlds of African Americans” (2016: xvii). The first interpretation focuses on (seemingly value-neutral) ‘trade relations’ and ‘market reforms,’ whereas the second one underscores the traumatic impact of white supremacy, cultural genocide, and carceral violence on the psychic and material realities of racialized others under late-stage capitalism. 

To many, the second description may sound too strong, strident, loaded, or biased – critiques that I receive on a regular basis – and not merely because the ideas conflict with ‘legitimate commonsense,’ but also because the language is so evocative, poignant, and emotionally resonant. Words like ‘trauma’ and ‘genocide’ evoke an emotional response in the sympathetic reader, unlike words like ‘market-oriented’ and ‘trade.’ This might make Johnson’s telling seem like a case of question-begging or loaded language or emotional appeal or moral grandstanding or some other type of fallacious/illegitimate reasoning, compared to the ‘impartial’ and ‘scientific’ descriptions offered by neoliberal economists.

In general, ‘commonsense’ philosophy rarely displays strong emotions, unlike marginalized philosophies, which tend to use narrative and autoethnographic methods. For instance, 

Sally Haslanger opens a paper on “the ideology and culture of philosophy” with the following lines: “There is a deep well of rage inside of me. Rage about how I as an individual have been treated in philosophy; rage about how others I know have been treated; and rage about the conditions that I’m sure affect many women and minorities in philosophy, and have caused many others to leave” (2008: 1). Shelley Tremain wrote a blog post titled “How Ableism in Philosophy Has Destroyed Me,” about how she would “likely be forced to move on the street” despite years of tireless service work and mentoring that was never remunerated. Are these fallacious emotional appeals or persuasive narrative arguments?

If you’re like me, you routinely get referee reports policing your tone. Is it a referee’s job to tell you to tone it down? We know that tone policing disproportionally affects members of marginalized groups – women, trans, racialized, queer, disabled speakers – so this editorial practice merely reinforces the burden of proof already heaped on marginalized academics.

Often, referees also impose a specific vernacular preference on authors: fluent Standard English. Standard English (SE) is defined as “a variety of English… associated with formal schooling, language assessment, and official print publications,” but it is also the vernacular typically used and preferred by wealthy, white, native-English speakers. Racialized minorities and second-language speakers often use non-standard vernaculars such as African American Vernacular English or Caribbean English Creole, or mixed vernaculars that combine English and non-English elements. Linguists agree that there is no objectively correct vernacular, and people tend to prefer their own native vernacular, whatever it may be. Yet, although SE is a social construct that benefits white people from the Global North, editors (in general) continue to impose this vernacular on authors by requiring that submissions be in fluent SE.  

Critical linguists refer to this practice as linguistic racism, since it reinforces white supremacy. The requirement of SE in academia perpetuates the stereotype that non-standard vernaculars are “unintelligent, lazy, and broken,” which puts their users “at a disadvantage in all areas of life, including housing, income, job markets, courtrooms, and classrooms.” Compulsory SE also reinforces the assumption that “multilingual countries like Nigeria and Singapore have less ‘legitimate’ and desirable forms of English” than America or the U.K. People who do not speak English as a first language, i.e., 95% of the global population, must master SE if they want to publish in a ‘top-tier’ philosophy journal, since all top-ranked philosophy journals require SE. This places non-native speakers at a “structural disadvantage,” making it harder for them to present and publish their work (Contesi 2021). 

Secondly, the requirement of fluency in SE discriminates against disabled communicators. Fluent English is the preferred vernacular of (especially first-language) nondisabled English speakers. Disabled people do not necessarily write or speak in fluent English. They may use dysfluent, dysgraphic, or dysphonic communication. These modes of communication are not ‘broken’ or wrong’ – they are native vernaculars for some disabled people. Nonetheless, disabled philosophers are required to use fluent SE if they want to publish in top-tier journals. This is a form of linguistic ableism that pathologizes disabled people’s modes of communication. As Joshua St. Pierre states on the Did I Stutter blog, disabled people have the right to “(1) resist speech assimilation and (2) advocate for dysfluency pride” (2015). 

Third, imposing any linguistic standard on authors stifles linguistic creativity and innovation. Asao Inoue explains why we should not impose SE on students, and the point generalizes to authors: 

I’d rather invite students to language with me, to think about how their languaging is judged next to standardized Englishes, to play with what we have in our words, to consider the racial politics of languaging and how its judged in the world. I cannot—will not—force them to langauge in one, narrow way, making them feel bad about their languaging and themselves when they don’t match up, and use the whip and gun of standards and grades to coerce them and force their tongues, shoving ill-fitting and sharp words into their mouths, down their throats, choking them because its allegedly “good for them.” (2023)

Why do so many academics discourage linguistic play? One reason suggested by critical linguists is that linguistic innovation is led by young women, especially those from non-white and low-income backgrounds (Labov 2001). Hence, linguistic play is perceived as feminine, racialized, and low-class, i.e., not the stuff of the Ivory Tower. The favouritism for fluent SE, then, is not only racist and ableist but also sexist. Editorial practice should not enforce these biases. 

Final Thoughts

The referee crisis is fundamentally connected to neoliberalism, including the conversion of full-time jobs that pay for professional service into fixed-term gigs that only pay for teaching; the concentration of oppressed minorities in the lowest ranks of the Ivory Tower; and discrimination against people who do not use fluent SE – the majority of people around the world. This has allowed academic elites to control the publishing racket and impose their preferences on everyone else, entrenching inequality and discrimination in the profession. As academic philosophy departments become increasingly broke and obsolete due to neoliberal austerity measures, tensions will only increase. The securitariat will become less secure as bureaucrats continue to axe ‘underperforming’ departments and seek out professors with connections to money and power. The referee crisis is a symptom of deep, structural problems that can only be fixed through collective action and structural change.  

^[1] For more on what this means, I recommend Robert Chapman’s Empire of Normality (2023) and  Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò’s Elite Capture.

^[2] Note that this is my personal opinion, which does not reflect the opinion of my employers or purport to be an objective, value-neutral fact. My critique of Moral Grandstanding is an opinion in the spirit of literature review.