PSU Magazine Spring 1989

Crossroad (Continued from page 7) "A Future of Growth'' mentions a need for more private support of Portland State, but it also urges the state government and the State Board to rethink the way it funds higher education, and to look at how Portland State affects Portland's - and the state's - economy: "Because of the essential roles higher education must play in the future of the state's economy, the Oregon Legislature should develop funding targets for the State System of Higher Education that will bring it to at least the top third of all states in per capita fund ing within the next 10 years:· Edgington sees the possibility of lottery funds being used for higher education . He also would like to see PSU have campuses in Washington County, Clackamas County and perhaps east Multnomah County in the next 10 to 15 years. " If the state prospers and as the economy grows, I see no reason we couldn't have that ," he said . The visions of greatness Edgington has for Portland State have a solid foundation . Its relatively new engineering program is producing students that have some of the highest accreditation test scores in the na– tion ; the university has 40 percent of the masters degree students among the state's three biggest universities; it has six doc– toral programs and more on the drawing board; and the last three degrees approved by the State Board have been at PSU, the latest of which was a Ph.D. in Public Administration. But even though PSU stands to make big gains as it enters this next phase in its development , no one is say ing it's going to be easy. Said Edgington , " I think it's going to be a struggle. We can't have soft pro– grams, and we can't go to the board with pleasantries. I think we're going to have to justify and identify everything we do. We've got to prove that there is a demand for our programs." D Socialism (Continued from page 13) ethnic protest in Estonia and Armenia than the Chinese have allowed in Tibet. Howard Goldblatt, professor of Chinese at the University of Colorado, gave an example of China's slow progress toward political reform as he critiqued a recent prize-winning Chinese book, The Price of Garlic, that centered around a failed aspect of the government 's agricultural policy. The government, he said, attached newspaper clippings to the back cover of the book. These clippings described the agricultural policy as a complete success and contradicted the major premise of the novel. Another indication of the slow pro– gress of political reform in China is that one of the panelists, Yan Jiaqi , is the author of the only published analysis of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) in China. The government has strictly limited the distribution of his book. The Chancellor's view N ew State System of Higher Educa– tion Chancellor Thomas Bartlett told Portland State's Faculty Senate in March that an in depth study of higher education needs and services in the Portland area by a special independent commission likely will lead to significant changes. "There will be a steady increase in the extent and the level of higher education in Portland," he said, "and clearly the key player in that process is Portland State." The Chancellor indicated that new ways of offering services, such as cooperative degrees or the movement of programs, will have to be found. He said the appointment of an indepen– dent study commission with professional consultants will help avoid the appearance of "turf battles" and will lend credibility to the study report . W hile most of the conference participants spoke from the assumption that the evolution of soc ialist countries towards more capitalistic and market-oriented societies was a positive development , Victor Lip– pitt, professor of economics at University of California-Riverside, pointed out several disturbing potential consequences of this trend . Lippitt sees no long- term solution to the fundamental contrad ictions of capitalism - namely, the market- oriented system's tendency to constantly expand and thereby threaten the natural environ– ment and its tendency to exacerbate social inequalities. He cautioned the two socialist super– powers - and China in particular - not to embrace capitalism as a panacea . Lip– pitt said , " China may well emerge in the 21st century as an economic powerhouse, but will have to relearn the contradictions of the capitalist system from painful ex– perience." A theme underlying all of the speakers' presentations was the growing interdependency of the world system. Alexander Nagorniy observed that Gorbachev 's ascent to power in 1984 was due in part to the success of the Chinese reforms and the Soviet elites' subsequent desire to appoint a reformer. When the Chinese began their economic reforms in 1978, many Soviet thinkers opposed these reforms on dogmatic grounds and ex– pressed pessimism about their potential outcome, Nagorniy said. However, as the Chinese economic reforms progressed, the Soviet intelligentsia quickly began to acknowledge and then praise them as a success. Perhaps the most telling indication of the far-reaching consequences of these reforms was told in a story by Herbert Ellison, professor of history at the University of Washington. During recent political demonstrations in Prague, Czechoslovakian security per– sonnel threatened to stop the demonstra– tions and crack down on the protestors (a la the Soviets' brutal suppression of Prague activists in the Spring of 1978). According to Ellison, the protestors warned, " you better watch out, Gor– bachev is watching." D PSU 17