PROFESSIONALISM AND THE UNIVERSITY

Address to the Ethics Alive function, Steve Biko Foundation, Faculty of Health Sciences,
University of the Witwatersrand. 18 March 2009.

Prof. Yunus Ballim

DVC: Academic
yunus.ballim@wits.ac.za

One of the pleasures of the Oxford English Dictionary is that, for each word included, in order
to give a sense of the variation of meanings, the dictionary presents extracts from actual
publications where the word was used. I looked for the word “Professionalism” and some of
the extracts give an interesting sense of the development of the word. For example, an 1863
article uses the word as: “Professionalism stamps its mark more deeply upon the
ecclesiastical mind than upon the followers of the non-clerical, but liberal, occupations.” –
there is a clear sense here that the word was taken to include a mantle of religious morality –
but also that the concept of professionalism carries with it notions of the in-group and the out-
group.
On the other hand, an 1893 article speaks of: “… bloodthirsty professionalism..[is] decidedly
characteristic of the Napoleonic warrior.” Here the word is used to refer to the almost amoral
requirement of appropriate method in effectively achieving a desired objective.
An 1895 article advises that “The..student should not lose sight of general cultivation - and
fall into stark professionalism.” And again, a 1949 article argues that: “With most people real
sexlove..soon gives way to family life, or professionalism, or dried-up-ness”. Both these
extracts use the word Professionalism in an almost anti-humanist form - to refer to the
narrowly trained but otherwise emotionless technocrat.
What these extracts emphasise is that, firstly, all professions carry with them the concept of
“professionalism” and, secondly, that notions of professionalism are socially constructed,
vary across time and place and draw significantly on the moral context of its application.
Professionalism is not an unchanging, fundamental or universal characteristic of the
professional. Given this rather obvious and generalised statement, I would like to focus my
comments on professionalism in the context the professional discipline, at a university that is
concerned with teaching, research and engagement at the high intellectual level – in other
words, in the realm of the best that can be thought and known.

In many ways, all who pass through the doorways of this building – or indeed any building at
a university – commit themselves to undertake their tasks in a professional manner. All ranks
of our staff commit to this idea. All the interactions that our students have with our staff are a
part of their learning experience. Our personal interactions with our students in the classroom,
laboratory or hospital have to be structured so as to reinforce positive learning. But equally,
the engagement of our students with the cleaning staff or the cashier at the coffee shop is an
important part of their learning experience and these too have to be positively reinforcing
experiences. It is through these sorts of interactions that our students imbibe our institutional
culture – that at Wits should stand for an abiding willingness and courage to critically engage
with important matters of the human condition – and to do this in a manner that fits with the
civilised search for meaning in an enormously complex world. It must be clear that
developing and sustaining this institutional culture is in equal measure, the responsibility of
the entire Wits community – students and staff alike.

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Allow me to repeat a point that I made in a recent article in our student newspaper. There was
recently a much-publicised event at a university is South Africa in which students, who
happened to be white and male, participated in a grotesque display of abuse of black workers,
mainly women, on their campus. They used this video to express their disdain for attempts at
developing the non- (or anti-)racial society in South Africa. To me, the offensiveness of this
event did not lie in it making us realise that such attitudes still exist in South Africa. We knew
that before the event and one more piece of evidence to this fact does not surprise us. The
event was offensive because the students involved were close to graduating at the time. If,
after the three or so years of regular presence on the campus, they are ready to graduate with
such grotesque notions of race, class and gender relations, they leave as incompetent
graduates, regardless of their ability to solve equations or diagnose illness. It is the
institutional culture that makes the difference in what we call graduateness – and this is not
simply an ability to pass our exams.

Of course, our students too have a responsibility to develop and express such professionalism
in the way that they go about their learning activities. They must recognise that not all of what
they do, can be guided by legal contract – that “to give one’s word” has a special meaning in
the world of professionals. Furthermore, our students must learn that valuing diversity of
opinion and accepting the idea of the irreducible plurality of human world views – is a
characteristic mark of the professional. The ability to hold two diametrically opposing ideas in
your head – simultaneously – and still be fully functional, is important to the meaning of
professionalism.

Our students must also recognise that corruption – at a large or small scale – and now having
an almost pathological presence in our society – is no more than an expression of feeble-
mindedness. That, as a directed and wilful distortion of good governance and process –
corruption is, in its very essence, a loud and brazen commitment to mediocrity.

And what of the rewards that accrue to the professional? These take many forms – money,
possessions, status, power – and can all be collected in very large quantities. However, our
understanding of professionalism must include an ability to manage these sometimes fickle
gifts of fortune. Here I quote from the writing of Seneca, one of the great stoic philosophers,
who wrote in Rome around the time that Jesus was born. This is an extract from a letter to his
mother1, allaying her concerns about him, after he had been forced into exile.

“Never have I trusted Fortune, even when she seemed to offer peace. All those
blessings which she kindly bestowed on me – money, public office, influence – I
relegated to a place where she could claim them back without bothering me. I kept a
wide gap between them and me, with the result that she has taken them away, not torn
them away. No man has been shattered by the blows of Fortune unless he was first
deceived by her favours. Those who loved her gifts, as if they were their own for ever,
who wanted to be admired on account of them, are laid low and grieve when the false
and transient pleasures desert their vain and childish minds …”

I will return to the idea of exile because I consider it to be something of a leitmotif in the life
of professionals as intellectuals.

1
Seneca. Consolation to Helvia. In: Seneca: Dialogues and letters. CDN Costa (editor and translator). Penguin
Books, London. 1997 (2005 reprint)

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And this is what I now wish to turn to: the professional as intellectual – and here I think that
my comments are directed at students, academics and those expressing their profession in
engagement with the general public – learners one and all, regardless of age or experience. I
am easily attracted to the more open definition of an intellectual to include Antonio Gramsci’s
or Edward Said’s “organic” intellectuals – all those who bring cerebral work to bear in
renewing and revisioning the way that society sees itself and operates – the notion of the
“engaged intellectual”, sometimes romanticised as the “warrior poet” – lawyers, software
developers, business professionals, care givers, etc can all be included here. I have much
respect for writers like Julien Benda, but I am uncomfortable with their narrow conception of
the intellectual - as being this very small group of super-thinkers or philosopher kings who
alone can claim to be the custodians of human consciousness. However, having said this, we
should take the view that, while it is true that intellectuals are not only to be found at a
university, only intellectuals should be found at a university – in its student and academic
staff community – people engaged in the near-sacred relationship between the teacher and the
taught, a relationship that should only be interfered with after much consideration and with
much reluctance.

I enjoy the journey metaphor in the human narrative and I would like to turn to two of them.
The first is from one of my favourite narratives – Virgil’s Aeneid, in which Virgil recounts
the journey of the Trojan hero Aeneas after the fall of Troy to his founding of the city of
Rome. This narrative seems to me to have important messages about the nature of ideas and
the ways in which we engage with them as students, academics and professionals.

Despite loud warnings and protestations from the High Priest of Troy, Laocoon, the Trojans
choose to bring the destructive idea of the wooden horse into the city’s walls. They see the
horse as a celebration of their victory and an acknowledgement of a new beginning for them –
now that the all consuming old questions of the bothersome Greeks have finally and
completely been solved. However, the horse is pregnant with danger and, once within the city,
this misinterpreted idea leads to sacking and destruction of Troy. The Trojans miss the point
that is always acknowledged by good intellectuals and professionals – ideas or theories are no
more than representations of reality and that, as such, can have very different meanings when
viewed from different directions. The world seems to be learning this point with the field of
accountancy in the present global financial crisis – that a balance sheet is also no more than a
representation of reality - which has to be interpreted in the context of the fundamental values
of the society that it aims to give meaning to. All good corporatists will confirm that profit is
merely an opinion.

Aeneas realises that he has to flee the crumbling city, leaving behind the comfort of all that he
knew and trusted – the ideas that he was willing to defend against all enemies - to face life as
an exile. He runs from the city carrying his aged father on his back and holding the hand of
his young son, to meet with equally concerned colleagues, where they will make plans for the
journey that lay ahead. Aeneas abandons the city carrying the burden of his past on his back
and holding the hand of his hopes and dreams for the future. In many ways, like Aeneas, the
student, academic or professional is a sort of intellectual exile – acknowledging the weakness
of past ideas and driven by the hope of a future with more clarity of meaning. Furthermore,
carrying the burden of our past and our hopes and dreams for the future, we too undertake our
work, our learning and our interactions with the community that we serve – inside and outside
the university.

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On his journey, Aeneas relies on the kindness and support of those in power and who have
resources. Without knowing the outcome, many are convinced of the value of his journey –
for its own sake and for the utility value to his followers – and so support him with materials
and resources but also by giving him safe harbour for respite. Often, such as when he enjoys
the hospitality of Queen Dido, Aeneas has to resist, with much difficulty, the temptation to
form a comfortable alliance with those who support him because he recognises that the loss of
his independence will distract him from the path of his search. In similar form, we need the
support of industry, government and society in a way that acknowledges the value of what we
do and without the answers to current social questions being immediately obvious. As
intellectuals and professionals, we also need to maintain a relationship with our resource
supporters that is critically engaged - rather than comfortably sycophantic. And, as with
Aeneas, intellectuals too need an occasional protection from the storm and a safe harbour for
respite – because it is when they have an opportunity to spend intermittent periods away from
the noise and pollution of everyday activity, away from the gaze of meddling Deputy Vice
Chancellors, that intellectuals and professionals are able to breathe the clearer air and express
themselves best in their disciplines.

Finally, to a second journey narrative, let me conclude by turning to the story of Moses after
winning the freedom of the Israelites in Egypt and leading them on the path to the “promised
land”. At a point on the journey, when Moses is in spiritual retreat seeking guidance from
God, his followers begin to doubt the idea of the “promised land”. They see that the path
ahead is difficult and beset with danger and their confidence flags. The road sign is clear but it
points to a path that they are not sure they have the courage for. Some among them propose to
build a symbol of worship where they are encamped – they choose to worship the road sign
instead. This new idea catches on and soon they have support to build a golden calf - not a
stone or a wooden image but one made of gold. God’s response is to make this recently
liberated group of people wander in the desert for 40 years. One generation of this group has
to die in the desert because they are un-transformable. The idea of an environment where they
can freely search for truth is so inimical to their understanding of the world that a new
generation, unfettered by the limits of a world view constructed in a time of slavery, will have
to pick up the path. In our daily lives as students, researchers, teachers and professionals, we
must be careful not to be counted amongst those who have to die in the desert because we
hold so rigidly to our theories that we are unable to even contemplate the possibility of a light
being shone on our subjects from another direction. It is the possibility of an alternative view
that makes our lives so exciting – and this is to be celebrated.

I have given you some scattered reflections of what I think the world of professionalism
should look like. I hope that you have found something useful here. To conclude then, I often
remind myself, my students and my colleagues, that in those last few minutes before we fall
asleep, when we don’t have to present a posture to anyone, all students, academics and
professionals must recite a six-word prayer:

“I may have been wrong today”

Thank you very much for your attention