My self-understanding as a university professor and teacher owes much to the “Junior Year Abroad” program at the London School of Economics (LSE) in the mid-1980s. A cosmopolitan atmosphere at the LSE bristling with irrepressible energy, conflicting ideas, political disagreement and debate, immeasurably broadened my narrow horizons and was to have a lasting impact on my approach to teaching.
I was exposed to the often radically conflicting perspectives of teachers spanning the political spectrum. The tutor assigned me was the political philosopher Kenneth Minogue, then a senior advisor to Margaret Thatcher, who would subsequently go on to preside over the influential neoliberal Mont Pellerin Society, founded by Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman.
My own nascent approach to politics could not have been more different from that of Minogue’s, who routinely took serious issue with my views, was always intimidating and occasionally rudely dismissive. To an extent, the experience was upsetting – it was not an experience I would ever put my students through. However, I will say it was not at all damaging or, indeed, lacking in value. In retrospect, it helped me to grow; as a young intellectual and as a person, it was a provocation to respond in kind, and sharply.
