You gotta serve somebody

"Gotta Serve Somebody"
Bob Dylan

You may be an ambassador to England or France
You may like to gamble, you might like to dance
You may be the heavyweight champion of the world
You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
It may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

On back in 1976, our now longest operating peace and conflict forensics scholar (now that Elise Boulding has passed on), Johan Galtung, wrote a piece on intellectuals published in the academic journal, Higher Education in Europe, which then reprinted it in 2002, as well as a follow-on piece. Galtung discussed intellectuals, their public role, and their intentions and loyalties. His basic typology for intellectuals is that they either are completely independent and publicly critical of whatever is wrong with public policy, corporate policy, or academic policy--or they are not true intellectuals, but are rather what he calls the intelligentsia, in service to elite interests.

Might be a rock'n' roll addict prancing on the stage
Might have money and drugs at your commands, women in a cage
You may be a business man or some high degree thief
They may call you Doctor or they may call you Chief.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

I think Galtung is more than a bit unrealistic and simplistic in his rudimentary typology in these two pieces. He fails to acknowledge where he has himself been a member of the intelligentsia by his definition. Or, if he can make the case that he has never succumbed to those depths, he needs to acknowledge that there are some academic superstars, such as himself, who need not fear sudden and chronic unemployment from the academy. He has always been at the top, deservedly so, but his scorn for those of us who fail to adequately attack our own academic institutions is perhaps too simplistic and easily delivered from someone whose talents are simply overwhelming. Speaking personally, I do not write op-eds for our local newspapers excoriating the university president for his massive and rapidly increasing salary even as the rest of us suffer freezes at best. For this failure on my part, Galtung would label me as part of the intelligentsia, even though I have been arrested, jailed, tried and imprisoned many times for my nonviolent resistance to our nation's militarism, including six times in direct local publicized opposition to Oregon's US Senators who voted for funding for the war in Iraq. I choose my battles because I am not a superstar who would easily find other work so fulfilling as teaching about nonviolence to hundreds of students each year. So, I guess, I am on the wrong side, according to Galtung.

You may be a state trooper, you might be a young Turk
You may be the head of some big TV network
You may be rich or poor, you may be blind or lame
You may be living in another country under another name.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

You may be a construction worker working on a home
You may be living in a mansion or you might live in a dome
You might own guns and you might even own tanks
You might be somebody's landlord you might even own banks.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

Galtung finally tell us how to fix this:
"The remedy? Obviously—the freelance intellectual, free to follow his and her leads wherever they lead" (2002b, p. 67). Sure, that would fix it all, but what would happen to the numbers involved and their abilities to reach and teach? Without institutional support from the academy or foundations, who would pay the rent, or is Galtung suggesting we who might be trying to develop intellectual goods should simply sleep under bridges and bring our mendicant bowls to the corner to remain pure? After all, his freelancer still needs a sponsor, a publisher, someone to keep the intellectual freelancer fed and clothed. Is that freelancer then pandering to the organization who hires her or him to speak? Is that freelance intellectual spinning her or his writing to try to sell a few books to survive? Who is that freelancer trying to please enough to live another day in order to be able to offer those intellectual products to more people?

You may be a preacher with your spiritual pride
You may be a city councilman taking bribes on the side
You may be working in a barbershop, you may know how to cut hair
You may be somebody's mistress, may be somebody's heir.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

Might like to wear cotton, might like to wear silk
Might like to drink whiskey, might like to drink milk
You might like to eat caviar, you might like to eat bread
You may be sleeping on the floor, sleeping in a king-sized bed.

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
It may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

You may call me Terry, you may call me Jimmy
You may call me Bobby, you may call me Zimmy
You may call me R.J., you may call me Ray
You may call me anything but no matter what you say.

I think Johan Galtung may have to return to his essays and refine them or he is going to write off all of us, even possibly himself, as mere intelligentsia. I suspect he'd acknowledge there are degrees and types of intellectuals in a far more complex taxonomy than the binary model he has created, if he wants to maintain his credibility and the deep admiration so many of us feel for him and his work over the past 50+ years.

You're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

References
Galtung, J. (2002a). The role of the intellectual—An excursion into self-criticism. Higher Education in Europe, 27(1/2), 60-63.
Galtung, J. (2002b). The role of the intellectual II—This time as other-criticism. Higher Education in Europe, 27(1/2), 65-68.