Julius Gould

(Samuel) Julius Gould (born 13 October 1924) is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the University of Nottingham. Gould was connected with the Institute for the Study of Conflict, was founder Chairman of the Social Affairs Unit and is also an academic advisor for the Bruges Group.

The 'Gould Report'

In 1977 Gould achieved brief notoriety in the British academic community as the author of a report for the intelligence connected Institute for the Study of Conflict alleging a Marxist penetration into British sociology.

Entitled The Attack on Higher Education: Marxist and Radical Penetration, the report was according to The Times ‘the outcome of a study group, which began in November 1975 and continued at intervals into 1977’. The group consisted of Gould and a number of other conservative academics, namely Caroline Cox, then director of the Nursing Education Research Unit, Chelsea College, London University; Antony Flew of Reading University; David Martin and Kenneth Minogue both of LSE, the American sociologist Edward Shils, and K. W. Watkins of Sheffield University. They were joined by the leading figures in ISC: Brian Crozier, Iain Hamilton and Michael Goodwin. The Conservative Education Spokesman Rhodes Boyson and John Vaizey (father of the British neo-con Ed Vaizey) were also consulted by the Group. Considering the ideological orientation of these individuals, The Observer commented that: ‘The study group seems to believe with Professor Hayek and his disciple, Sir Keith Joseph, that true liberty is possible only in a capitalist, free market civilisation.’

The rhetoric of the report was strikingly similar to that used later in response to alleged extremists during the so called ‘war on terror’. The Times reported Gould’s view that: ‘The radical minorities examined in the report often disagreed with each other, but they had a common distaste, bordering at times upon sheer hatred for the liberal, tolerant society in which they moved.’ The report stated, apparently without irony, that: ‘groups and individuals in the fields of education and culture have shown by their theory and, more importantly, by their practice that they reject key notions long associated with the idea of an open, plural society: notions such as freedom of expression and association.’

The report was particularly critical of the Open University, which was running courses which offered a critical analysis of the role of education, and had produced a text book called Schooling and Capitalism and another which it referred to as a ‘Marxist reader’.

The Times published extracts of the report and referred in its Leader Column to, ‘attacks on freedom of expression and inquiry in British universities and colleges.’ However, the paper also criticised the report as having an ‘alarmist tone which goes beyond his evidence.’ The Economist commented that: 'There is an odd slipperiness about [Gould's] work,' and adding that, 'A refutation of a Marxist analysis in his field of specialisation would have been more in keeping with the academic tradition Mr Gould wants to defend than this document.'

Gould was subsequently asked to appear before the professional ethics committee of the British Sociological Association for questioning the academic integrity of the Association’s other members.

Robert Young, one of the academics targeted in the report, called it ‘the closest British academic life got to a McCarthy-ite witch-hunt of radicals.’ Young had written an piece on 'the ideological foundations of functionalist sociology' which was published in the Cambridge journal Science or Society? in June 1971. According to Young, the study group member Edward Shils had sent a copy to Gould who subsequently attacked Young in his ICS report. According to Young, 'Shils was a member of the set of American conservative intellectuals who made up the Congress of Cultural Freedom, which published Encounter and various other periodicals, all financed by the CIA.'

Edward Shils's Fellowship at King's College was subsequently terminated, partly as a result of Young's protest. Young claimed that Shils had 'made little contribution to the academic life of the college and used it as a base for CIA-related investigation of radicals. It was claimed on Shils' behalf that he was of considerable help to graduate students, and I was able (in my capacity as Tutor for Graduate Students) to show that he had made himself remarkably unavailable to them.'

Career

Education: University of Oxford (MA).

• 1956-1964 Reader in Social Institutions, London School of Economics
• 1964-1982 Professor of Sociology, University of Nottingham
• 1983-5 Research director, Institute for Policy Research

Other positions

• 1981-2007 Chairman of trustees, Social Affairs Unit
• 1993-4 Council of the United Synagogue
• Government and Opposition on Editorial board (with, amongst others, right wing operative Leonard Schapiro) circa 1974.

Publications

• Gould, J. Attack on Higher Education: Marxist and Radical Penetration, 1977, report of a study group of the Institute for the Study of Conflict
• Dictionary of the Social Sciences (joint editor)
• Jewish Life in Modern Britain (joint editor)
• The Attack on Higher Education
• Jewish Commitment: A study in London