In recent years, much has been talked about how universities should be. In Japan, the university was long considered a sacred "hall of knowledge" that cannot be evaluated with economic yardsticks such as efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Nobody would dare deny that education and research are the principal roles of universities. But in fact, there are divergent views as to the content of education and research done at those institutions.

Decades ago, university education for non-science majors placed emphasis on philosophy, history and the history of ideas. In the department of economics, which I am familiar with, the emphasis in specialized education for economics majors was placed on acquisition of knowledge related to such unworldly and highbrow subjects as the basic principles of economics (i.e., the Marxian economics based on dialectical materialism), economic history and history of economic thoughts. Students were also required to learn German or French in addition to English.

Those who had been trained in these seemingly useless subjects were hired for white-collar jobs at private corporations and government agencies, and subsequently played key roles in managerial and administrative work. In short, universities were regarded as an arena for teaching not practical knowledge but subjects that would have little or no value in real society after graduation.