On Credentialism and Associated Follies
(avg. read time: 9–17 mins.)
I am posting this after receiving my PhD in Biblical Studies. The occasion has led me to reflect on what it means to have such a credential and on the credentialist tendencies common in academic and academic-adjacent contexts. In case anyone should otherwise get the wrong impression from what follows, I would suggest reading this in balance with my post reflecting on my vocation of being a biblical scholar next week. I am absolutely honored and grateful for receiving my PhD and for all that is thereby entailed. I am by no means writing this reflection to denigrate the PhD or what it signifies, but in fact to remember what it should signify and to guard against mentalities that can contribute to credentialism.
The key term credentialism can have multiple meanings. On the one hand, it can refer to the increased demand for credentials that has led to credential inflation. That is, jobs that once required lower levels of formal credentials, like high school diplomas or Associate’s/Bachelor’s degrees, now require the next level of formal credentials, despite the requisite skillset not changing commensurately. This shifting of credential requirements then has a cascade effect of credentials in general becoming inflated and devalued. On the other hand, it can refer to the philosophy and values that inspire this inflation. The latter, along with associated follies, is the subject of this reflection. Admittedly, this will not be as clearly structured as many of my other writings, but there is much to untangle here.
Credentialism generally manifests as relying on formal qualifications to determine someone’s competence or expertise. It and associated follies (such as the fallacy of appeal to authority) can also manifest in the attitude of always “deferring to the experts,” usually on the assumption that all relevant experts agree. In cases where experts disagree, it can manifest in empty academic flexing by way of comparing schools that experts got their degrees from (“my school is better than your school”). Likewise, when a clear majority of experts in a given field favor one view over the other, this mentality can manifest in focusing on the fact that the majority thinks this way and not on their reasons for thinking this way.
As one may observe from the foregoing paragraph, popular fallacies that can accompany credentialism when people appeal to credentialed experts in public debate are the fallacies of argumentum ad populum/appeal to the majority and appeal to authority. It may be the case that a majority agreement on an issue may be in the right, but it is not so simply because of the majority that support such a view. It is, rather, that the majority happen to have analyzed the matter correctly and reasoned properly. The reasons and quality of analysis are more important than the majority itself. To rely on the fact that “a lot of smart people agree with me” is to ignore the distinct possibility that a lot of smart people can be wrong. For example, a lot of smart people repeat the line that Christmas is celebrated on December 25 because it took over a festival dedicated to Sol Invictus that was instituted by Aurelian on December 25, 274. But these smart people have not done an investigation of their own; otherwise, they would need to acknowledge that no primary source actually contains this information.
As for the appeal to authority, it is, of course, possible to appeal to legitimate authority and the credentialed individual speaking on subjects in which they are credentialed can qualify as a legitimate authority. Expert testimony is allowed in court cases precisely because such experts are deemed legitimate and worthy of being heard because of their knowledge and understanding of a subject matter. The fallacy can come either when the credentialed individual is speaking beyond their expertise or if the appeal to authority as such is considered some sort of final point, and not simply a form of support for an argument. And again, what matters is that the authority of the credentialed individual can be verified, as can their claims on the subject matter. Thus, what matters in a legitimate appeal to authority is not so much the authority but the content of their testimony as someone who has done the relevant (and much more extensive) work on the subject and the verification of the same.
Because of these various follies and others, there has been an ongoing crisis of expertise. It is by no means new, but it has become increasingly apparent and ubiquitous in recent years, thanks to Internet culture being what it is. In fact, one of the impetuses for this reflection was a popular post on social media from “a military legal worker” in 2020 on the case of Kyle Rittenhouse. Ironically, if you accepted this analysis on the force of the person’s credentials and because it “sounded legit” as the “military legal worker” claimed to be dismantling a lot of ignorance and misinformation about the Rittenhouse case, you were, frankly, misinformed about the facts of the Rittenhouse case. The description of what Rittenhouse did was factually incorrect, as the evidence presented at the trial demonstrated. He was also not illegally carrying the firearm, as that was not even an issue in the trial, since the investigation adequately disposed of such a claim (the charge that made it to trial, and was ultimately dismissed before the jury even rendered a verdict, was whether or not the firearm itself was illegal). We are not told what the two crimes this person references were, so I am not sure if one of them the analyst was referring to was the ultimately dismissed violation of curfew charge (thousands of people not named Kyle Rittenhouse were also violating the curfew that night and neither he nor they were actually arrested for it). It also obfuscates horribly by roping Jacob Blake into the discussion of the case when he was not involved in the events of that night at all (his being shot was the occasion for the protest and riot, but that is as far as his involvement goes in this case). Furthermore, even though whether or not Joseph Rosenbaum was a sex offender was not directly relevant to the question of whether or not Rittenhouse acted in self-defense in shooting him, this take on the people Rittenhouse shot not being sex criminals aged like milk left out on a hot summer day. (Reading the court documents of what Rosenbaum was charged with can make one sick, to say the least.) But you were supposed to overlook all of these things because this person was an expert, and you were meant to defer to their (ill-informed) expert opinion.
Naturally, credentials and the expertise they aim to signify have such force because of an appeal to ethos. Knowledge and expertise are crucial to establishing the credibility of a speaker, especially when they are in an audience that may not be inclined to defer to them. Credentials are a shortcut for establishing precisely this point. This is an understandable and reasonable heuristic in human psychology, but it is, of course, possible for it to have overweening influence. For example, people may dismiss something a non-credentialed person says on a subject, but if a person with relevant credentials were to say the exact same thing, people are more inclined to give them credibility, even though the content of the point has not changed. This undue consideration of credentials is of one piece with the genetic fallacy, wherein an argument is dismissed because of who or where it comes from (e.g., “you only say that because you’re X”), not because of its actual merits.
For those of us with the credentials, credentialism can seem beneficial as a matter of accruing respect. Many of us struggle, to some extent or another, with Impostor Syndrome. The credential and what it symbolizes can sometimes seem downright salubrious to this condition. We finally feel vindicated, that we have earned the respect that comes with the credential. Earlier this year, there was much ado about whether one should call First Lady Jill Biden “Dr. Jill Biden.” She has a doctorate, after all, specifically an EdD. For those who thought we should call her “doctor,” this is a matter of giving her the respect due her credential (and what it symbolizes) by addressing her in the proper fashion. For those who thought such an idea absurd, the objections that were not specifically focused on her personally either denigrated the type of degree she received (an EdD is not a PhD or an MD) or had some kind of hang-up about how only medical doctors should be called “Dr.” (simply because medical doctors are the kind of doctor a person is most likely to encounter).
I want to address these responses in reverse order. First, it is true that an EdD is not like a PhD. There are different standards and expectations involved, since the former is a practice-based degree (with research involved) and the latter is a research-based degree. But to say that one is more or less worthy of being called “doctor” because of the different doctorate pursued would be credentialism in its essence and I have no desire to indulge such a mindset. Second, personally, I am inclined to call “Dr.” anyone who has earned a doctorate (and did not simply pay for it from, e.g., the Universal Life Church, or, as Bill Nye at least used to do, put “PhD” after one’s name after getting an honorary doctorate). But I do not see how it is appropriate to insist upon such, whether on your own behalf or on behalf of someone else. I am reminded of the example of Paul in 1 Cor 9, wherein he reminds the Corinthians what Paul and his fellows had a right to expect and demand from the Corinthians as proclaimers of the gospel. But he and they have not made use of their rights by choice. The situation is not the same (not least because the credentialed are not potentially being deprived of provisions), but the principle can still apply that it can actually be counterproductive for the credentialed to make similar insistences about what they think they are entitled to by virtue of being credentialed.
Look, I get it. It is frustrating to go through the grueling work of getting a PhD, especially if you are overstressing yourself with Impostor Syndrome, coming under such scrutiny from established scholars in your field (especially when you have a genuine admiration and respect for them), putting everything on the line for a series of comprehensive/qualifying exams, investing days upon days into coming up with and writing a dissertation, and finally having your dissertation pass defense, only for someone who went through none of that to dismiss something you say for some inane reason (like the fact that they Googled something). I get that anti-intellectualism is a strong force in our world today, as it has often been (it is simply more pronounced in the modern era and the age of the Internet, but it is not new to it). I get the frustration of watching people with more influence and less knowledge than you on a subject matter spread misinformed claims on that same subject matter that you have expertise in. And I still remember an encounter I had with a pastor at my friend’s church (at the time) who felt obligated to talk down to me about seminary when he found out I was in my second year at seminary. He made the common quip about seminary being a cemetery for your faith and how you don’t need to go to seminary to serve God, which he punctuated with saying that he didn’t go to seminary (I suppressed my urge to respond with, “No kidding?”).
But let’s be forthright here: the crisis in expertise and the problems spawning from credentialism are as much, if not more so, the fault of credentialed experts, academics, and intellectuals as they are the fault of those who array themselves against the credentialed. Experts make overconfident declarations, filling in gaps in inference, evidence, and knowledge with “trust me, I’m an expert, look at my credentials,” but can be, and often are, demonstrated to be in the wrong. When credentials become a shield for shoddy work, you know the toxicity of credentialism is present and active. Too often, experts proceed on the assumption that they deserve trust because of credentials, rather than putting in the work to earn trust by demonstrating intellectual virtues. Sure, it can be irritating to hear the anti-seminary canards, but the seminarian stereotypes are not complete fabrications of fantasy; they are based in experience. Many of the scholars in my field, some quite gleefully thumbing their nose at fundamentalist upbringings, have done much in attempting to undermine the Bible, its veracity, and its authority, as well as the structures of Christian faith built around it. Biblical scholars like myself should hardly be surprised that some would treat us with skepticism and distrust. Too frequently, experts forget that it is our function to serve others, not to have them serve our will according to whatever we think (not know) is best. Their trust is not owed to us simply because of our credentials, even if we may wish it were that easy to gain trust. The waters of this world and of our various fields are too muddy to not expect some filtration.
This leads to a question particularly for those of us with PhDs and other doctorates: what does it even mean to be a doctor? The origin of the name and function do not necessarily determine what it means today, but it is worthwhile to consider the original function. The term derives from the Latin verb docēre, “to teach.” In the early church the term originally applied to the great teachers of the Bible, such as the apostles and certain patristic authors (particularly Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, John Chrysostom, Basil the Great, Gregory Nazianzus, Gregory the Great, and, later, Athanasius of Alexandria). The title also derived from those who received the licentia docendi (license to teach) from the church as master teachers of clerics. Initially, such credentialed individuals had to pass a test, take an oath of allegiance, and pay a fee (although the last one was abrogated by the eighteenth canon of the Third Council of the Lateran in 1179). The actual doctoral degrees granted by the earliest universities were licenses to teach at the university level, particularly in the fields of theology, law, and medicine. A doctorate signified a learned individual more advanced in study than one with a Magister’s degree and had been approved by their peers with an established career in contributing to the pursuit of knowledge in their field.
Much from this origin still persists in doctoral contexts today, but with the PhD in particular, the focus is now on signifying approval by a peer group of established academics (with their own PhDs) of one who has demonstrated competency by contributing original research in the form of a dissertation that passes the scrutiny of academic peers, as well as (particularly in American programs, but not as much in Europe) by passing doctoral-level courses and a series of comprehensive/qualifying exams composed by one’s professors. Inherent to these various processes is the achieved approval of one’s academic peers, as in the original doctoral context, although it is now possible to achieve this distinction earlier in life than in the medieval university. And with the near demise of the species known as the “research professor,” the doctorate is hewing closer and closer to its origin as meaning a license to teach.
In this context, it is obvious that being credentialed through such a process is not a bad thing. After all, the credential ought to signify that the holder has been so licensed by competent expert peers who have done the proper evaluative procedure. Other experts can testify that this person is a qualified expert. Peer review is a crucial component of such academic training and certification, just as it is crucial to vetting publication of research aimed at advancing discussion and knowledge in the field.
However, we must remember that this process is by no means foolproof, any more than journal peer review is foolproof.1 It is not a simple thing to pass through this process, but people may do so successfully while others fail for reasons other than the quality of their work or their capabilities. After all, it is possible for peer review to reinforce groupthink, particularly through overweening gatekeeping. This system can produce the least interesting and least helpful scholars, namely the kind who can do aught else but articulate and defend every majority view, with the possible exception of their dissertation subject. Conversely, because the approval of peers is so crucial, an insightful outsider may be too easily dismissed due to the fact that their mindset is too radically at odds with their peers. Although Philip J. Davis and Reuben Hersh wrote on the subject of mathematics, their closing reflections in their chapter “The Ideal Mathematician” have proven to be a classic statement of the problem:
If such a person accepts our discipline, and goes through two or three years of graduate study in mathematics, he absorbs our way of thinking, and is no longer the critical outsider he once was. In the same way, a critic of Scientology who underwent several years of “study” under “recognized authorities” in Scientology might well emerge a believer instead of a critic.
If the student is unable to absorb our way of thinking, we flunk him out, of course. If he gets through our obstacle course and then decides that our arguments are unclear or incorrect, we dismiss him as a crank, crackpot, or misfit.2
Furthermore, as the doctorate still represents at base a license to teach a subject at a university level, it would be well to reflect on the responsibility the credential entails, not on the authority or declaration of competence it presumably endows. For such a purpose, I would recommend reflecting on Jas 3, wherein James warns that many of us must not become teachers, because teachers will receive greater judgment (3:1). This note is itself only an opening for James’s larger teaching on taming the tongue in the rest of the chapter. The tongues of teachers, especially credentialed ones, bear great potential for both edification and destruction, due to the power of their position. The latter potential comes not only from the destructiveness of the words/declarations themselves, but also from the distrust they can sow when found false, as when one claims to praise God and turns around to curse humans who bear God’s image and likeness (3:9–12). The virtues that characterize the wisdom from above, not the credentials, must be the teacher’s virtues: purity (clarity), peaceability (establishing conditions of wholeness and flourishing that characterize shalom), gentleness, obedience, mercy, good fruits, and being unwavering without hypocrisy (i.e., having integrity).
This list of virtues leads also to reflecting on a teaching of Jesus that represents the opposite of credentialism: by their fruits you will know them (Matt 7:15–20). In other words, this approach looks at results produced by character to determine the value of the source, rather than making judgments about the source based on predetermined values like credentials. This process is admittedly more difficult and time-consuming, especially where experts disagree. Often, we do not know where to start analyzing such things as the fruits an expert bears, and this is precisely why the credentialist checkpoints have been set up. But in the end, the only test that really matters is the fruit borne by the expert and the non-expert, by the one licensed to teach and by the one who, for whatever reason, did not or could not attain such a license.
Such a method of judgment also means focusing on transparency. To eschew humility and obscure uncertainty with declarations about expertise and credentials is effectively to deny the test of knowing by the fruit borne. But such exercises can only sow more distrust among people not already inclined to accept the statements of said expert. To appeal to credentials or to rely on other follies that represent shortcuts in thinking noted here is to stifle and smother inquiry. Such scrutiny can be frustrating to deal with, and it can be quite unnerving putting our work up for such open scrutiny, but it is no less than what we implicitly accepted by virtue of seeking the license to teach that the doctorate represents. The scrutiny does not and should not end when we receive our credentials, for that is only the beginning and further opening to scrutiny beyond our more immediate academic peer group.
One particularly irritating experience I had with the latter came from the review of my article “A Synthetic Proposal About the Corinthian Resurrection Deniers.” In the first journal I sent it to, one reviewer said it was a “fine article,” presenting an “erudite critique” and an “excellent methodology which is clearly in evidence throughout the article.” Another reviewer said of the same article, among many other things, “the marked peculiarities of this essay in its insufficient treatment of the biblical text, its idiosyncratic construction and employment of theories (not use of interpretive methods and articulation of interpretations), and its odd use of plain English do not recommend acceptance of this essay for [redacted]. Simple editing cannot rectify such problems.” With some slight simple editing, it was published elsewhere.
Philip J. Davis and Reuben Hersh, The Mathematical Experience (Basel: Birkenäuser, 1981), 42–43.