The Diversity Principle: an author talk by David Oppenheimer

The Diversity Principle: The Story of a Transformative Idea (Yale University Press, 2026) author David B. Oppenheimer, clinical professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, discusses his book with his colleague Sue Schechter, Berkeley Law Field Placement Program Director.   Prof. Oppenheimer's book draws on the two-hundred-year history of diversity in education, commerce, and science to explore the idea that people with different backgrounds, experiences, identities, and viewpoints produce better work by engaging with one another—a core tenet of the first modern research university, founded in Germany in 1810. It was the inspiration for John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty, a touchstone of academic freedom; a hallmark of Charles Eliot’s remaking of Harvard in the late nineteenth century to promote the “clash of ideas”; and a foundation of the twentieth century efforts toward equality of Thurgood Marshall, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Pauli Murray. In telling the story of the diversity principle through the experiences of these and other remarkable thinkers, Oppenheimer argues for affirming diversity as a central value of education and an essential ingredient for a robust intellectual and political culture.