Politics & Power Quote by Donna Shalala

Patriotism rarely shows up in policy debates as cleanly as it does here: Donna Shalala wraps higher education in the language of national competition, turning universities into proof-of-concept for American competence. The move is tactical. Instead of defending campuses as cultural institutions or engines of personal growth, she defends them as a strategic asset America can still claim without apology. “One of few areas” is the quiet sting: it concedes decline elsewhere while insisting the U.S. retains a decisive advantage in a domain that manufactures power - knowledge, credentials, research capacity, global networks.

Her phrasing performs two kinds of persuasion at once. First, it reassures domestic audiences that spending on universities isn’t indulgence; it’s geopolitical maintenance. Second, it recruits international demand as validation: “Look where the rest of the world goes” treats foreign students like a global consumer survey, evidence that quality is measurable and America is the brand people choose when stakes are high.

The subtext is also defensive. Shalala’s era in public life spans waves of skepticism about elites, ballooning tuition, and periodic political efforts to cut funding or police academia’s culture. By spotlighting graduate degrees and the world “coming here,” she implicitly argues that undermining universities would be self-sabotage: you don’t weaken the one sector where you still “win.”

Context matters: as a public servant tied to education and health policy, Shalala is speaking in a register designed to move legislators and moderates, not faculty. It’s a case for institutions framed less as sanctuaries of debate and more as export industries and talent magnets - the soft power America can still scale.