Academic freedom (the right to speak, research and write) for both faculty and students is considered to be an essential ingredient for universities to operate. Should it be limited in any way? Why/why not?
Dear Wondwosen, of course that there should be academic freedom, as you refer to with your question. In my opinion the distinction between anarchy and academic freedom is very tiny. There are academic issue where you have your freedom of speech, writing, publishing, doing classes etc. But, I witness a very bad things covered under the term academic freedom, thus I think there should be some kind of restriction.
Regards,
Janusheva
Dear Wondwosen
Academic freedom is the right of a faculty member to practice his or her teaching activities, Research and community service, and talk about his views, philosophy, thought and knowledge without any external pressure exerted on him by any party. Academic Freedom The right of academics to work without external control or pressure and academic freedom is also the freedom of members of the academic community, individually or collectively, to pursue, develop and analyze knowledge through research, study, documentation and production Teaching, lecturing and writing.
In fact, there is a restriction on academic freedoms in most universities in the Arab world based on the results of many studies related to this subject
Hi Hamza,
Thank you for sharing findings about the Arab world which must be in many ways similar to Africa. How do you think this affects university operations- in terms of the functions you talked about (ie teaching, research, publication, etc.)??
Hi Janusheva, you have a point but will it be that easy to put restriction on selected areas? If so how?
Yes, there should be no borders and constraints to the right to speak, research and write, both, for faculty and students! Only under such conditions, we can consider Academia has autonomy!
There is always an abuse of power whenever unbridled authority is given in all human societies.
This is the story of academic freedom in Hungary and EU influence!
The Central European University has long been a target of Viktor Orbán’s populist right-wing and anti-immigrant government in Hungary, with recent moves including forcing the institution in Budapest to suspend its educational programmes for refugees and asylum seekers and shutting down the teaching of gender studies in the country...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/the-state-of-higher-education-in-hungary
Academic freedom should be given to faculty and students. it should be unlimited for positive thought and nation building... but should not allowed to anti- national thought or activities.
It is must to provide full academics freedom to the Universities. So , that they can achieve excellence in their business.
Freedom is important, but there must always be a limit. That is, one must have rules to maintain the respect and ethics of the academic process.
Dear Arben J Salihu
, I do very much agree with your contribution. There are family clans at the Universities. That prevents real academic freedom. I have had a question about that issue. Please, do visit.https://www.researchgate.net/post/Do_you_have_experience_with_caste_employment_at_Universities_in_spite_of_the_law
No freedom in this world can be without limits.
The prerequisite for limitless freedom would be "perfectly disciplined people".
Are there such people ?
Yes, Ashis, I agree but excessive limitation of academic freedom will affect the smooth running of institutions and goes against the very reason why such institutions were created in the first place.The question then is where, how and to what extent the limitation should be entertained.
Academic freedom is eroding in Denmark, according to scholars who described how humanities researchers have been withdrawing from public debate in response to attacks from politicians and the public... #fear
Scholars say criticism of fields such as gender studies and race theory is leading to self-censorship...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/danish-researchers-under-attack-withdrawing-public-debate?&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial_daily
The ongoing row over free speech on campus, and whether universities and other bodies like students’ unions are doing enough to protect it, has been rumbling on for a few years now. But by and large it has been an issue that has been debated in the court of public opinion rather than something constantly mired in legal wrangling. All that could be about to change in England, where new legislation is being introduced today that some fear will dramatically ramp up the legal risks for higher education institutions. As John Morgan reports, the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill will aim to protect “political minorities” by enabling individuals to sue universities and students’ unions, but critics fear it will mean “risk-assessing the life out of campus”...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/english-universities-fear-legal-minefield-under-free-speech-bill?&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial_daily
“Each form of resistance provides an example, an inspiring one, that will never be reiterated verbatim in other contexts but will metamorphose into something else when taken up by different collective movements. What is important, in my view, is to remember that resisting encroachments on academic freedom is never going to be a purely academic matter or an issue concerning only academia.”
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/foundations-of-solidarity-a-conversation-with-zeynep-gambetti/?mc_cid=6d1711d176&mc_eid=68f1d1c041
As the UK government pushes through legislation against supposed “no platforming” by students, academic freedom must include the right to criticise employers, an anonymous whistleblower writes. After blowing the whistle about colleagues’ experiments on animals, they turned the tables, launching disciplinary action, which ultimately led the author’s role to be changed without their knowledge. With a change in the law imminent, the government should make the right to express an opinion about one’s organisation explicitly protected...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/academic-freedom-must-include-right-criticise-employers?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
“The NSL has basically brought Hong Kong into line with a situation that mainland academics and students have known for decades: academic and intellectual censorship as the norm – the difference being that mainland [Chinese] have learned to navigate the whimsical nature of the system, while their counterparts in Hong Kong have not...”
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/hong-kong-gets-grips-security-laws-invisible-red-line?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Academics in Australia face homegrown dangers, intellectual freedom advocates have stressed, as the country inaugurates the latest national network of Scholars at Risk...
While the dangers can be extreme in autocracies and war zones, nowhere is immune...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/academics-under-threat-here-too-australians-stress?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
The Singapore parliament this week passed legislation to counter foreign interference that could threaten its national security and sovereignty, amid growing concerns globally about the use of digital tools and campaigns by foreigners to advance their national interests abroad. But critics said the law could impact on free speech and academic freedom and academics are calling for more safeguards for free and open inquiry and research...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20211007004259776
The legal meaning of academic freedom needs to be utterly clear cut, according to Australian physicist Peter Ridd, who says the current uncertainty is like walking near a cliff on a foggy night. “If you’re an academic and you think the cliff edge is somewhere but you don’t know where it is, you don’t go out at night.” Ridd joins a growing chorus of academics who say that their right to criticise their universities and make whistle-blowing disclosures must be protected...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ridd-judgment-leaves-academic-freedom-too-ambiguous?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Democracy is in recession, academic freedom is in danger
Maintaining autonomy, both the university’s and the individual’s, has become more and more difficult, Ignatieff thinks. The university’s role as the creator of knowledge “generates enormous value”, which attracts both the attention of governments and industry who seek to pressure the academe...
Universities and academics must also be allowed to pursue apparently useless knowledge for its own sake, pure science, pure archival research, pure experimentation, divorced from social use in the confident expectation that, in the course of time, the most apparently useless research often turns out to benefit us all...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2021110307413274
The English higher education regulator has opened an investigation into whether the University of Sussex has met its obligations on academic freedom and freedom of speech after Kathleen Stock quit the university following protests over her views on gender identity...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/english-regulator-investigates-sussex-over-kathleen-stock-exit?&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Wondwosen Tamrat@ Speak, Research, Write are only a part of the vast field of academic freedom. On the one hand I am a firm believer in academic freedom and University autonomy, on the other hand I would like a system where ethics and decency are the corner stones of the freedom and autonomy.
Amid the firestorm of criticism that followed the University of Florida’s decision to ban three political science professors from testifying in court in support of a case challenging Florida’s new restrictive election law, the University of Florida’s president, Dr W Kent Fuchs, struck up a seven-member task force to advise him on academic freedom...
The central question raised by UF’s attempt to gag its professors is the relationship between the university as an institution and academic freedom. At the end of our discussion, Post explained this relationship succinctly: “Universities are supposed to be there for the discovery and dissemination of knowledge. Universities are there to insulate professors, not to do the bidding of the governor.”
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20211120082340249
Professional sanctions are perfectly compatible with academic freedom.
“Academic freedom is not full-fledged ethical licence. Neither social shaming nor private sanction are penalties of state, and it is entirely unpersuasive to argue that they, on their own, ‘chill’ free expression,” says Daniel Carpenter...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/professional-sanctions-are-perfectly-compatible-academic-freedom?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
The sacking of three elected deans from Boğaziçi University could signal a renewed attack on institutional autonomy and freedom of speech in Turkey’s universities, scholars have warned...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/bogazici-students-and-staff-fear-reprisals-after-deans-sacked?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Do not think that such thing as academic freedom in universities exists at all.
Academia is hierarchical, with respect to function, level and employment. These intellectual limits are due to the fact that science is today part of the economic production assembly line, i.e. conformity is a requirement for success, especially in state funded institutions. In some private elite institutions, things look a bit different, because they do not depend so much on ‚blessings from above‘.
Academic freedom is relative. It is, like in other aspects of life, governed by accepted norms and rules in society at large, and the particular country the academic works in. There are many countries, for example, where denying official narratives is criminalized and coming up with counter narratives, even if based on research findings, would lead to definite arrest, prosecution and/or dismissal.
Academic freedom at universities should have certain limitations. You can see that lots of academics in universities are abusing this unlimited freedom they got to a great extent.
It is imperative to remember, and perhaps this could refer to various regions in the world, that there are universities that are being run in ways far removed from any principles of "academia". The prime concern is such places would be financial profit and the serving of personal interest of "ruling gangs"!
Some sort of "state-supervision" becomes a necessity in theses cases to curb the atrocities committed in the name of "autonomy" & "academic freedom"!
Turkish academics say recruitment reforms are needed to fix academic “inbreeding” and the nepotistic “abuse” of newfound institutional autonomy...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/turkey-needs-central-control-stem-academic-inbreeding
Academia should accept the inevitability of digitisation and focus its efforts on ensuring that academic freedom and a sense of community survive the process, according to the philosopher A. C. Grayling...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/preserve-best-bits-academia-moves-online-urges-grayling?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
French universities want more autonomy, and at fears about the impact on equality and academic freedom...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/liberte-egalite-autonomie-do-french-universities-want-more-freedom?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
In their 2008 paper for the League of European Research Universities, Geoffrey Boulton and Colin Lucas argue that “the freedom to enquire, to debate, to criticise and to speak truth to power, whether it be the power of government, of those that fund the university, or those who manage it, is central to the vitality of the university and its utility to society”...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20220422080611775
Politicians wanting to protect academic freedom must not misconstrue it as a form of free expression alone, warn those who have worked on global monitoring and protections of the right...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/experts-dont-muddle-academic-freedom-freedom-expression?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Academic freedom is relative according to the society aspects of life, governed by accepted norms and rules in life at large, and the particular country the academic works in But certain rules should be there in order to avoid abusing these unlimited freedom limitations
“Like so much in North Korea, the country’s higher education system is a black box to outsiders,” writes Asia reporter Pola Lem in her long read on the secretive state. Stories of overseas students being imprisoned or deported “allied to the generally negative perception of the isolated totalitarian state and its leader, Kim Jong-un, make it easy to assume that life for students and academics there must be nightmarish”. But Pola has spoken to several people with experience of teaching in or studying at North Korean universities. The picture is of a system where student and academic life is in some ways much the same at North Korean universities as anywhere else – such as publish or perish culture. “In other ways, however, it is indeed a world apart,” Pola writes...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/academic-life-north-korea-strange-and-difficult-you-think?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Arguments made in defence of academic freedom are often “incomprehensible” to the wider public, the former president of the Central European University has said, as he called for a much broader defence of the right for universities to self-govern without interference...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/case-academic-freedom-incomprehensible-most-ignatieff?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
A group of University of Oxford academics says the institution’s social media guidelines and harassment policies are “frustrating” academic freedom...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/professors-contest-oxford-harassment-rules-free-speech-row?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
England’s new director for freedom of speech and academic freedom must be impartial, the shadow higher education minister has said, despite failing in a bid to block party political donors from being appointed to the position...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/labour-warns-against-cronyism-academic-freedom-appointment?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
The rampant hiring and firing based on political loyalty seen in Turkey seems unlikely to happen in the Netherlands but universities there and in Ireland may nonetheless feel less free to criticise their funders as safeguards on institutional autonomy are diluted...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/irish-and-dutch-education-reforms-threaten-university-autonomy?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Historically, academics have not been very good at explaining their methodologies, mostly because their separation from the state was sufficient to keep politicians at bay, says Steven Jones, professor of higher education at the University of Manchester. Those days are now behind us and universities have become an easy target in an age of culture wars, he warns. The temptation is to look away, and hope the news cycle moves on, but someone needs to start pointing out that universities remain the lifeblood of many communities before it is too late...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/tory-leadership-race-shows-what-soft-target-universities-have-become?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily
Academic freedom is not the same as freedom of expression
In the era of today’s heated culture wars, the concepts of academic freedom and freedom of expression have become increasingly conflated...
But the two are different. Free speech is about the right to express one’s opinion, however accurate, false, good or bad it might be. Academic freedom requires professional competency as determined by disciplinary communities. It is most succinctly defined by the American Association of University Professors’ 1915 statement as “freedom of inquiry and research; freedom of teaching within the university or college; and freedom of extramural utterance and action”...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20220909154014140
Vice-chancellors should appoint an “academic freedom champion” within their senior leadership team to counter growing concerns that scholars and students are afraid to speak out on issues of sex and gender, says a report...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/free-speech-champions-seen-fix-academic-freedom-crisis?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=21651442&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2075554049&spReportId=MjA3NTU1NDA0OQS2
Ljubomir Jacić the intention is noble but there is a danger that those appointed by Vice-Chancellors to be "academic freedom champions" could turn out to be mere gatekeepers and thus stifle genuine academic freedom. And who said ALL Vice-Chancellors want academic freedom in the institutions they head, anyway?
In principle, everyone is free to research, write and speak. But there are structural barriers that limit this freedom: it's hard to research if you don't have access to academic literature (library access, etc) or funding; it's hard to research or write if you don't have time in your workday; and it's hard to speak if no one is listening. Each of these deserves a separate answer. I'm not clear on what you're asking.
Universities should forget abstract talk about their “values” and focus instead on truly supporting academic freedom, says Carsten Holz...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/forget-values-statements-universities-need-support-academic-freedom?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=22733820&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2113317592&spReportId=MjExMzMxNzU5MgS2
European defences of academic freedom are too often based on a misunderstanding of universities’ democratic role, according to a European Commission legal expert...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/eu-defence-academic-freedom-narrow-and-technocratic?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=22857099&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2114833522&spReportId=MjExNDgzMzUyMgS2
“Defining academic freedom exclusively in terms of freedom of speech brings several risks. It severs academic freedom’s traditional link to research and teaching and removes the obligation to abide by disciplinary standards of rigour. It would appear to give academics the right to make any claims, however outlandish,” say King’s College London president Shitij Kapur and Liviu Matei, founder of the Global Observatory on Academic Freedom...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/academic-freedom-not-freedom-speech-academics?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=22877985&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2115010473&spReportId=MjExNTAxMDQ3MwS2
The sight of women students and high school girls removing their headscarves during ongoing protests in Iran have become common in recent weeks, but in a new show of defiance, university students are refusing to maintain segregation rules on campus despite threats of expulsion and increased security intended to stop demonstrations. Gender segregation has been enforced in universities for decades with male and female students sitting on opposite sides of classrooms and lecture halls. They eat in separate canteens or at different sittings...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2022102710364417&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0714
The Scholars at Risk Network (SAR) has called on the international community, governments and higher education institutions to improve reporting of attacks on higher education and threats to academic freedom...
The report says the attacks – which include violent attacks on the university space, wrongful imprisonments and prosecutions, the use of force against students, terminations and expulsions and imposition of travel restrictions, threats to institutional autonomy, and other pressures violating the rights and safety of individuals – have become a distressing worldwide phenomenon...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20221110091916408&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0716
An academic freedom deficit comes with a cost to society
The political system circumscribes the role that universities play as spaces for public discourse. Academics can enjoy wide leeway if they limit their activities to the ivory tower and avoid appearing in the media. But restrictions kick in when academics with unsanctioned viewpoints try to influence the wider society...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20221130125639733&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0719
Academic freedom in universities is a prerequisite for unlimited thought and invention processes and shouldn't be compromised as long as it doesn't divert to unethical and personality abuses.
Do Iranian scholars actually want academic freedom?
Restrictions are partly due to a stilted academic culture in which criticism is uncomfortable...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/do-iranian-scholars-actually-want-academic-freedom?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=23734368&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2152232956&spReportId=MjE1MjIzMjk1NgS2
Florida’s Ron DeSantis is increasingly tipped as a future US presidential candidate. Given the governor has used his current position to intervene in the state’s universities - with seemingly little regard for academic freedom - should the higher education sector fear his rise more than a return of Donald Trump?
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/what-would-president-desantis-mean-us-higher-education?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=23878596&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2154145263&spReportId=MjE1NDE0NTI2MwS2
In addition to hundreds of student arrests, a significant number of academics in Iran have been suspended or expelled from their universities since September 2022 when protests first began on university campuses in response to the death of student Mahsa Amini...
More than 1,000 students are banned from entering their universities and around 600 students have been suspended from studies.
Many students who are not allowed to enter the universities are unable to write exams and “they are receiving zero as their final marks”, the report notes...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230119152240283&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0723
The US and UK have both fallen in a global academic freedom ranking, with a 2022 stocktake showing continued declines in basic freedoms and how security impacts on campus life...
Drops in campus integrity and freedoms to research and teach leave academic powerhouses sitting below Bosnia and Benin in global rankings...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/significant-declines-us-and-uk-academic-freedom-ranking?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=24610273&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2190151486&spReportId=MjE5MDE1MTQ4NgS2
Diversity statements are an imposition on academic freedom, argues Samuel Abrams, a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College. Requirements that applicants make clear and strong statements about their personal support for diversity and subscribe to views set out by the DEI office “are in conflict with the fundamental values that should govern university life: intellectual freedom and epistemic humility”, he writes...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/diversity-statements-are-imposition-academic-freedom?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=24626082&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE4MTk2NAS2&spJobID=2190293882&spReportId=MjE5MDI5Mzg4MgS2
AT FIRST GLANCE, Florida House Bill 999, recently introduced by State Representative Alex Andrade in response to Governor Ron DeSantis’s Stop WOKE Act, which was passed by the legislature in 2022, represents a new stage in the right’s conflict with the university. Throughout the 2000s and 2010s, most conservative activists embraced a civil libertarian position on campus free speech. They targeted so-called political correctness, arguing that speech codes and other measures infringed on the First Amendment rights of conservative students. With Bill 999, Florida Republicans have gone on the offensive, openly attempting to fire or silence liberal professors...
If passed, the bill will ban programs in “Critical Race Theory, Gender Studies, or Intersectionality, or any derivative major or minor of these belief systems” in state universities. It will also grant boards of trustees complete control over faculty hiring decisions and allow them to strip faculty of tenure...
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-perils-of-orthodoxy-and-florida-house-bill-999/
Academia should have rights to research and write scientifically. The ultimate aim of academia is to search truth for the humanity above sects and creeds. However, academia is a part of human society, hence internal and external factors minimize its integrity.
Over the past decade, academic freedom has declined in more than 22 countries representing more than half of the world’s population, four billion people, says the Academic Freedom Index: Update 2023 (AFI)...
Among these countries are India, China, Mexico, Britain and the United States...
Academic freedom infringements do not only hinder researchers, they make it more difficult for students to develop independent, creative and knowledgeable minds...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230310142937133&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=UWNACFR1
A European Parliament report on academic freedom shows that the issue is taken seriously not just for universities but for society as a whole. The report has some suggestions for ways to tackle differing levels of freedom in a variety of political contexts...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230411083503394&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0735
A call from academic and student union representatives for academic freedom to be enshrined in the country’s constitution has fuelled further debate in Sweden about improving protection of academic freedom and university autonomy. The academic and student unions argue that the current higher education-related legislation protecting academic freedom is inadequate and has implications for the functions and values of universities and democracy...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230422090015746&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0736
Academic freedom in African universities has dipped significantly in the recent past as a result of threats by political systems, according to researchers who searched databases on the issue in Scopus and Google Scholar platforms. The papers were published between 2004 and 2022...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230517121836775&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0740
Academic freedom in decline worldwide The Academic Freedom Index: Update 2023 (AFI) released in March this year reported that more than four billion people, half the world’s population, were living in 22 countries where academic freedom had declined over the past decade...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230915123512200&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GLNL0754
In response to some European governments tightening their political grip on universities, a member of the European Parliament has proposed a legal basis to safeguard research freedom across the continent...
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03006-5
In response to crackdowns on academic freedom in eastern and northern Europe, a member of the European Parliament has proposed a law to safeguard research freedom across the continent...
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/ITRE-PR-751835_EN.pdf
Academic freedom goes to the very heart of the new private universities’ academic ambition, which sets them apart from most public universities in India. It is inseparable from the idea and reality of the modern research university, which has its origins in Immanuel Kant’s 1798 treatise The Conflict of the Faculties...
A key reason why it is so easy to suppress academic freedom in Indian universities without provoking much outrage beyond a diminished and embattled liberal intelligentsia is a simple one: the idea of the research university has never gained real momentum in this country...
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/indias-lack-research-universities-hinders-its-academic-freedom
Some universities are facing pushback about their use of surveillance devices to monitor offices, laboratories and seminar rooms. “University managers say that there’s no issue with privacy, because all the system collects are coordinates,” says geographer Stuart Grieve. “My concern is that it’s very easy to take one data set and combine it with another.” Privacy campaigners fear that the data could be used for disciplinary purposes...
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03287-w
Academic freedom comes first, not institutional autonomy
Universities in Latin America have long benefited from the explicit juridical protection of their autonomy, but the former Bolsonaro government in Brazil highlighted a core weakness in the Latin American concept of university autonomy: the secondary and subordinate position it gives to academic freedom...
When academic freedom is understood as just another form of university independence, on an equal footing with administrative, organisational and financial autonomy, academic freedom gets exposed...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231017135909321
"Brandeis University has banned the activist student organization Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). At Columbia University, the SJP and another pro-Palestinian activist group, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), have been temporarily suspended, supposedly for breaking campus rules. Do these actions violate the principles of academic freedom?
Certainly, in the Brandeis case, and probably, in the Columbia one. That’s because academic freedom, although primarily applicable to faculty members, also includes students’ “freedom … to form associations in accordance with their intellectual, political, and convivial interests,” as the sociologist Edward Shils put it. This associational freedom obviously extends to activist organizations like the SJP...
Are donors succeeding in getting colleges to punish or prohibit disfavored speech? It’s impossible to say for sure — but we know that they are trying. Even the appearance that such corruption is plausible damages the university..."
https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/the-review/2023-11-20
"Some academics have made the naïve argument that flawed work should be published in the (social) scientific literature on the grounds of “academic freedom”. But, academic freedom is the freedom to research any question of (social) scientific interest using appropriate standards of methodological rigour. Work which violates such standards should not be given a platform in academia..."
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2023/11/24/the-persistence-of-eugenics-in-mainstream-journals-highlights-major-gaps-in-research-integrity/
The ‘Palestinian Question’ and the ‘suspension of thought’
"The topic of Robin DG Kelley’s lecture, which set out to explore links between the disabling of criticism against Israel in educational institutions and right-wing attacks on progressive curricula, was forged before the 7 October Hamas attack on Israel but perhaps took on a greater sense of urgency as a result of it.
“Here I am, speaking to the question of academic freedom, when for me … the more important question is: what is the responsibility of intellectuals in the face of genocide?” said Kelley...
Borrowing from American linguist and political activist Noam Chomsky, Kelley answered his own question: Israel’s attacks on Palestine call on intellectuals to “speak truth to power”.
We must “stand up for principle and return to critical thought”, he said..."
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231210061908861
EU project to explore impact of nationalism on HE freedoms
A 38-country interdisciplinary research project funded by Horizon Europe – coordinated by Aarhus University in Denmark – will examine how shifting geopolitics and the rise of new nationalisms restrictively influence freedom and openness in European higher education and research and suggest ways to address perceived threats...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240124134929239
The large COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) action programme, officially known as “Rising nationalisms, shifting geopolitics and the future of European higher education/research openness” (OPEN), runs from 2023 to 2027 and aims to strengthen European scholarship. The international, interdisciplinary network will liaise with stakeholders in higher education and research to generate ideas to address and alleviate perceived threats to universities’ openness and global cooperation capabilities...
“We are currently witnessing a (re)nationalisation of higher education and a politicisation of research increasingly influencing university politics, including autonomy and governance, academic freedom, open science, and international engagement...
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240124134929239
It depends country wise. In general, academic freedom for students is more essential than academic freedom of faculty. Since, students are most essential element in any institution. Many cases exist where students are being harassed and tortured mentally. Few cases of racial discrimination do exist. Conflicts in student and supervisor are highly prevalent. Thus, a nodel body or institute has been set up which regularly makes necessary norms for students. Provision for faculty are less. From the point of academic research (read, write) faculty are always at advantageous position since they are part of administration and authority.
Freedom with some limitations is perfect for the university system. Absolute freedom gives unlimited freedom to the university leader to damage the university system for a dictatorship style of leadership.
Arvind Jayant , academic freedom is about freedom of speech, write and research of students and faculty, not about the academy's leadership.
How universities in Africa lost their academic freedom
"What is the current state and fate of academic freedom in African universities? How and why did universities in Africa lose their academic freedom in the first place? What are the ongoing forms of struggle and resistance to regain academic freedom in higher education in Africa?...
There is a caveat that academic freedom is not merely a subjective ideal to benefit individual persons in the universities but it is a public good to protect researchers to pursue knowledge for the welfare of society. So far, repressive politics have not worked well for Africa and, probably, it is time to stop crushing intellectual labour in the universities but co-opt it to guide in development agenda where philosopher-kings and their acolytes have failed..."
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024022115014069
Academic freedom a top concern as new security law looms
"A new security law for Hong Kong, which is expected to have a chilling effect on academic and other freedoms, is being rushed through the city’s legislature under an accelerated process after less than a month of public consultations...
Privately, they said it will have a dramatic effect on universities’ open culture. They said the crimes are defined so broadly in the government’s consultation document released last month that it is unclear where the legal boundaries lie..."
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240308125355719
How virtual colleges are keeping the academic project alive
"Academic freedom has been dealt a crushing blow in countries such as Russia, Occupied Ukraine and Myanmar, but virtual universities are tapping into the resilience of those countries’ young people and their belief in the power of scholarship to create a better future..."
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240401094839518
Iran elects heart surgeon as president
"Iran’s researchers hope that the unexpected victory of heart surgeon Masoud Pezeshkian could boost science funding, increase academic freedom and reduce their isolation from the international research community..."
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-02262-3
Academic freedom and staff safety: A complex balancing act
"University leaders worldwide play a key role in upholding what is fundamental to our institutions’ autonomy and functioning: academic freedom, which is both a right and a responsibility.
As we strive to protect this right and privilege as a foundational attribute, we are also entrusted with ensuring the integrity of researchers and teachers and enabling them to have the courage to seek truth without fear or favour.
Many leaders have had their commitment to academic freedom tested in recent years as the nature, type and volume of public communications continue to morph and grow exponentially by the day...
It is becoming increasingly difficult to differentiate what comes first: the global volatility and instability, which creates anxiety, fear, uncertainty and increasing isolationism or the fear and uncertainty, isolationism and anxiety being driven through social experimentation (social media, AI, technology and digitisation) leading to greater global volatility and instability.
In reality, both coexist and feed off each other. Why is this important?
We are currently witnessing significant implications for universities worldwide as they increasingly confront a volatile world in which academics find themselves at the frontline of harassment and abuse. We are fighting to maintain the provenance of the academy..."
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024071214035212
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