Academic Freedom

On September 17, Trump spoke from the National Archives Museum. College students, he claimed, are being “inundated with critical race theory,” which is a “Marxist doctrine holding that America is a wicked and racist nation.” On September 22, he issued an  executive order  that alluded to Rufo’s work, forbidding the federal government and its contractors and grantees from holding training sessions that the president said promote racial or sexual “stereotyping” and “scapegoating.” The order outlined nine “divisive concepts” that cannot be taught or promoted, including that: “the United States is fundamentally racist or sexist.” “an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously.” “an individual’s moral character is necessarily determined by his or her race or sex.” “an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, bears responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the s...

In truth the real expansion in higher education law and regulation mostly occurred after 2010, as we saw ever stricter immigration controls, the introduction of the Prevent duty, HEFCE incrementally moving from friendly funder to wannabe regulator, and the evolution of quality and standards from an enhancement carrot to a regulatory stick. For more:  https://wonkhe.com/blogs/keeping-track-of-the-ever-evolving-laws-of-higher-education/?utm_content=buffer5a907&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

 https://labornotes.org/blogs/2014/10/wave-contingent-faculty-organizing-sweeps-campuses

  Class Shock: Affect, Mobility, and the Adjunct Crisis by  Yasmin Nair   For years, academia was a hallowed portal into a magical way of life. Or, to be more realistic, it seemed to be one way towards class mobility that was secure, respectable, and relatively easy to obtain, or so most people thought. If you believe cinematic and televisual representations, all academics are professors who live in immaculately maintained houses glowing with the soft light reflected off antique wooden furniture, their rooms filled with never-ending shelves of books, sunlight dappling warm kitchens, and living rooms abounding with vases of fresh-cut flowers. It’s not that such scenarios no longer exist; there is a stratosphere of academia where such idyllic existences are still possible. But, as the mainstream public is quickly learning these days, a growing number of academics are in fact underpaid and overworked graduate students and adjuncts. The dreams of class ascension and mobility ...

 https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/academia-suffering-adjunctivitis-low-paid-adjunct-professors-struggle-make-ends-meet

 https://www.gppi.net/media/KinzelbachEtAl_2021_Free_Universities_AFi-2020.pdf 

  Fighting to Protect—and Define—Academic Freedom  For two decades, Scholars at Risk has assisted academics across the globe. By Robert Quinn Despite the leading work of the AAUP, academic freedom is not well respected, or even understood, in much of the United States and globally. This is evidenced in confrontations on US campuses, many of which conflate academic freedom and free speech (to the detriment of both). And it is evidenced globally in record levels of reported attacks on scholars around the world, ranging from loss of position or denial of promotion to restrictions on travel, harassment, intimidation, wrongful prosecution or imprisonment, and violence resulting in serious harm or even death. Twenty years ago, Scholars at Risk (SAR) was founded to respond to the severest of these attacks—to help threatened scholars stay alive and keep working. In its first ten years (2000–2009), SAR developed a core set of programs aimed at providing direct assistance to scholars wh...

  Academic Freedom in the United Kingdom  Austerity and market logic have limited academic freedom. By Lori Allen Obstacles to academic freedom in the United Kingdom are encountered in more and less obvious ways, all of which are sinister. From the blatant surveillance of Muslim students, the censorship of scholars discussing Palestine, and the mainstreaming of racism and Islamophobia in a Tory-led Brexit climate to the slow stifling of intellectual agendas by audit exercises requiring that academic departments demonstrate profitable “impact,” academic freedom is under threat, for faculty members and for students. Like other rights and democratic principles, academic freedom is always at risk everywhere, because critical thought, imagination, and informed debate threaten power. There is now, however, a confluence of forces in the United Kingdom—both cultural and institutional—that should frighten anyone who values the right to question status quo inequalities. It should also e...