Institute for the Study of Civil Society 55 Tufton Street, London, SW1P 3QL Tel: 020 7799 6677 Email: [email protected] Web: www.civitas.org.uk Why Academic Freedom Matters cademic freedom in British universities has become a A response to current challenges national talking point. Government policies such as the Why Academic Freedom Matters A Prevent Duty and the Research Excellence Framework pose a threat to academic freedom, as do students – and increasingly scholars themselves – who want to turn the campus into an intellectual ‘safe space’. Yet despite the seemingly novel nature of current preoccupations, debates over academic freedom have a long history. This book explores why, for centuries, scholars have considered intellectual autonomy essential for the pursuit of truth and the advancement of knowledge. Contributors to Why Academic Freedom Matters come from a variety of institutions, disciplines and career stages. Together, they consider the key threats to academic freedom today that emanate from national government policies, institutional practices, student-led groups and the desire from scholars themselves not to upset either students or colleagues. Each chapter offers a different perspective on the continued importance of academic freedom within a changing university. The volume as a whole provides a timely discourse on the connection between free enquiry and academia’s historic mission to advance the sum of human knowledge. In making the case for free, open and robust debate, this book points to the many ways in which academic freedom is being eroded and why this still matters for scholars, students and the future of higher education. Joanna Williams (Eds.) Cheryl Hudson and Edited by Cheryl Hudson and Joanna Williams £9.00 ISBN 978-1-906837-82-2 Cover design: lukejefford.com Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page i Why Academic Freedom Matters Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page ii Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page iii Why Academic Freedom Matters A response to current challenges Edited by Cheryl Hudson and Joanna Williams CIVITAS Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page iv First Published July 2016 © Civitas 2016 55 Tufton Street London SW1P 3QL email: [email protected] All rights reserved ISBN 978-1-906837-82-2 Independence: Civitas: Institute for the Study of Civil Society is a registered educational charity (No. 1085494) and a company limited by guarantee (No. 04023541). Civitas is financed from a variety of private sources to avoid over-reliance on any single or small group of donors. All publications are independently refereed. All the Institute’s publications seek to further its objective of promoting the advancement of learning. The views expressed are those of the authors, not of the Institute, as is responsibility for data and content. Designed and typeset by lukejefford.com Printed in Great Britain by 4edge Limited, Essex Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page v Contents Acknowledgements vii Contributors’ Biographies ix Preface xiii Why Academic Freedom Matters Joanna Williams 1 A Century of Academic Freedom Cheryl Hudson 19 Part One: What is Academic Freedom? 1 Between Golden Ageism and Prometheanism Philip Cunliffe 38 2 Academic Freedom and the ‘Truth Function’ Alan Ryan 49 3 Towards a Philosophy of Academic Freedom Dennis Hayes 65 4 Ad Hominem and the Wise Wound James Heartfield 81 v Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page vi WHy ACADEMIC FrEEDoM MATTErS Part Two: The University in the Twenty-First Century 5 on Academic and other Freedoms Thomas Docherty 96 6 Faith in the Academy: religion at University Rania Hafez 112 7 No Time for Muses: The research Excellence Framework and the Pursuit of Mediocrity Anthony J. Stanonis 128 Part Three: Threats to Academic Freedom 8 Academic Freedom in an Age of Terror? Tara McCormack 146 9 Changing the Subject: The rise of ‘Vulnerable’ Students Kathryn Ecclestone 163 10 Warning: on Campus, a Fear of Words and Ideas Jenny Jarvie 182 11 Je Suis Charlie, But… Jane Weston Vauclair 200 12 Safe Space rhetoric Versus real Violence Jason Walsh 216 vi Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page vii Acknowledgements My thanks to the many friends and colleagues, on campus and off, whose commitment to rigorous debate and fearlessness in exploring challenging ideas sustains me. Some of them are contributors to this volume. Thanks are especially due to Joanna Williams, my co-editor, for providing a place at the Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Kent in which to think and talk about the many issues addressed here. I am indebted to the University of Liverpool’s history department, a wonderfully collegial place to work through my ideas about history and higher education. I dedicate this book to my sons Frank and orlando in the hope they always keep their minds free. Cheryl Hudson Thanks are due to the University of Kent’s Centre for the Study of Higher Education for hosting the conference Academic Freedom: Still Relevant in Today’s Universities? in March 2015. This conference brought together some of the contributors to this volume and very much inspired its creation. Thank you to Spiked for putting the issue of free speech on campus so firmly on the public agenda. Thank you to Cheryl Hudson for being not just a great co-editor but more importantly, an intellectual collaborator. Above all, thank you to my husband, Jim Butcher, and children, George, Harry and vii Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page viii Florence, for not complaining about the weekends I’ve spent in front of a computer! Joanna Williams viii Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page ix Contributors’ Biographies Joanna Williams is the author of Academic Freedom in an Age of Conformity: Confronting the Fear of Knowledge (Palgrave Macmillan 2016) and Consuming Higher Education: Why Learning Can’t Be Bought (Bloomsbury 2012). She is the education editor of Spiked and a Senior Lecturer in Higher Education at the University of Kent. Joanna regularly contributes to national higher education debates and her research has been published in a number of academic and popular journals. Cheryl Hudson is University Teacher in History at the University of Liverpool. Cheryl has taught at universities in the UK and the US and is former director of the academic programme at the rothermere American Institute, University of oxford. Her research interests lie in the history of American political culture and she has published articles in a number of academic and popular journals. Cheryl is co-editor of Ronald Reagan and the 1980s (2008). Her current book project is Citizenship in Chicago: Race, Ethnicity and the Remaking of American Identity, 1890-1930. Philip Cunliffe is Senior Lecturer in International Conflict at the University of Kent. He blogs at www.thefirstphilippic.wordpress.com. His most recent book, Legions of Peace: UN Peacekeepers from the Global South was published in 2013. ix Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page x Thomas Docherty is Professor of English and of Comparative Literature at the University of Warwick, having previously held the Chair of English at Trinity College Dublin, and Chair of English at the University of Kent. He is the author of many books, including, most recently, Universities at War (Sage 2014); Confessions: The Philosophy of Transparency (Bloomsbury 2014); For the University (Bloomsbury 2012); Aesthetic Democracy (Stanford 2008); and The English Question (Sussex 2007). Kathryn Ecclestone is Professor of Education at the University of Sheffield. Kathryn’s research explores the ways in which endemic public, political and professional concern about ‘emotional well-being’, ‘resilience’ and ‘vulnerability’ has encouraged the huge spread of ideas and practices from diverse areas of therapy, counselling and psychology across the education system, changing the teacher/academic/ student relationship, support systems and what counts as appropriate curriculum knowledge. Rania Hafez is Senior Lecturer and Programme Leader for the MA Education at the University of Greenwich. She is also co-chair of the Learning & Skills research Network, London & South East and was previously Director of Post Compulsory Education at the University of East London. rania has researched and published on teacher education, teacher professionalism and on Islam and education. In 2008 rania founded the professional network ‘Muslim Women in Education’. In addition to her academic work rania Hafez is a regular political and cultural commentator. x Academic Freedom Layout.qxp_Layout 1 21/06/2016 09:49 Page xi CoNTrIBUTorS’ BIoGrAPHIES Dennis Hayes is Professor of Education at the University of Derby and the Director of the campaign group Academics For Academic Freedom (AFAF) which he founded in 2006. He was a columnist for the Times Educational Supplement and is a member of the editorial board of the Times Higher Education magazine and a columnist for The Conversation. In 2009 he edited and contributed to a special edition of the British Journal of Educational Studies on academic freedom and he writes regularly in the national and international press on free speech and academic freedom. James Heartfield is author of The Death of the Subject Explained, and an historian of the British Empire. His book Who’s Afraid of the Easter Rising? was published by Zero Books in 2015. Jenny Jarvie is an independent news and culture writer who reports from Atlanta for The Los Angeles Times, and writes on cultural issues for publications including The New Republic, ArtsATL, CityLab, and The Atlanta Journal- Constitution. Born in London and based in Atlanta, she has worked as a staff writer at The Los Angeles Times and The Sunday Telegraph.