As colleges grapple with how to recover from the Israel-Hamas controversies on their campuses, some have decided that the best path forward is to try to steer clear of controversial issues.
This week, Harvard University and Syracuse University announced new policies saying school leadership will no longer comment on controversial political issues.
The move, which draws both derision and applause, reflects a long-standing debate over the role of major academic institutions.
“I think it’s a beautiful line in the sand,” said Beth Akers, a senior fellow focusing on higher education at the American Enterprise Institute. “A lot of the energy and resources were consumed in this type of statement, I think it was wrong. I am very satisfied with the Harvard material.”
The nation’s oldest university made the decision a month later to establish an Institutional Voice Working Group, which concluded in its report that the school’s expressing a position on political issues makes it “more difficult for some community members to express their views.” their views when they diverge from your views.” the official position of the university.”
The school, however, tries to distance itself from the general concept of institutional neutrality.
“The purpose of the university is to seek the truth. In this search, the university as an institution can never be neutral, because we believe in the value of seeking the truth through open investigation, debate and the weighing of evidence, as opposed to mere unjustified assertion or belief”, the report reads.
Harvard has previously shown support for the Black Lives Matter movement, flown a Ukrainian flag over Harvard Yard and released statements about the Israel-Hamas war.
The concept of institutional neutrality became popular in the 1970s after the University of Chicago published the Kalven Report, which reached largely the same conclusions as the new Harvard report.
“The idea is that the university is not really capable, in our view, of taking a position on current issues. It is not the role of the university to be a moral authority. It’s the university’s job to be a place for faculty and students to debate the issues of the day, but the university itself doesn’t have a position,” said Tom Ginsburg, faculty director of the Forum for Free Inquiry and Expression at the University of Chicago. .
“It’s funny because Harvard tried to pretend that its position was really distinct, but the end result is the same, and I think that’s a good thing,” Ginsburg added.
Stephanie Hall, acting senior director of higher education policy at the Center for American Progress, said that while she supports schools in finding ways to promote free speech, she is concerned that Harvard’s policy was prompted by outside influences. and worries about how it can be implemented.
“We would hate to think that, with any kind of neutrality policy, universities would be undermining their ability to engage with the political or economic forces that impact them,” Hall said.
“My initial reactions to some of these things were, well, how are we defining controversial? How are we defining public policy issues? How do you determine which issue is not central to the school’s mission and therefore worthy of an official position?” she added. “I think all of those things alone could be up for debate. How well this works on the ground will really depend on how thorough leadership and management are in working out the details.”
Universities have been at the center of political controversy throughout the academic year, with House Republicans holding multiple hearings with the heads of elite schools on anti-Semitism and their policies surrounding free speech and harassment, in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7 and the subsequent war. in Gaza.
These hearings contributed to the resignations of the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania, both before the pro-Palestinian student protests that dominated the end of the semester.
Ginsburg said it’s important to remember that the Kalven Report offers general principles and that the University of Chicago has spoken out when issues could directly affect it or its mission, such as when its then-leader released a statement denouncing the former “Muslim ban.” President Trump. “
“And as far as I know, no one within the university criticized him for it. I think we all agreed that this was an appropriate exception because it threatened our mission,” Ginsburg said.
One of the most common demands from protesters who occupied parts of dozens of campuses across the country was that their college release statements condemning the war in Gaza.
But Syracuse, one of the universities that saw such a camp, this week became the second school to adopt a policy of not commenting on controversial issues, saying it will only happen “under the most extraordinary circumstances.”
The committee tasked with creating the new policy spent four months on the initiative, with Chancellor Kent Syverud stating that the result “reinforces our firm commitment to the principles of freedom of expression and inquiry to ensure the flourishing of freedom of expression and academic freedom.”
“I think this is a change for schools to embrace because they have already issued statements on a number of political issues,” said Laura Belts, director of political reform at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. “Therefore, when a school decides to adopt institutional neutrality, it will need to explain to the campus community why it is making this change and whoever is deciding that it will no longer make this type of statement and assure students that they will move. moving forward with this in a principled way, and that it’s not just something they’re adopting because of the current conflict.”
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
