On Tuesday, Harvard University officials Announced The university announced it would officially adopt an ideologically neutral stance on political events and other controversial issues, a decision that came after months of turbulent protests on campus over Israel’s war with Hamas.
Earlier this month, a faculty-led working group Published The report strongly recommends taking a neutral stance on issues that do not directly relate to the university itself.
“Universities have a responsibility to speak out to protect and promote their core functions. University leaders must communicate the values of the university’s core activities and must defend university autonomy and academic freedom when threatened,” the report states. “However, universities and their leaders should not make public statements about public matters that do not directly affect the university’s core functions.”
The report suggests that a key reason Harvard is pursuing a neutral stance is that university officials are under intense pressure to speak out about the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel and the continuing war in Gaza. The report notes that if university officials speak out on topics unrelated to the university’s core functions, the university will be required to comment on any other controversy.
“Once universities and their leaders become accustomed to making public statements on matters that go beyond the university’s core functions, it is inevitable that they will face intense pressure to do so from multiple, opposing sides on any and every issue of the day,” the report states. “This is the reality of modern public life in an age of social media and political polarization.”
investigation The results announced last week of Harvard Crimson The survey shows broad faculty support for neutrality: Over 70% of faculty across the arts and sciences in the survey support moving to formal neutrality, and more than half report feeling “somewhat negative” or “negative” about “the current state of academic freedom at Harvard.”
The announcement was widely praised by advocates of freedom of expression.
“For better or worse, what Harvard does, other schools will follow,” said Ángel Eduardo, senior writer and editor at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. I have written “The principles outlined in the Institutional Speech Working Group’s report not only bode well for the future of free speech and academic freedom at Harvard, but may also portend major changes for universities across the nation.”
Syracuse University on Wednesday Announced It said it would adopt the recommendations of a similar working group and officially adopt a neutral stance.
“We accept the guiding principle that the remedy for speech that some find hurtful, offensive or hateful is not to impede, hinder or suppress the free speech of others, but rather to enhance it,” the university’s statement read. “Except in extremely extraordinary circumstances, and for the sole purpose of upholding our mission of discovering, advancing and disseminating knowledge, the University will not make any institutional statements or declarations regarding current controversies.”
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