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Forceful suppression of political and scholarly views in universities has a long and shameful history. University of Cambridge Chancellor\u00a0John Fisher<\/a>\u00a0was hanged, drawn and quartered for failing to support Henry VIII\u2019s \u201cgreat matter<\/a>\u201d. A few years later,\u00a0John Hullier<\/a>\u00a0was burned at the stake on Cambridge\u2019s Jesus Green for refusing to renounce Protestantism.<\/p>\n We imagine our modern universities to be more civil. Certainly, in the 1950s, when Russel Ward\u2019s appointment to the New South Wales University of Technology (now UNSW) was\u00a0blocked for political reasons<\/a>, this was frustrating, but not deadly. In Soviet Russia, by contrast, scientists who disagreed with Stalin\u2019s approved theory of genetics went to prison. Some were executed.<\/p>\n These events show why academic freedom matters. Academic freedom is related to free speech in universities, the subject of a public debate that prompted the federal government to\u00a0commission a review<\/a>\u00a0of the issue in 2018. This month the government\u00a0appointed Professor Sally Walker<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0monitor universities\u2019 adoption of a code of free speech<\/a>\u00a0arising from the review.<\/p>\n This sounds like a good thing, which we would expect to reinforce academic freedom. However, in this case, the category of \u201cfree speech\u201d actually conceals particular political interests that could threaten academic freedom.<\/p>\n Academic freedom has been very hard won. Such freedoms are important because they are how we know we can trust scholars to tell the truth about the discoveries they make, even when that means society, politics or the economy may need to change as a result. If Stalin had allowed his geneticists academic freedom, for example, they might well have prevented\u00a0widespread famine<\/a>.<\/p>\n So, when the\u00a0Institute of Public Affairs<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Centre for Independent Studies<\/a>\u00a0used a system of\u00a0policy \u201caudits<\/a>\u201d\u00a0imported from overseas<\/a>\u00a0to declare a \u201cfree speech crisis\u201d in Australian universities, this was taken seriously. Although academic freedom is different from free speech, the suppression of free speech can sometimes inhibit academic freedom.<\/p>\n One of our most meticulous retired High Court judges, Robert French, wrote a\u00a0300-page report<\/a>\u00a0on the subject. He concluded:<\/p>\n Reported events [\u2026] do not establish a systemic pattern of action [\u2026] adverse to freedom of speech or intellectual inquiry in the higher education sector.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n French was not the only one who took the time to consider the question.\u00a0Philosophers<\/a>,\u00a0legal scholars<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0vice-chancellors<\/a>\u00a0authentically explored free speech and academic freedom from every angle.<\/p>\n t became evident there was no \u201ccrisis\u201d at all. Nevertheless, conservative commentators kept saying there was. No review could mollify them.<\/p>\n The rather more\u00a0alarming news<\/a>\u00a0that the government has appointed another legal authority to monitor university compliance with French\u2019s model code of free speech is unlikely to satisfy them either. The \u201ccrisis\u201d cannot be resolved by assuring free speech, because that is not what it was about.<\/p>\n The so-called \u201cfree speech crisis\u201d is actually an anti-political correctness campaign waged by particular groups of conservative intellectuals. French\u2019s\u00a0review<\/a>\u00a0shows some Australian conservatives looked to the success of such campaigns in the United States and the United Kingdom in increasing the political right\u2019s power. They manufactured a similar \u201ccrisis\u201d in Australian universities to achieve the same ends here.<\/p>\n Anti-political correctness is a philosophy that is not the same as free speech. Anti-political correctness claims that conservative students, lecturers and visitors to university campuses are unfairly limited in what they can say. Often this relates to so-called \u201cpolitically correct<\/a>\u201d subjects such as race, gender or sexuality.<\/p>\n The difference from free speech is obvious. Anti-PC advocates want to be able to say what they like, but they do not want to be called \u201cracist\u201d, \u201csexist\u201d or \u201chomophobic\u201d in response. Anti-political correctness is always earned at the expense of someone else\u2019s free speech.<\/p>\n Anti-political correctness is connected to\u00a0libertarian philosophies<\/a>, which value individual freedom over collective well-being. However, anti-political correctness typically does not grant everyone the same freedom.<\/p>\n This is because anti-political correctness is linked to a conspiracy theory known as \u201cCultural Marxism\u201d. Cultural Marxism is an imaginary left-wing movement that some conservatives believe deliberately coordinated a take-over of cultural institutions, including universities. Political sociologist Rachel Busbridge and her colleagues\u00a0describe<\/a>\u00a0the transfer of this conspiracy theory from the US to Australia, where what was a far-right fringe theory has taken root in more mainstream conservative movements.<\/p>\n So, when the Institute of Public Affairs points to a \u201cfree speech crisis\u201d in universities, it\u2019s in fact seeking to take universities back from Marxists who some conservatives (falsely) believe control higher education. This is clearly not about free speech at all.<\/p>\n The IPA\u2019s \u2018free speech crisis\u2019 campaign is a well-rehearsed political strategy. Institute of Public Affairs\/YouTube<\/p><\/div>\n Intellectuals earnestly exploring the supposed free speech crisis have suggested progressive (though probably not radical leftist) scholarship is\u00a0more thoroughly developed<\/a>\u00a0in universities than conservative thinking. This may be placing some limits on conservative students to explore their politics in a rigorous and critical way.<\/p>\n If the university system was at its best, the right kind of response would see scholars making a new bargain: I\u2019ll read\u00a0Ayn Rand<\/a>\u00a0with you if you read\u00a0Karl Marx<\/a>\u00a0with me (I\u2019m game). But those who manufactured a free speech crisis did not intend to produce this kind of critical engagement nor even an authentic scholarly conversation between thinkers with diverse politics.<\/p>\n This is a pity. Universities have many flaws \u2013\u00a0they always have<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 but also many uses. It would be useful if they provided the intellectual underpinnings to democracy, especially as the world changes. This means producing better conservative work than they currently achieve, while also continuing to nurture the universities\u2019 quite well-developed progressive thinking.<\/p>\n This is a critical job. It\u2019s not one that can be achieved by the loudest, most insulting yelling \u2013 though students are free to do that, too. But the job of the university, at its best, is to find a critical place for anti-political correctness on campus, just as for all kinds of ideas.<\/p>\n Students could fruitfully explore the history and philosophy of\u00a0libertarianism<\/a>\u00a0and anti-political correctness in political science, cultural studies, history, political economy and many other disciplines. Of course, they should similarly engage with feminism, critical race studies and postmodernism.<\/p>\n A willingness to read both Ayn Rand and Karl Marx is not the kind of critical engagement many free speech campaigners have in mind.<\/p><\/div>\n Imposing anti-political correctness on all members of the university as a compulsory philosophy undermines, rather than promotes, academic freedom. To do so under the cover of \u201cfree speech\u201d is not only disingenuous, it further jeopardises our universities, which are already facing risks to academic freedom. These are increasingly due to the commercial pressures universities face.<\/p>\n Financial pressure was not always the source of threats to academic freedom. It used to be government. The predecessor to the\u00a0National Tertiary Education Union<\/a>\u00a0was formed during the Cold War in part to defend academic freedom in Australia from the kind of\u00a0McCarthyism<\/a>\u00a0going on in the United States.<\/p>\n In the 1950s, the union was active in the\u00a0Ward case<\/a>, which was about academic freedom. The union was also very influential in the\u00a0Orr case<\/a>, which it believed to be about academic freedom. (It was\u00a0wrong<\/a>\u00a0about this one, it turned out.)<\/p>\n Things have changed, but the union has continued to support academic freedom. More recently, the union spoke in support of\u00a0Peter Ridd<\/a>, whose comments on Sky News opposing his colleagues\u2019 claims that climate change has affected the Great Barrier Reef got him sacked from James Cook University.<\/p>\n This last case is rather different to the earlier ones, since many more commercial interests are at stake. Ridd\u2019s\u00a0GoFundMe page<\/a>\u00a0seeking support for a High Court appeal shows hundreds of thousands donated by the likes of\u00a0Bryant Macfie<\/a>, whose commercial interests align with their denial of the majority of climate science.<\/p>\n Universities are vulnerable to commercial pressure. Over the past 40 years, universities have become\u00a0explicitly commercial enterprises<\/a>. A vice-chancellor\u2019s job now pressures them to protect their institution\u2019s \u201cbrand\u201d first, perhaps more than academic freedom.<\/p>\n Although the\u00a0specifics of the Ridd case<\/a>\u00a0suggest this is actually about the university\u2019s code of conduct, university managers have tended to be quicker to protect income streams than scholarly independence.<\/p>\n In 2016, La Trobe University management\u00a0suspended Roz Ward<\/a>\u00a0over a private post on Facebook supporting the \u201cred flag forever\u201d. Management reportedly responded to pressure that threatened the withdrawal of funding for their Centre for Health, Sex and Society.<\/p>\n Academic capitalism<\/a>\u00a0has grown in universities worldwide since the 1980s. Its critics have regularly pointed out the academic freedom risks associated with commercialising scholarly endeavour. These have only increased as the logic of profit dominated higher education.<\/p>\n Recently, the University of New South Wales appeared to allow its commercial interests \u2013 the importance of international fees paid by students from China \u2013 to trump its commitment to academic freedom when it\u00a0deleted a tweet<\/a>\u00a0by Elaine Pearson about human rights in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n An unacceptable disgrace.@UNSW<\/a> deletes tweet of an article about #HongKong<\/a> human rights abuse by @PearsonElaine<\/a> , AUS director of @hrw<\/a>, over pressure from Chinese nationalists who r mobilized by Chinese app #Wechat<\/a> (Weixin) and email Chinese consolate for \u201chelp\u201d from Australia pic.twitter.com\/CJpkcdnVwY<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 \u5df4\u4e22\u8349 Badiucao (@badiucao) July 31, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\nFree speech and academic freedom<\/strong><\/h4>\n
A \u2018crisis\u2019 born of an anti-PC campaign<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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Does anti-PC have a place in universities?<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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Imposed \u2018solution\u2019 threatens academic freedom<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Commercial interests are a threat<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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