{"id":55115,"date":"2020-12-08T00:00:13","date_gmt":"2020-12-08T08:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/world.edu\/?p=55115"},"modified":"2020-12-07T11:32:03","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T19:32:03","slug":"forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/","title":{"rendered":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

The heads of English further and higher education institutions recently received one of the most extraordinary and disturbing letters ever written to them by a secretary of state for education.<\/p>\n

On 9 October, Gavin Williamson emailed all such institutions \u2013 both public and private \u2013 under the purview of the Department for Education to \u201cask\u201d them to \u201cadopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance\u2019s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism\u201d.<\/p>\n

And so saying, Williamson launched into a glowing and quite uncritical two-page summary of this \u201cdefinition\u201d, pointing out that it had been \u201cadopted\u201d by the British government as long ago as 2016.<\/p>\n

Confessing himself \u201cfrankly disappointed\u201d that most HEIs had not yet signed up to the definition, Williamson then revealed that he had asked his officials \u201cto consider options that include directing the [Office for Students] to impose a new regulatory condition of registration and suspending funding streams for universities at which antisemitic incidents occur and which have not signed up to the definition\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou should have no doubt,\u201d he concluded: \u201cthis government has zero tolerance towards antisemitism. If I have not seen the overwhelming majority of institutions adopting the definition by Christmas then I will act.\u201d<\/p>\n

I am not concerned here with the minutiae of the IHRA definition of antisemitism, although I should say \u2013 as I and a number of other well-informed Jewish commentators have said in print elsewhere \u2013 that it contains numerous ambiguities and was, in any case, never meant as a legally enforceable tool.<\/p>\n

What concerns me here is the threatening language employed by the secretary of state, used, no doubt, quite deliberately to bully and browbeat providers.<\/p>\n

And to what end? Certainly not to enforce, say, fiduciary responsibility or health and safety legislation. If either of these objectives were in play, I could well forgive Williamson\u2019s harsh language; indeed I would probably applaud it. But we need to be clear about what the end is here.<\/p>\n

Williamson is telling providers that unless they adopt a particular mode of thought (in relation to anti-Jewish prejudice), they could find themselves at the receiving end of financial penalties. They might even endanger their registration with the OfS, which is essential if their eligible students are to draw down tuition funding from the Student Loans Company.<\/p>\n

Whether the OfS has the legal authority to withdraw registration on these grounds is, of course, itself open to question. Indeed, the 2017 Higher Education & Research Act (HERA) that established the OfS specifically obliges it (in Section 2<\/a>) to have regard \u201cto the need to protect the institutional autonomy of English higher education providers\u201d. The OfS was certainly not set up to breach that autonomy at the political and\/or ideological whim of any secretary of state.<\/p>\n

It remains to be seen whether Williamson will carry out his threat. Should he do so, the implications of such a shameless act of ministerial overreach are breathtaking. Other religious and ethnic groups are bound to exploit the precedent and demand that their interests are similarly enforced by ministerial fiat and OfS agency. A door will have been opened that it will be exceedingly difficult and probably impossible to close.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been told that Williamson has been advised to wait until a suitable piece of draft primary legislation reaches Parliament that will allow him to amend the HERA to give the OfS the authority it will need to enforce the IHRA definition. Whether the OfS will itself be happy to be used in this way is another question that will have to be asked. My own soundings suggest \u2013 unsurprisingly \u2013 that it is not.<\/p>\n

Anti-Jewish prejudice on campus is without doubt a serious problem. However, legislation is already on the statute book to deal with it: namely the Equality Act of 2010. Indeed, this was the very document that was recently used by the Equality and Human Rights Commission to excoriate<\/a> the handling of antisemitic complaints by Williamson\u2019s political opponents in the Labour Party under its previous leader, Jeremy Corbyn.<\/p>\n

Does Williamson know this, I wonder?<\/p>\n

Author Bio: <\/strong>Geoffrey Alderman is Professor Emeritus at the University of Buckingham.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The heads of English further and higher education institutions recently received one of the most extraordinary and disturbing letters ever written to them by a secretary of state for education. On 9 October, Gavin Williamson emailed all such institutions \u2013 both public and private \u2013 under the purview of the Department for Education to \u201cask\u201d […]\n… learn more→<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":55116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[357540],"coauthors":[11733],"class_list":["post-55115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-higher-education","tag-antisemitism"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nForcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The heads of English further and higher education institutions recently received one of the most extraordinary and disturbing letters ever written to them by a secretary of state for education. On 9 October, Gavin Williamson emailed all such institutions \u2013 both public and private \u2013 under the purview of the Department for Education to \u201cask\u201d […]\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"World leading higher education information and services\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"680\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"383\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kevin\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Kevin\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Kevin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee\"},\"headline\":\"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":684,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/12\\\/antisemitism.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"antisemitism\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Higher Education\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/\",\"name\":\"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/12\\\/antisemitism.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/12\\\/antisemitism.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/12\\\/antisemitism.jpg\",\"width\":680,\"height\":383},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/\",\"name\":\"World leading higher education information and services\",\"description\":\"Global Higher Education Jobs, University jobs, Lecturer & tenure jobs.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee\",\"name\":\"Kevin\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g8ba4c352a279c450aa9435d770c1ebf4\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Kevin\"},\"description\":\"Kevin is founder of the world.edu project. The past 28 years have been involved in publishing to the education sector in print and the internet. Kevin has a degree in Education and has a many years experience in developing companies and projects.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\"],\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/author\\\/kevin\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services","og_description":"The heads of English further and higher education institutions recently received one of the most extraordinary and disturbing letters ever written to them by a secretary of state for education. On 9 October, Gavin Williamson emailed all such institutions \u2013 both public and private \u2013 under the purview of the Department for Education to \u201cask\u201d […]","og_url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/","og_site_name":"World leading higher education information and services","article_published_time":"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00","og_image":[{"width":680,"height":383,"url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Kevin","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Kevin","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/"},"author":{"name":"Kevin","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee"},"headline":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach","datePublished":"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/"},"wordCount":684,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg","keywords":["antisemitism"],"articleSection":["Higher Education"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/","url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/","name":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach - World leading higher education information and services","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg","datePublished":"2020-12-08T08:00:13+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/antisemitism.jpg","width":680,"height":383},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/forcing-an-antisemitism-definition-on-universities-is-ministerial-overreach\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/world.edu\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Forcing an antisemitism definition on universities is ministerial overreach"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/#website","url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/","name":"World leading higher education information and services","description":"Global Higher Education Jobs, University jobs, Lecturer & tenure jobs.","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/world.edu\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/world.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee","name":"Kevin","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g8ba4c352a279c450aa9435d770c1ebf4","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1e8d491a5f9b9bf3db67c9e46abbba7bb06b26b458bd5025c55e0a4b9b60ea8a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Kevin"},"description":"Kevin is founder of the world.edu project. The past 28 years have been involved in publishing to the education sector in print and the internet. Kevin has a degree in Education and has a many years experience in developing companies and projects.","sameAs":["https:\/\/world.edu"],"url":"https:\/\/world.edu\/author\/kevin\/"}]}},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55115"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55117,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55115\/revisions\/55117"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55115"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=55115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}