THE QUEST FOR TRUTH
By Avi Davis

What has happened to the University? An institution that at one time propelled democracy’s emphasis on free inquiry and open debate is reportedly adrift, uncertain, a place of intimidation and indoctrination; a home, not to free thought and boundless optimism, but to growing cynicism, the location of a bitter culture war where the acquisition of knowledge is stymied and dissent barred.

Or is the reverse the case? Have the Universities’ critics overstated their case? Is the University, in truth, as free as it ever was - a place humming with intellectual curiosity and with a proven commitment to openness?

These conflicting perspectives are the central issues that this week’s international conference on academic freedom will address.

The institution of the Western University has passed through three significant phases of evolution. Founded in the Middle Ages, it was established first as a learning center whose concerns were purely ecclesiastic. For several hundred years, its central task was the training of individuals who would explain and interpret the word of God to man.

Change came in the 16th Century and early years of the Renaissance. This new period of learning distanced the University from strict religious inquiry by developing science, logic and reason as rigorous intellectual disciplines. The Enlightenment which followed, completed the transformation of the Academy into a humanist institution in which culture replaced God as the transcendental force that forged a unifying vision. It was during this period that the concept of the University as a trustee for the examination and criticism of accepted truths gained traction.

By the end of the 19th Century, it became apparent that only if the Academy remained an independent institution, free of political influence and affiliation, religious coercion or ideological dogma, would it be capable of producing creative and intellectually vibrant citizens committed to a pluralistic society. Academic freedom came to mean more than simply encouraging teachers to explore a range of views and teaching students to be open to them. It came to define progress itself. Western democracies looked to their universities for their next generation of leaders; and the Universities obliged – by supplying them in droves.

The concept of a free and open learning environment was enshrined in the principles of academic freedom, first fashioned in Germany and later adopted in 1915 by the Association of American University Professors. The twelve pages of the Declaration of Principles on Academic Freedom and Academic Tenure were predicated on the notion that the acquisition of human knowledge involves a never-ending quest for truth and there is no humanly comprehensible truth which is not open to challenge. The argument that absolute truth is not the monopoly of any individual or group but the ultimate objective of all human beings – and that every individual is entitled to ascertain that truth in his or her own way - is in fact one of the great philosophical building blocks of modern democratic society.

One would consider these principles to be now so entrenched in the university system as to be immutable. But as we enter the first years of the 21st Century, it appears that the University has changed course yet again, entering a fourth phase of development and in the process becoming a deeply troubled institution. The University today is profoundly conflicted about its direction, defensive about its practices and resistant to addressing its own shortcomings. It is uncertain whether it should be a bullhorn to promote fringe causes – from radical egalitarianism to feminist empowerment to Afro-Centrism, or whether it should hew to its long cherished traditions of open inquiry and free debate on all issues. While there are many professors and administrators who proudly maintain a reverence for a balance of views and opinions, it is fair to state that they have become a dwindling minority for whom holding to their own positions requires considerable fortitude.

Is it therefore right to contend that this new period is one of intellectual suppression, not openness? Is it true that today the University is a place where tacit indoctrination and intimidation by radical professors, intolerant pressure groups and cowed administrations, goes virtually unchallenged? In their book, The Shadow University, Alan Charles Kors and Harvey Silverglate, outlined how several universities had developed speech codes so severe that merely talking about a controversial subjects might expose a student to censure. These extended to any comment or gesture that “annoys,” “offends,” or otherwise makes someone “feel bad”. Tufts University went so far to rule that attributing harassment complaints to the “hypersensitivity of others who feel hurt” is itself harassment. Although many of the codes came under legal challenge in the 1990s and were deemed overly broad by the Courts, that these codes still exist and are surreptitiously enforced by overly aggressive administrations, is a charge made by many instructors and their students. They maintain that the one complaint administrations fear more than any other – even more than assaults on academic freedom itself- is racist, sexist or homophobic conduct which is allowed to pass uncensored. Is this a correct understanding of the current state of the University?
More troubling than this development, however, could be the degree to which Universities throughout the Western world have become entranced by the lure of large donations from Muslim countries. Today, Hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent by Saudi financiers to found centers for the study of Islam in the most prestigious schools of the West – Harvard, Georgetown and Yale in the United States, Oxford and Cambridge in the U.K. Is the effect of such funding to strangle criticism of Islam, Saudi Arabia and the Muslim world and to create an environment hostile to Israel and the West? And is there in fact even more to worry about? As Professor Anthony Glees of Brunel University in London has reported, there is clear evidence that British universities, after accepting more than £233.5 million from Saudi and Muslim sources since 1995, have become the most fertile recruiting grounds for home grown Muslim-British terrorists. International Muslim financiers are successfully employing British libel laws (although not yet as successfully in the United States) to thwart the publication of books deemed hostile to Islam; And now criticism of Islam itself can often be considered hate speech on campus. Can anyone doubt that if these allegations are proven correct, they pose a grave threat to the present and future security of Western democracies and the freedoms they safeguard?
The stakes are high. One can easily understand that if our institutions of higher learning become bastions of reflexive politically correct thinking, shunning contrary thought or opinion, we run the risk of producing a generation of future leaders whose narrowed vision and distaste for compromise can lead to disastrous legislative decisions – or non-decisions. It is not a stretch to imagine the descent of our own democracy into the vortex of an autarchy where sacrosanct speech codes, moral ambiguity, ideological uniformity and resistance to any discussion of the threats posed by the Islamic world, will govern our leaders’ thinking. Such rigidity may in fact strip them of the mental agility needed to cope with the daunting security and ideological challenges that lie ahead.

Where, then, are the guardians of academic freedom? Sadly, some of the very institutions whose mandate it has always been to protect academic freedom, no longer seem so interested in the job. It is disheartening, but perhaps symbolic, to note that when our office contacted the AAUP for a copy of the original Declaration of Principles on Academic Freedom for use as a graphic in our brochure, the original – or any facsimile of it - could not be found. The wording of that document, in fact, no longer appears on the organization’s website – neither in its original form nor its later iterations.

Perhaps the concept of academic freedom has indeed slipped out of fashion, and is losing its struggle with political correctness and the ideological conformity it promotes. But the great quest for truth, the most important legacy of the University and its most significant contribution to Western civilization, cannot be sacrificed. For if it is, democracy and the freedoms it safeguards, will not survive. Those who champion academic freedom must therefore be prepared to fight for it, as if they are on a quest for truth itself, and the battle must be waged at the highest echelons of government. For as the historian Ariel Durant wrote: “A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within. Thereafter, it lingers on as a stagnant pool, left by once life-giving streams."

Academic freedom is one of those life-giving streams. We cut off its nutrient-rich flow at our own peril.

The Western Word - An International Weekly Digest   6-13-2008