Academic Freedom and Anti-Teorrism

Here's a little hot button political issue in my universe that no one knows or cares about. Academic freedom means academic institutions have a core mission of developing knowledge for the public benefit. They will only accept money if there are no restrictions on their ability to perform fundamental research. Some foundations have been pushing an anti-terrorism term. It will generally say something like, "If we give you money, you agree not to do anything to promote terrorism or anyone or anything related to terrorism." Institutions don't make a habit of promoting terrorism, but there may be a student group somewhere advocating a position that could be considered, "terrorist". There could be a student who happens to be a cousin of a Tamil Tiger. It is an impossible standard for Institutions to sign onto.

Still the Foundations have been burned. The issue hasn't gone away and we're in the position of arguing each project on a case by case basis. NPR did a pretty good job of covering this a little ways back.


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1956519