A founding member of Britain’s first council to combat cancel culture within universities says social media is having a dangerous impact on academic freedom.
Professor Ian Pace said social media has created realms where ideological views are not being challenged, exasperating the “cancelling process.”
The lack of debate and an inability to separate someone’s identity from their work are creating a more hostile environment for academics, the City, University of London professor said.
Following a spate of free speech rows, including the attempted deplatforming of gender critical professor Kathleen Stock, Mr. Pace, along with a number of leading scholars, have set up the London Universities’ Council for Academic Freedom.
The council—modelled on the recently launched Harvard Council on Academic Freedom in the United States—aims to defend the principles of free inquiry, intellectual diversity, and civil discourse.
The group has already amassed more than 100 academics—70 of them professors—mainly from the capital city’s most renowned universities including University College London, King’s College London, Imperial College London, and the London School of Economics (LSE).
Deplatforming
Speaking to The Epoch Times on Monday, Mr. Pace said the council has been created to support academics in a climate where there is growing concern on the erosion of academic freedom.“It came about really through a group of us with common concerns and worried about the extent to which we felt academic freedom was being eroded and knowing that there were many other people concerned and just wanting to bring them together, in this case, focusing on London,” Mr. Pace said.
“We noted the Council of Academic Freedom at Harvard, which was very much a model for what we were looking to put together. This was an impetus for Alice Sullivan, John Armstrong and me, soon afterwards joined by various other founder members.”
Mr. Pace—professor of music, culture and society at City, University of London—said the group will promote a “more mature and measured” discourse and input into academic freedom policy to try and influence institutions’ and government policy.
“It should be absolutely at the heart of what is done in higher education and there are worries that this is to some extent being lost.”
The new council comes after a trans row erupted at one of Britain’s most prestigious universities over an attempt by students to block a gender-critical speaker.
Leading feminist and professor of philosophy Kathleen Stock faced protests and calls for her to be deplatformed from an event at Oxford Union by members of the university’s students union.
Gender Identity
The non-partisan council group stressed that “academic freedom safeguards the pursuit of knowledge and truth, which is central to the mission of higher education” and underpins the knowledge universities can produce in a democracy.“Universities should not adopt institutional positions on contested issues,” their launch statement said.
“We encourage open, honest, courageous and reasoned discussion of controversial ideas, in and outside of the classroom, in a spirit of having respect for people even while one does not necessarily respect their beliefs.
“We oppose harassment and discrimination against university staff and students, including on the basis of their beliefs and lawful expression of their views. We support the right to protest and criticise but oppose attempts to obstruct the freedom of others to express their lawful views.”
Akua Reindorf, KC, the leading barrister who has helped challenge the influence of the controversial charity Stonewall in higher education, will speak at a launch event for the council at LSE on Nov. 20.
Asked why he believes cancel culture has rocketed in recent years, Mr. Pace told The Epoch Times, speaking in a personal capacity: “I do feel we are starting to see the effects of the disintegration of a more shared public sphere in which there is regular engagement between those of differing views.
“I mean by this, for example, that fewer people now read whole newspapers, they read articles online, often the ones they are pointed to by social media.
“Also, in Britain, fewer people watch national television channels than previously, so there isn’t so much of a common field of discourse.”
Touching upon the impact of social media, the professor added: “Similarly, social media has had a big effect, enabling people to remain within realms where they rarely have to engage with people who don’t share their ideological views on a lot of things. I certainly think lockdown has also exacerbated that situation.”
‘Distasteful’
Mr. Pace said the importance of pupils and students engaging with those outside their own circles, and even with those whose views they find “distasteful” was hugely important.“I think that’s part of what education is about—it’s about taking people outside of just their own realms and experience to appreciate other ones as well. That’s a fundamental aspect of awareness of diversity, which must include intellectual diversity.
“But I’m not always sure that some of the things that go by the name of diversity with a capital ‘D,’ necessarily amount to that.”
He added: “I think with the rise of a large amount of consciousness around identity, about which obviously a lot of people have written, it becomes harder to maintain boundaries between individuals and their work. I can even trace this back to the old feminist slogan ’the person is political.’
“So, a critique of someone’s work or challenge to some of their arguments, if those things are seen as bound up with their identity, can be interpreted as a personal attack. That’s what I’ve seen happening in academia, and it leads to complaints and attempts to silence, rather than debate.”
