7 - Academic Freedom in the Neo-Liberal Order: Governments, Globalization, Governance, and Gender

Abstract

This paper seeks to examine the meanings and challenges of academic freedom for African universities and intellectuals as they confront old and new pressures from globalization, governments, and the general public. It is argued that as the “devel- opment” university of the 1960s and 1970s shifted to the “market” university of the 1980s and 1990s, threats to academic freedom became less political and more eco- nomic. The essay begins by discussing various definitions of academic freedom in Western and African contexts, then proceeds to explore the role of governments, the impact of globalization, the dynamics of internal governance, and finally the gender dimensions of academic freedom.

A Historical Review of African Scholarship and the Decolonial Discourse: Challenges and Prospects

“…These critics felt that negritudism Western modernity and civilisation which influenced Africa in the 1960s and 1970s resulted in the dependency syndrome and the development of Afro-pessimism in African scholarship. This saw the adoption of a depoliticised stance of post-modernism and post-coloniality in their writing which worsened the isolation of Africa, misrepresentation of its histories, knowledges and identities Zeleza, 2003). The poststructuralism and post-modernism postures in the academics and researchers of the era negatively impacted on African scholarship.…”

The nexus between corruption and academic freedom: An international investigation of the underlying linkages

“…The Internet and the degree of globalization impact knowledge flows and the ability of nation‐states to effectively control information 5 ,. 6 They are included (alternatively) to gauge their impact on academic freedom (see Minerva, 2014; Zeleza, 2003). Additionally, ethnic tensions (EthnicTEN) in a nation likely inhibit the free flow of ideas and thus their expected influence on academic freedom would be negative.…”

The Social Foundations of Academic Freedom: Heterogeneous Institutions in World Society, 1960 to 2022

“…Shaped by their case-based approach, these studies cast academic freedom largely as a domestic phenomenon, bolstered or threatened by proximate social/political dynamics. Scholarship with a regional or comparative lens can be found, but it remains fairly theoretical or does not seek to generalize (see, e.g., Zeleza [2003] for a descriptive account of academic freedom challenges in African universities, and Marginson [2014] or Ben-David and Collins [1966] for comparative arguments using illustrative country examples). Some recent empirical work, however, has begun to draw on systematic and even crossnational data.…”

“…Along similar lines, prior work explains variations in academic freedom in terms of war and militarism. A core idea-borne out in World War I (Tap 1992), the Cold War (Schrecker 1986), the War on Terror (Bird and Brandt 2002), and various civil conflicts (Zeleza 2003)is that states tend to grow more coercive, secretive, and intolerant in times of war and impose greater surveillance and control over academic research and teaching (Gerstmann and Streb 2006). Related are long-standing concerns about the effects of militarism on academic freedom, suggesting that in militarized contexts and times, the university becomes an extension of the national security state or the military-industrial complex (Giroux 2007).…”

“…Liberal free markets brought their own challenges (Zeleza 2003), but universities and academic freedom flowered considerably during this period, increasingly independent of the state. Global protections for academic freedom expanded as liberal world society institutions grew more assertive.…”