Academic Freedom

Are Academic Freedom and Tenure Still Justified?

The need for establishing a process for academic freedom and tenure became evident as colleges and universities began to expand their educational horizons. As the number of enrollments in various disciplines increased, so did the need to clarify the role of professors and administrators. Historically, universities governed themselves without trustees, deans, provosts, or presidents. As they entered the modern age and included the field of natural sciences, varied opinions came into play, and teachers in some disciplines began to question the wisdom and intellect of those in other disciplines. With increasing concerns about the future of academic freedom within disciplines, as well as dealing with college presidents and their boards of trustees, a professional organization, the Association of University Professors, formulated the Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure for use by institutions of higher learning engaged in the concept of shared governance.

In 2006 Henry A. Giroux reported that while higher education in the United States is unique in that it produces quality research and has excellent preparation programs for students, attempts have been made by what he deems as “right wing forces” to undermine the principles of academic freedom. Giroux further suggested that there was a political war being waged against higher education that was intent on diminishing academic freedom and was concerned with who controls hiring, curriculum, and pedagogy itself. In some instances, institutions appeared to have lost the trust that they previously held from key stakeholders, including government officials. Tenure and academic freedom in all fields of scholarship have come under attack for political, financial, and conceptual reasons, placing academic freedom at risk or, at best, in question.

Does tenure continue to serve its original mission of providing and safeguarding an environment of academic freedom? Prior to groundbreaking work by Stephen J. Ceci, Wendy M. Williams, and Katrin Mueller-Johnson, empirical data to inform perspectives in response to this question were nonexistent. In a multifactorial experimental survey, 1,004 randomly selected faculty members in the behavioral sciences from top-ranked institutions were asked how colleagues would typically respond when confronted with dilemmas concerning teaching, research, and wrongdoing. Lower-ranked faculty (assistant professors and tenured associate professors) were perceived as being less likely than full professors to exercise academic freedom. Fear of reprisal from senior colleagues resulting in denial of tenure and promotion suggests a “hush time” lasting 10 to 20 years or more. In spite of these data and a trend toward questioning the need for tenure, faculties have a responsibility to speak truth without retaliation. Tenure is not, nor should it be, a necessary condition for engaging in controversial research. Neither is tenure a sufficient ingredient, in and of itself, for academic freedom. While there may be a price to pay for engaging in controversial research and scholarship, Kevin McDonald notes that “professors who engage in controversial research know they are ‘going to jail,’ but with tenure, at least it's not hard time.”

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