Provost Chris Bracey and two law experts considered the application of institutional neutrality and free speech in higher education during a virtual panel on Monday.
Vikram Amar, a professor of law at the University of California, Davis, and Frederick Lawrence, a lecturer at the Georgetown University Law Center and former dean of GW Law, debated institutional neutrality and free speech in front of a virtual audience of more than 650 GW students, faculty and staff. The seminar followed Bracey’s announcement at a Faculty Senate meeting earlier this month that the University is weighing its stance on institutional neutrality and comes amid a wave of higher education institutions adopting the policy.
“As President Granberg and I have articulated many times, academic freedom and freedom of expression are foundational to GW’s identity and academic mission,” Bracey said.
Bracey said at a Faculty Senate meeting earlier this month that the University’s conversations on whether to adopt institutional neutrality will “likely” involve a presentation to the Board of Trustees and the formation of a task force to “study the issue” and make recommendations over the summer.
“Please note that this conversation will not end here but will continue into the future with additional engagement with the GW community,” Bracey said during the seminar.
A University spokesperson said in November that GW is not considering institutional neutrality “at this time,” which came after more than 15 American universities adopted the policy following the outbreak of the war in Gaza and campus demonstrations across the nation.
Bracey moderated the discussion with Amar and Lawrence, pausing throughout the conversation to address questions community members submitted through the chat function on Zoom.
Lawrence said institutional neutrality helps universities ensure their students maintain their freedom of expression rights. He said with “extreme” institutional neutrality universities can’t take a position on anything, but there are other forms that permit institutions to take stances on issues that threaten their values.
Lawrence said institutional restraint involves universities being careful about when and how they speak out on issues. He said if universities take public stances on everything, officials risk “misunderstanding” the mission of the university.
“Because if you think you stand for everything, then you stand for nothing,” Lawrence said.
Lawrence said institutional restraint requires officials to take a step back and ensure the topics they are speaking out on are in their areas of expertise because academic freedom allows individuals to speak freely only in their own area of knowledge. He said a president has to be comfortable with issuing statements, like on political and social issues, that reflect the values of the institution.
Faculty senator Guillermo Orti, the co-chair of the senate’s Professional Ethics and Academic Freedom Committee, introduced a resolution at the Faculty Senate meeting earlier this month that proposed the senate endorse the American Association of University Professors’ statement on institutional neutrality. The statement recommends universities focus on the “practical results” of releasing individual statements on social or political issues rather than following a policy of institutional neutrality.
The resolution asserted that adopting institutional neutrality would not be the solution to problems GW faces and suggested the University “look inward” at its principles to prioritize values like academic freedom. The senate unanimously voted to send the resolution back to committee for review after multiple faculty senators proposed amendments to clarify the resolution’s wording.
Lawrence said collective action of university leaders speaking out can be an answer to the Trump administration’s attacks on universities because singular universities are “wary” of standing up to the administration. He said conversations among university presidents are happening behind the scenes, and he “suspects” more will speak out in the coming days.
University President Ellen Granberg said at April’s Faculty Senate meeting that she planned to attend a conference call among university presidents that weekend to start conversations about mobilizing universities against President Donald Trump’s executive actions.
More than 220 university leaders on Tuesday signed a joint statement, including Georgetown and American universities, condemning the Trump administration’s “government overreach” and “political interference” of universities and calling on university leaders for “constructive engagement.” Granberg officially signed the statement on Wednesday.
Amar said it’s “ironic” that few universities have spoken out against when they have expertise to bring to the table in regard to the importance of federal funding for science research, hiring for facilities, having faculty self-governance and immunity from governmental control.
“It’s kind of troubling to me that some of them feel chilled because maybe universities were speaking out too much in the previous three or four years and on subjects that didn’t really relate to the university’s mission, and as a result, they got themselves in trouble,” Amar said.
Amar said Harvard University is an example of an issue “directly relevant” to “all higher education,” that universities should speak on. He said universities are not constrained by institutional restraint if they want to speak out, but there’s a “well-founded fear” of being “next on the list,” amid Trump’s executive orders targeting higher education institutions.
Trump’s administration froze $2.2 billion of federal funds to Harvard after accusing the university of failing to protect Jewish students, and Harvard refused to comply with the White House’s policy change demands. Harvard sued the Trump administration on Monday over the multibillion dollar cuts to research funding.
Amar said universities may decide not speak out on issues altogether because in instances where they speak out about one issue and not another, it’s hard to justify that decision. He said not weighing in during times where a group’s interests are at stake can “speak volumes” depending on what the university has already spoken out about.
He said there’s also internal institutional tension when officials — like presidents, deans and provosts — publicly communicate different information, which could make the university look as if it doesn’t “have its act together.”
“At a minimum, I think institutional speech ought to be done pursuant to a very careful thought through intentional set of considerations and processes,” Amar said.
Amar said universities have changed their land use and expressive activity regulations on campus, like banning overnight stays on certain land, following the Trump administration’s attacks on universities that were “too permissive” when it came to protests on campus. He said universities changing their regulations “punish” voices and viewpoints by having a double standard between pro-Palestinian speech and other kinds of speech.
Officials in March temporarily suspended GW’s Students for Justice in Palestine for 21 days after indefinitely barring the organization from hosting on-campus events, saying the group violated University policy.
Amar said “a lot” of universities “looked the other way” during protests even when demonstrators crossed lines by not enforcing time, place and manner limitations. He said these universities are now tightening and uniformly enforcing viewpoint neutral rules to follow laws and protect students.
“A lot of folks don’t understand that civil disobedience isn’t legally protected when it crosses regulations that are content and viewpoint neutral,” Amar said. “There’s no First Amendment right to have an encampment.”
