Higher Education in Closing Spaces

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Academic freedom—the principle that students and teachers can study, research, teach, and express ideas without interference or censorship—is crucial for the advancement of knowledge, democracy, and the flourishing of higher education institutions. However, various threats can pose challenges to academic freedom in these institutions.

These threats include political interference as authorities reinforce a dominant ideology. This interference can limit the freedom of learners and educators to pursue independent research or express dissenting views. In addition to this type of overt censorship, learners and educators can self-censor in hostile environments out of fears of retribution, damaging their careers, or facing public backlash. In some contexts, access to higher education is inaccessible to certain populations, such as women in Afghanistan. Further, budgetary constraints can influence the selection of research topics and the content of courses.

This panel aims to advance participants' understanding of higher education in closing spaces. The first presentation provides a conceptual framing to understand the range of political and ideological risks facing higher education institutions, with specific attention to groups, individuals, institutional structures, and/or contextual settings where risks are greatest. Alongside this, effective approaches and capacities to mitigate and counteract these risks will be outlined. The second presentation will explore what higher education can do to support student activism and contributions to democratic processes. With these insights, we aim to offer ideas for the ‘power of protest’ to open up these closing spaces. The final presentation will provide lessons from the case of Afghanistan, built on more than a decade working in the country, which will share lessons learnt from the opening and the closing of higher education spaces.

Sub Unit

• Higher Education SIG

Chair

• Ian Barron, Center for Youth Engagement, UMass Amherst

Individual Presentations

• Higher Education Under Threat: Risks and Resiliency - Daniel Couch, The University of Sydney; Ritesh Shah, University of Auckland

• Student Activism - Scott Pulizzi, Education Development Center (Edc)

• Lessons from Afghanistan - Javid Mussawy, University of Massachusetts Amherst; Nangyalai Attal, UMass Amherst

• Current Threats and Implications for the Future of Higher Education in Afghanistan - Mujtaba Hedayet, University of Massachusetts Amherst; Hassan Aslami, University of Massachusetts Boston