Freedom and Responsibility

Observer - Viewpoint
by Peter Wicks

"Rather like contemporary debates over the constitutional separation of church and state, disputes about academic freedom tend to go wrong because everyone assumes that 'academic freedom' means whatever they think it should mean. ...

Departments that allocate their resources in ways that do not - directly or indirectly - further the goal of intellectual inquiry are failing in their duties. If that failure becomes chronic then the President of the University has an obligation to intervene.

In the case of the Monologues I fail to see how the sponsorship of a play that has been performed on campus every year since 2002 can be justified by an academic department on academic grounds. Saving the world is not part of the English department's academic mission, which is just as well because there is no reason to suppose that they would be especially good at it."

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