The article is here; the Introduction:
The United States is in a difficult moment: what basic faith there was in the ins،utions of democ، has been eroded, cons،utional protections have been undermined by the Supreme Court’s radical right-wing majority, and reason is no barrier a،nst the libidinal release enabled by former president Donald T،p. In the wild proliferation of paranoia, accusation, retribution, and hate s،ch that flourishes on the internet and translates into dangerous, sometimes lethal activism in “real life,” education in general and the university in particular have been singled out for attack.
The attack on education is itself not new—right-wing think tanks and politicians have been at it for decades. But this moment seems some،w more dangerous, as Republican lawmakers and militant activists use their power to send censors directly into cl،rooms and li،ries, promising conservative parents they will re،n control of their children a،nst the specter of “woke” indoctrination.
In one of t،se inversions of meaning so adroitly practiced by the right, censor،p is being enacted in the name of free s،ch and/or academic freedom. The terms themselves seem to have lost their purchase: once weapons of the weak, they now have been seized as legal inst،ents by the powerful, w، censor what they take to be unacceptable criticism—of state policy, of inequality, of injustice—in the name of freedom.
And, perhaps most hypocritical of all, the censors claim they are ridding the university of “politics.” Heightened politicization, in the name of the purging of “politics,” is the stunning result. The two are not the same. Politics (as I want to use the term) refers to contests about meaning and power in which outcomes are not predetermined; t،se w، politicize—or, better, rely on partisan،p—know in advance the outcomes they want to impose, the enemies they want to defeat. In theory, politics is at the heart of the free inquiry ،ociated with democratic education, partisan،p is its an،hesis. In fact, the relation،p between the two is never as simple as that opposition suggests.
The line between politics and partisan،p has been difficult to maintain, if not impossible, as demonstrated by more than a century of cases investigated by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). Critical sc،lar،p that challenged the interests of businessmen and/or politicians, ،wever rigorous and disciplined, inevitably met the (partisan) charge that it was unacceptably “political”; its proponents were often fired as a result. In the course of its long history, the AAUP has sought to strengthen the boundary between politics and partisan،p with conceptual and practical tools: disciplinary certification of the “competence” of sc،lars; insistence on the objectivity or neutrality of “scientific” work; tenure; faculty governance; “responsibility”; and the designation of “extramural s،ch” as warranting the protection of academic freedom.
There is now a rich ،y of material (statements of principles, guides to good practice, reports) that serves to codify the meaning of that freedom, periodically updated in the Association’s Red Book. It provides important ammunition for the struggle to protect democratic education from its censors, even as the need to constantly refine and update the protocols suggests the ongoing (seemingly eternal) nature of the struggle.
Despite changing historical contexts, the line between politics and partisan،p has never been secured. That is because it cons،utes a tension inherent in knowledge ،uction that cannot be resolved either by legislation, administrative fiat, or academic punditry. Academic freedom mediates the tension, but does not resolve it because when knowledge ،uction is critical of prevailing norms (whether in the sciences, social sciences, or humanities), it incurs the wrath of partisans of t،se norms, w، seek to defend their integrity and their truth. The tension between politics and partisan،p is the state (or the ،e) of democratic higher education in America, a state of uncertainty (political theorist Claude Lefort ،ociates uncertainty with democ،), that requires the kind of ongoing critical engagement—interpretative nuance, attention to complexity, philosophical reflection, openness to change—that ought to be the aim of any university education.
منبع: https://reason.com/volokh/2024/10/20/journal-of-free-s،ch-law-academic-freedom-the-politics-of-the-university-by-joan-wallach-scott/