By Matthew Abraham The facts on the Finkelstein case at DePaul have been covered in some detail elsewhere, so I will not review here what is already quite well known. It is difficult to dispute that DePaul was subjected to enormous financial and political pressure as it considered Finkelstein’s tenure application. The documentary record itself…
By Peter Kirstein DePaul University denied Dr. Norman Finkelstein tenure and promotion to associate professor on Friday, June 8, 2007. I posted on my blog several leaked documents, none from Finkelstein I might add, including College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Dean Chuck Suchar’s infamous non-recommendation for tenure. I was attending the AAUP annual meeting…
Five years ago this week, DePaul University denied tenure to political scientist Norman Finkelstein (pdf of tenure denial letter). To mark the anniversary of this important academic freedom case, Academe Blog will have essays by Peter Kirstein and DePaul professor Matthew Abraham, and interviews with Norman Finkelstein and Alan Dershowitz. Finkelstein remains a figure who…
Ramola Ramtohul is a professor of Social Studies at the University of Mauritius. In addition to surveying Mauritian university and higher ed landscape, Professor Ramtohul describes the precarious state of academic freedom in the country. Academic freedom is stronger than in most other African nations, but government authorities monitor academics closely, leading to a “chilling…
The United States Air Force Academy is in many ways like any other elite university. Students pick a major, attend class, join clubs, and play sports. Faculty generally teach three or four courses per semester, and do research and service work. But as Jeff Dyche, a former teacher at the AFA, explains in the new…
New in the AAUP Journal of Academic Freedom: “Academic Freedom in Principle and Practice: The Case of Algeria.” Malika Rebai Maamri describes a great effort by Algeria’s president to improve the quality and availability of higher education. But despite many new institutions, articulation of democratic ideals, and resources to support higher education, things have gone awry.…
The 1920s and 1930s were a period of struggle at the University of Pittsburgh, with no tenure or due process rights for faculty and an autocratic chancellor focused on fundraising. When, in 1934, professor Ralph Turner was abruptly dismissed from his post, AAUP and state investigations ensued and speculation abounded. Was Turner dismissed because of…
North Carolina multimillionaire Arthur Pope has been using his wealth to influence the state’s politics and policy for years. In the May-June issue of Academe, Hassan Melehy, a professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, explains how Pope uses his wealth to fund foundations which push for more and more conservative influence over education. On the one hand,…
As we all know, universities around the country are in financial trouble. Many states have been cutting funding to their public universities, forcing the schools to do more with less. So it’s understandable that administrators would be on the lookout for new sources of funding—including wealthy donors. In “Fine Print, Restrictive Grants, and Academic Freedom,”…