Close overseas partnerships that harm free speech, says OfS

English universities should terminate agreements with overseas institutions if they involve restrictions on free speech, according to new long-awaited guidance published by the Office for Students (OfS).

From August, institutions will be required to take “reasonably practicable steps” to secure free speech and academic freedom within the law under their new duties outlined in the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act.

The regulator – which will have new powers to investigate free speech complaints made against universities – has outlined examples of various scenarios and how it may expect institutions to deal with them.

One describes a situation in which a university runs a programme of visiting scholarships funded by a foreign government that comes with a condition that “recipients must accept the basic principles of the ruling party” of that country.

Given the potential of this to undermine free speech and academic freedom at the university, the OfS says “amendment or termination of the scholarship agreement is likely to be a reasonably practicable step” that it should take.

Similarly, another example outlines a scenario whereby a university jointly funds an overseas institute with a commercial entity that employs people subject to an “ideological test” as a condition of employment.

Depending on the circumstances, the OfS says that – given that this might undermine academic freedom not only for those employed on these terms, but also for staff and students more widely – terminating or amending these arrangements would again be a “reasonably practicable step”.

Speaking to reporters, the OfS’ director for freedom of speech and academic freedom, Arif Ahmed, said the examples were intended “to help the sector”.

“Universities, colleges, students’ unions can look at these and think they may have situations like those in the example, they may have situations that are similar, or they may not have them,” he said. “But if they do – and to the extent they do – they can think how their current procedures, policies and so on relate to them.”

The sector has long called for more guidance from the regulator on how it intends to use its new powers, given the complexity of many free speech-related cases.

A review published on 25 March by the prime minister’s social cohesion adviser, Dame Sara Khan, said universities needed to do more to understand the impact of harassment related to people’s views and ensure they had the right protocols in place to deal with such incidents.

Further “reasonably practicable steps” outlined in the OfS guidance include:

• Universities should “promptly reject public campaigns to discipline, expel or fire a student or member of staff for lawful expression of an idea or viewpoint”
• Freedom of speech and academic freedom should not constrain an individual’s chances of being hired or promoted
• Free speech “codes of practice” should be published and made easily accessible on an institution’s website.
• University policies “should not be so broad that they suppress the lawful expression of a particular viewpoint or of a wide range of legally expressible content”
• The OfS’ complaints scheme should be brought to the attention of staff and students “at least once a year”
• Staff should be trained in freedom of speech and academic freedom, including those dealing with disciplinary procedures, events and human resources processes.

Asked by Times Higher Education how much universities might need to change in order to comply with the regulation, Dr Ahmed acknowledged that they were already bound by existing laws that uphold freedom of speech and academic freedom.

But, he added, the effect of the new duties would be “to shift the dial more in the direction of freedom of speech and academic freedom…That is the direction we expect universities to be moving.”

“How much work that involves in any particular case is going to depend on what is exactly happening at that university and how it is currently balancing those things,” Dr Ahmed said.

“Many universities already certainly say they regard freedom of speech as central to everything they do – as a fundamental part of their activities – so on the basis of that we would expect there is already some compliance, but I am not going to pre-judge exactly how much or how little there is. It may be that in some cases there is a serious amount of work to do.”

tom.williams@timeshighereducation.com