Around the world, scholars and university students face frequent and pervasive attacks on their academic freedom and the autonomy of the institutions where they work. As Scholars at Risk’s annual Free to Think reports have previously shown, particularly in authoritarian societies where the rule of law is weak and dissent is viewed as destabilizing, the right of scholars to research, teach, and speak freely has long been oppressed, including through targeted killings, disappearances, arrests, and prosecution. Likewise, systems of higher education have often been caught in the crossfires of armed conflict, with universities, scholars, and students attacked, either directly or collaterally. Such trends continue today.

At the same time, societies across the globe are witnessing the erosion of the liberal norms and institutions that bolster academic freedom. The past decade has seen the democratic election of officials with increasingly autocratic impulses who use the powers of their offices to introduce, pass, and implement illiberal legislation and policies that undermine, overhaul, or shutter democratic institutions, including universities.  In many societies, this trend of autocratization has been accompanied by an isolationist impulse that is antagonistic to international research collaboration, stymying the free flow of ideas between countries.

Such trends are deeply threatening, not just to the higher education sector, but to democracy. Universities are where students learn to be active, engaged members of civic society. As such, autonomous universities and academic freedom, including the ability to ask questions and to safely exchange ideas, are cornerstones of democracy. They are as critical to a democratic society as a free press or independent judiciary. Historically, open societies have upheld university autonomy and academic freedom as essential values, but data from the Academic Freedom Index (AFi) indicates that this is changing. When liberal democracies undermine higher education, they risk exporting their actions to the rest of the world. In this sense then, liberal and authoritarian governments are increasingly taking pages from each other’s playbooks to damage democratic institutions, including the higher education sector.

The attacks on higher education described in this report imperil both the lives and livelihoods of scholars and students. They upend scholars’ careers, jeopardize students’ futures, and result in death, injuries, and the deprivation of liberty.  But even more, they threaten the foundations of social progress by degrading the quality of teaching, research, and discourse on campus. Ultimately, they impact all of us by damaging higher education’s unique capacity to drive the social, political, cultural, and economic development from which we all benefit.

Through its Academic Freedom Monitoring Project, Scholars at Risk (SAR) responds to these attacks by identifying and tracking key incidents, with the aim of protecting vulnerable individuals, raising awareness, encouraging accountability, and promoting the dialogue and understanding necessary to prevent future threats. Since 2015, SAR has been publishing Free to Think, a series of annual reports analyzing attacks on higher education communities around the world. This year’s report  highlights concerning developments and trends in 18 countries and territories around the world: Afghanistan, China, Colombia, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Iran, Israel, Nicaragua, Nigeria, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Russia, Türkiye, Sudan, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Attacks on higher education from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2024

Free to Think 2024 documents 391 attacks on scholars, students, and institutions in 51 countries and territories, from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024. The reporting period was marked by several concerning trends. Among these, intrastate and interstate armed conflict brought devastation to the higher education systems of multiple countries. Government and university authorities—often under pressure from external actors, including donors, politicians, or other community members—cracked down on dissent and disfavored speech, both in the classroom and outside of it. This often resulted in university students and scholars losing their positions or facing arrest and detention, including for their participation in peaceful protests. In many cases, such actions were bolstered by new illiberal laws and policies that undermined university autonomy, academic freedom, and international research collaboration. These developments created the conditions for more violent and grave attacks on higher education.

Violent attacks destroyed higher education systems amid multiple new and ongoing armed conflicts. The outbreak of renewed violence in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory dramatically damaged higher education in the region. This violence was sparked on October 7, 2023, when the Palestinian group Hamas massacred around 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and abducted more than 200 from villages in southern Israel. Israel reacted with a military assault in the Gaza Strip that continued at the time of writing in September 2024 and had killed more than 40,000 Palestinians and injured more than 93,000.^[1] In Gaza, universities were among the thousands of civilian structures destroyed by Israel’s aerial and ground bombardment. By January 17, 2024, the media reported that Israeli military forces had destroyed the last standing university in Gaza.^[2] The violence killed nearly 100 university professors and hundreds of students.^[3] In the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Minister of Education and Higher Education, the presence of Israeli military checkpoints made it essentially impossible for students and scholars to access their universities.^[4] In Israel, the October 7 attack left Israeli society, including students, scholars, and universities, traumatized and reeling. As Israel called up reservists to fight in Gaza, the country’s universities felt the conflict keenly through a delayed start to the academic year and the absence of some students while others attended classes carrying their military-issued weapons. Deep divides grew between Jewish-Israeli and Arab-Israeli students, and those who expressed criticism over the Israeli military operations in Gaza were silenced—including students and professors.^[5]

In Sudan, one year into a civil war that broke out in April 2023, more than 100 Sudanese universities had been severely damaged or entirely destroyed, most through intentional targeting or looting.^[6] The violence almost completely halted research and teaching. In Ukraine, academics and students continued to pursue their research, teaching, and studies, even as Russian shelling destroyed one in five higher education institutions.^[7], In Myanmar, three years into the national resistance to a February 2021 military coup, the country’s university student population had shrunk by 90 percent from pre-coup levels , at least partially reflecting students’ decisions to boycott the military junta’s education system, in many cases  joining either the nonviolent or armed resistance.^[8]

Multiple governments cracked down on dissent by forcibly dispersing, arresting, or prosecuting scholars and students for criticizing government policies or actions. In Nicaragua, the government continued to target dissenters, arresting professors and students who criticized or protested against the government.^[9] Iranian security forces continued to arrest scholars and students for their participation in the “Women, Life, Freedom” uprising that began in September 2023. As of May 2024, it was estimated that more than 700 students had been arrested, attacked, or beaten for participating in demonstrations at universities.^[10] In Mali, Étienne Fakaba Sissoko, an economist and professor at the University of Bamako in Mali, was sentenced to two years in prison and fined for allegedly defaming the state in a book that he published in 2023.^[11] Libyan security forces arbitrarily detained two professors, apparently to exert pressure on the General Syndicate of University Teaching Staff Members, which was involved in negotiations with the government.^[12] A student uprising that took place in Bangladesh in July and August 2024 (outside the formal  reporting period) resulted in the deaths of more than 200 people, mostly at the hands of state police. In addition more than 10,000 were arrested, most in “block raids,” during which police knocked on doors looking for students.^[13]

In authoritarian contexts with close relationships between the government and public higher education institutions, universities were complicit in silencing dissent, including terminating the positions of scholars who dissented. In Russia, higher education and research institutions, including the government-led Russian Academy of Sciences^[14] and St. Petersburg State University,^[15] fired scholars who spoke out about the government or engaged in research contrary to government narratives. The crackdown, which had intensified after Russia invaded Ukraine in March 2022, prompted the flight of some prominent academics from the country.^[16] In China, according to the Voice of America, a public university fired a scholar of Chinese politics after he commented publicly on China’s foreign relations.^[17] Meanwhile, the Chinese University of Hong Kong fired a historian with Canadian citizenship after Hong Kong immigration authorities denied her visa on the basis of her connections to foreign governments and non-governmental groups.^[18]

Across both authoritarian and liberal states, national and sub-national governments introduced and implemented illiberal legislation and policies that undermined university autonomy and academic freedom. Several authoritarian countries introduced measures that directly expanded government authority over the higher education sector. In Nicaragua, the government passed legislation further eroding university autonomy. This included alleged reforms to Law 89, the Law of Autonomy of Higher Education Institutions, and Law 582, the General Education Law, which granted the government further administrative and financial oversight of universities.^[19] According to the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua—a United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights mandated independent research group—“the university sector of Nicaragua as a whole no longer has independent institutions.”^[20]

Taliban authorities in Afghanistan issued policies extending their control over the content of higher education, including by instructing higher education institutions and libraries to replace all texts contrary to Sunni Hanafi jurisprudence with those focused on the biography of the Prophet Muhammad.^[21] In China, at least nine universities saw government-appointed, university CCP committees, which had long operated as informal, parallel administrative structures, formally merge with the universities’ previously independent administrative offices.^[22]

In liberal countries, legislation and policies provided state and university actors with pretexts for penalizing scholars and students. In the United States, elected officials in some states passed bills to shape or control the content of  university curricula, tenure systems and approvals,  accreditation processes, and mission statements.^[23] The bills  often used  vague and overbroad language that made it difficult for faculty to understand their scope, eroding academic freedom even more, and difficult for administrators to implement narrowly, eroding institutional autonomy.^[24]

The reporting period also saw a number of government directives and policies that impeded international research collaboration, whether intentionally or inadvertently. Governments concerned about espionage sought to prevent sensitive military or technological information from being surreptitiously taken by or leaked to Chinese government or commercial entities.  A  proposed foreign influence transparency registry in Canada, for example, requires scientists working for one of the country’s three main research agencies to flag any research proposals they deem  problematic—undefined—for review by  defense and intelligence officers.^[25] The lack of standards and transparency in the proposed review would create an excessive risk of arbitrary, biased, or overbroad restrictions, undermining academic freedom and the free exchange of non-sensitive ideas and expertise.

Some states and universities have also restricted engagement with researchers and students from certain countries not to combat espionage but to respond to human rights violations. For example, the Australian foreign minister wrote to more than 30 university vice-chancellors and presidents asking them to pause research partnerships with Iranian institutions because of concern over the human rights situation in the country, in addition to information security concerns.^[26] Friedrich Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany announced that it would no longer work with  students funded by the China Scholarship Council (CSC) because of concerns that those students—who  are asked to sign loyalty pledges to the Chinese Communist Party —could be persecuted when they return home based on their free expression of views while at FAU (views that presumably Chinese government does not wish them to hold or share).^[27]

A summary of the year would not be completed without recognizing the impact of the violence in Israel and Gaza, which became a flashpoint on university campuses in many countries outside the region. In the United States and in Germany, dozens of scholars who spoke out about the violence on social media or incorporated discussions, assignments, or resources about the current crisis or history of the conflict into their teaching, found their job offers rescinded, their teaching duties suspended, or their contracts terminated. In many of these cases, the scholars had criticized the actions of the Israeli government and military, called for a ceasefire in Gaza, or expressed support for Palestinian self-determination.^[28] In China,^[29] India,^[30] Morocco,^[31] the United Kingdom,^[32] and the United States,^[33] among other countries, universities canceled lectures, poetry readings, and film screenings related to the violence in the Middle East. Often, university leaders justified the cancellations by expressing unspecified security concerns. In many countries, from the United States to Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, students protested Israeli military actions and the loss of Palestinian lives. .^[34] These mostly peaceful protests nonetheless disrupted university campus life, in some cases leaving significant debris or, more seriously, the defacement and vandalism of university buildings.^[35] Some protesters used slogans that were overtly antisemitic or Islamophobic,^[36] resulting in an atmosphere on some campuses where some Israeli, Jewish, Arab, or Muslim students or their supporters reported feelings of insecurity that impeded their regular academic or other activities. In some cases where these protests were met by counter-protests in support of Israel, the situation devolved into violence.^[37]  In several countries, including France,^[38] Germany,^[39] India,^[40] Italy,^[41] and the United States,^[43] state and higher education officials called in police or security forces to break up protests, often resulting in clashes, with police sometimes using less-lethal methods of crowd control, including teargas and rubber bullets.

Some universities limited the space for free expression on campus by developing and implementing new policies restricting students’ right to protest or, more broadly, to engage in politics on campus. In the United States, some universities responded to the pro-Palestinian student protests that disrupted campuses throughout the 2023-24 academic year by instituting new policies restricting student protests—a trend that was expected to continue into the 2024-2025 academic year.^[44] In India, both Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and South Asian University (SAU) announced new policies restricting student expression. While JNU barred students from protesting near academic buildings, SAU barred students from protesting on campus at all.^[45]

This overview illustrates the wide range of attacks targeting scholars, students, and higher education institutions globally and illuminates how authoritarian and illiberal authorities undermine university autonomy and shrink the space for academic freedom. While the attacks  described in this report are only a fraction of the attacks on higher education that have occurred over the reporting period, they point to the significance of the problem. Additional evidence on the scale of such attacks can be found in the large numbers of scholars and students seeking help. Over the last year, SAR and our partners who implement scholar support programs have continued to receive high volumes of requests for assistance, including but not limited to those seeking to escape the crises in Afghanistan, Occupied Palestinian Territory, Ukraine, Sudan, and Iran. Together, these data indicate that attacks on higher education remain a widespread phenomenon.

Academic Freedom Declining Globally

The attacks on higher education described in this report are indicative of deteriorating conditions for academic freedom. Declining levels of academic freedom are also evident in the most recent annual data from the Academic Freedom Index (AFi), showing that more than half of the world’s population currently lives in contexts with “completely restricted” or “severely restricted” levels of academic freedom. Whereas in 2006, approximately 4 billion people lived in places with robust environments for academic freedom, today, that number has declined by more than a quarter to 2.8 billion. The countries featured in Free to Think 2024 illustrate these trends. In its 2024 update, the AFi rated eight out of nineteen^[46] contexts highlighted in this report’s section on “Regional Pressures on Higher Education” as “completely restricted.” An additional three contexts were rated as “severely restricted.” Six of the countries featured in this report are among the 10 percent of countries with the lowest levels of academic freedom globally: Afghanistan, China, Iran, Myanmar, Nicaragua, and Türkiye.

To a large extent, then, the trend is towards declining levels of academic freedom; indeed, according to the AFi’s 2024 Update, academic freedom is expanding in just 10 out of 179 assessed countries.^[47] In fifteen of the contexts highlighted in the “Regional Pressures” section below,  academic freedom has been on the decline over the past decade; this includes both authoritarian and democratic contexts.

Figure 1: Concerning declines in respect for academic freedom have occurred in more than 10 countries highlighted in Free to Think 2024, according to data from the Academic Freedom Index (AFi), a tool co-developed by the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi), the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), the V-Dem Institute, and SAR. 

These attacks are destructive and damaging to higher education communities at the national, institutional, and individual levels. They are deadly. They chill free speech, encourage self-censorship, and deter scholars and students from researching, teaching, and expressing their ideas at all. They stifle academic productivity, depriving society of the full benefits that universities, colleges, and research institutions are uniquely positioned to offer: the advancement of knowledge and the development of solutions to problems that affect everyone.

A Global Response

Reversing the trend described above requires three key steps: expanding awareness, building consensus, and implementing concrete protections for scholars, students, and higher education institutions. The first—expanding awareness—requires improving our understanding of how attacks on higher education occur and why. This report is a key step in this direction, but too many attacks on higher education still go unreported and unrecognized.

Preventing attacks on higher education requires building consensus by creating normative change. We must insist on full recognition of the right of academic freedom for scholars and students. The international community has seen some progress in this regard.  In the UN system, for example, the UN Special Rapporteur (UNSR) on the Right to Education issued a report on academic freedom that proposes considering academic freedom to be an “autonomous human right grounded in several provisions of international law.” The report specifically notes that the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, released in March 2024 by an international Working Group on Academic Freedom, co-led by SAR,^[48] reflect the status of international law and practice with respect to academic freedom. Despite this recognition, rising illiberalism threatens this progress, and more must be done to secure the safety of scholars and students to research, teach, and learn freely.

Finally, promoting academic freedom requires more effective implementation. It requires that change occurs not merely at the level of policy, but also on the ground. For this to happen, we must have better practical guidance.  Along these lines, the UNSR on the Right to Education notes in her report on academic freedom that “Endorsement and implementation of the principles would support academic freedom worldwide.” The report calls upon the HRC to consider the principles and encourage their implementation and upon states to fully implement them.^[49] Moreover, other regional tools exist, including the Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy^[50] and the European Strategy for Universities adopted in 2022, which recognizes the role of academic freedom in promoting European democratic values.^[51] Yet, for these tools to be effective, they must be used. They should be viewed as resources for those fighting attacks on higher education wherever they occur.

With this report, SAR calls on states, higher education communities, and civil society around the world to do more: to reject violence and coercion aimed at restricting inquiry and expression; to protect threatened scholars, students, and higher education institutions; to fight illiberal policies and practices that constrain intellectual discourse, research and teaching; and to reaffirm publicly their commitment to academic freedom and support for the principles that critical discourse is not disloyalty, that ideas are not crimes, and that everyone must be free to think, question, and share their ideas.

^[1] United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, “Humanitarian Situation Update #209 | Gaza Strip,” August 26, 2024, https://www.ochaopt.org/content/humanitarian-situation-update-209-gaza-strip.

^[2] SAR AFMP, Al Israa University, January 17, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-al-israa-university/. Laura Pollack, “Israel destroys last university in Gaza as strikes continue,” The National, https://www.thenational.scot/news/24059315.israel-destroys-last-university-gaza-strikes-continue/.

^[3] UN Office for the Commissioner of Human Rights  “UN experts deeply concerned over ‘scholasticide’ in Gaza,” April 18, 2024, https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/04/un-experts-deeply-concerned-over-scholasticide-gaza.

^[4] “Palestinian Minister: Access to school or university in West Bank has become ‘impossible,’” Jordanzad, August 6, 2024, https://www.jordanzad.com/index.php?page=article&id=626771.

^[5] Ben Upton and Paul Basken, “Israeli universities delay start of academic year after attacks,” Times Higher Education, October 9, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/israeli-universities-delay-start-academic-year-after-attacks. Jackie Northam, “The war in Gaza is leading to deep divisions at Israeli universities,” NPR, January 30, 2024, https://www.npr.org/2024/01/30/1226618464/israel-universities-gaza-war-arab-students. Adam Sella, “War Brings Tensions, and Assault Rifles, Into an Israeli College,” New York Times, January 7, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-haifa-university-students.html#. Hilo Glazer and Itay Mashiach, “’Systematic Witch Hunt:’ What Persecution of Arab-Israelis Looks Like Amid Gaza War,” Haaretz, November 2, 2023, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-02/ty-article-magazine/.highlight/systematic-witch-hunt-what-persecution-of-israeli-arabs-looks-like-amid-gaza-war/0000018b-90db-db7e-af9b-fbdb254e0000.

^[6] Polly Nash, “The war in Sudan and higher education: one year on,” The PIE, June 3, 2024, https://thepienews.com/the-war-in-sudan-and-higher-education-one-year-on. Wagdy Sawahel, “Destruction of HE will demand post-war reform of sector,” University World News, March 28, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024032603345775.

^[7] Dylan Carter, “One in five HE institutions damaged or destroyed in war,” University World News, March 1, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240301072602780. Emily Dixon, “Is it time for Ukraine’s exiled academics to return?,” Times Higher Education, March 14, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/it-time-ukraines-exiled-academics-return.

^[8] “University student population has plunged 90% since coup,” Radio Free Asia, January 8, 2024, https://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/universities-01082024154241.html.

^[9] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, August 19, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-19-multiple-institutions/.

^[10] “Iranian Universities Step up Suppression on Students,” Iran International, May 12, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202405115746.

^[11] SAR AFMP, University of Bamako, May 21, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-21-university-of-bamako/.

^[12] SAR AFMP, University of Tripoli, November 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-university-of-tripoli/. SAR AFMP, University of Tripoli, November 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-28-university-of-tripoli/.

^[13] SAR AFMP, Various Institutions, July 15, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-07-15-various/.

^[14] SAR AFMP, Russian Academy of Sciences, September 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-01-russian-academy-of-sciences/.

^[15] SAR AFMP, St. Petersburg State University, October 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-13-st-petersburg-state-university/.

^[16] Mary Ilyushina, “To please Putin, universities purge liberals and embrace patriots,” Washington Post, May 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/07/russia-universities-education-putin-overhaul/.

^[17] “Foreign professor fired from Chinese university after interview with VOA,” Voice of America, July 2, 2024, https://www.voanews.com/a/foreign-professor-fired-from-chinese-university-after-interview-with-voa-/7682090.html.

^[18] SAR AFMP, Chinese University of Hong Kong, October 27, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-27/.

^[19] SAR AFMP, Multiple institutions, November 30, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-30-multiple-insitutions/.

^[20] Jan-Michael Simon, “Statement by Jan-Michael Simon, Chair of the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (GHREN), 54th session of the Human Rights Council, September 12, 2023, https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/hrbodies/hrcouncil/grhe-nicaragua/OA-GHREN-54HRC-12SSEP23_English.docx.

^[21] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, December 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-14-multiple-institutions/.

^[22] Gu Ting, “China’s ruling party takes direct control of country’s universities,” Radio Free Asia, January 18, 2024, https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/china-universities-01182024160231.html. Patrick Jack, “Party strengthens control of Chinese university administration,” Times Higher Education, January 29, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/party-strengthens-control-chinese-university-administration.

^[23] Ibid. Jeffrey Adam Sachs and Jeremy C. Young, “The Censors’ Next Target,” Inside Higher Education, January 10, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2024/01/10/legislative-censors-change-broaden-their-approach-opinion.

^[24] For example: Johanna Alonso, “DEI Ban Prompts Utah Colleges to Close Cultural Centers, Too,” Inside Higher Education, July 1, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/2024/07/01/onset-anti-dei-law-utah-colleges-close-cultural-centers. Mark Toner, “Countering the ‘Chilling Effect’,” NAFSA, May 2, 2024, https://www.nafsa.org/ie-magazine/2024/5/2/countering-chilling-effect.

^[25] Jeffrey Mervis, “Canada moves to ban funding for ‘risky’ foreign collaborations,” Science, February 17, 2023, https://www.science.org/content/article/canada-moves-ban-funding-risky-foreign-collaborations.

^[26] Jonathan Yerushalmy, “Where freedom meets repression: Australian academics tread a fine line over ties to Iran,” The Guardian, February 24, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/25/where-freedom-meets-repression-australian-academics-tread-a-fine-line-over-ties-to-iran.

^[27] Yojana Sharma, “German university ends ties with China scholarship scheme,” July 20, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230720113914406. Amnesty International, “On My Campus I am Afraid”: China’s Targeting of Overseas Students Stifles Rights, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ASA1780062024ENGLISH.pdf.

^[28] See, for example: SAR AFMP, De Paul University, May 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-08-depaul-university/. SAR AFMP, University of Texas, Austin, November 22, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-22-university-of-texas-austin/. SAR AFMP, Indiana University, December 15, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-15-indiana-university/. SAR AFMP, University of Cologne, April 4, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-05-university-of-cologne-the-new-school/. SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/. SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/. SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/. SAR AFMP, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-07-max-planck-institute-for-social-anthropology/.

^[29] SAR AFMP, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong, October 30, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-30-hang-seng-university-of-hong-kong/.

^[30] SAR AFMP, University of Delhi, April 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-13-university-of-delhi/. SAR AFMP, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, November 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-14-indian-institute-of-technology-bombay/.

^[31] SAR AFMP, Abdelmalek Essaadi University, March 19, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-19-abdelmalek-essaadi-university/.

^[32] SAR AFMP, University of Birmingham, December 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-14-university-of-birmingham/. SAR AFMP, Liverpool Hope University, October 20, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-20-liverpool-hope-university/.

^[33] SAR AFMP, University of Arkansas, November 8, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-08-university-of-arkansas/. SAR AFMP, Indian University, December 20, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-20-indiana-university/. SAR AFMP, University of Pennsylvania, November 21, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-21-university-of-philadelphia/. SAR AFMP, California State University, San Bernadino, November 18, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-18-california-state-university-san-bernardino/. SAR AFMP, Indian University, November 15, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-15-indiana-university/. SAR AFMP, Barnard College, November 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-01-barnard-college/. SAR AFMP, University of Vermont, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-university-of-vermont/.

^[34] Ashifa Kassam, “Clashes and arrests as pro-Palestinian protests spread across European campuses,” The Guardian, May 8, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/08/pro-palestine-student-protests-campuses-europe-arrests-police. Shuriah Niazi, Ameen Amjad Khan, and Mohiuddin Alamgir, “Asian students swell ranks of ‘global’ anti-war protesters,” University World News, May 9, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024050917120630. Wagdy Sawahel, “MENA universities join global protests over war in Gaza,” University World News, May 3, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240503162533493.

^[35] Susan H. Greenberg, “Protests Cost University of California $29M,” Inside Higher Education, July 22, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/07/22/protests-cost-university-california-29-million.

^[36] Chris McGreal, “How pervasive is antisemitism on US campuses? A look at the language of the protests,” The Guardian, May 3, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/03/college-gaza-protests-antisemitism.

^[37] See, for example, SAR AFMP, University of California, Los Angeles, April 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-30-university-of-california-los-angeles/.

^[38] SAR AFMP, Sorbonne University, April 29, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-29-sorbonne-university/.

^[39] Ruairi Casey, “Punched, choked, kicked: German police crack down on student protests,” Al Jazeera, May 25, 2024, https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/5/25/punched-choked-kicked-german-police-crack-down-on-student-protests.

^[40] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-multiple-institutions/.

^[41] SAR AFMP, University of Florence, November 21, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-21-university-of-florence/.

^[43] Isabelle Taft, Alex Lemonides, Lazaro Gamio, and Anna Betts, “Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped,” New York Times, July 21, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/21/us/campus-protests-arrests.html.

^[44] Anemona Hartocollis, “Penn Bans Protest Encampments From Its Campus for the First Time,” New York Times, June 6, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/us/penn-ban-encampments-campus-protests-gaza.html. Josh Moody, “Colleges Eye Rule Changes in the Wake of Spring Protests,” Inside Higher Education, May 31, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/governance/executive-leadership/2024/05/31/protests-are-mostly-over-whats-next-colleges. Michael Vasquez, “Indiana U. Joins the Ranks of Colleges Imposing New Limits on Protest,” Chronicle of Higher Education, July 29, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/indiana-u-joins-the-ranks-of-colleges-imposing-new-limits-on-protest.

^[45] Shuriah Niazi, “Uproar over JNU restrictions on student campus activities,” University World News, December 14, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231214130326960. Madhur Sharma, “A Decade Of Protests And Crackdowns On Indian Campuses,” Outlook, December 19, 2023, https://www.outlookindia.com/national/a-decade-of-protests-and-crackdowns-on-indian-campuses-news-337303. SAR AFMP, South Asian University, June 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-06-16-south-asian-university/.

^[46] While we discuss the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the same highlight, here they are counted as two separate contexts since the AFi analyzes them separately.

^[47] Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, Lars Lott. 2024. Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg andV-Dem Institute. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405

^[48] The Principles can be downloaded in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, and Spanish, and feedback can be provided here: https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/principles/.

^[49] Human Rights Council, “Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Farida Shaheed*,” A/HRC/56/58, June 27, 2024, https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/ahrc5658-right-academic-freedom-report-special-rapporteur-right.

^[50] Organization of American States, “IACHR Issues Declaration of Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy,” December 9, 2021, www.oas.org/en/iachr/jsForm/?File=/en/iachr/media_center/preleases/2021/331.asp.

^[51] European Commission, “European Strategy for Universities,” January 18, 2022, https://education.ec.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2022-01/communication-european-strategy-for-universities-graphic-version.pdf.

Academic freedom is “the human right to acquire, develop, transmit, apply, and engage with a diversity of knowledge and ideas through research, teaching, learning, and discourse.”^[1] It is independently and interdependently grounded in several provisions of international law, including the freedom of opinion and expression, the right to education, and the right to the benefits of science, respectively, and has elements of freedom of association, freedom of movement, and other rights.

Human rights instruments in which the right of academic freedom is grounded include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has elaborated on the right in its General Comment No. 13 on the Right to Education (1990) and in General Comment No. 25 on the Right to Science (2020). In addition, UNESCO’s 1997 Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel elaborates on academic freedom and institutional autonomy. Regional human rights bodies including the  European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), and the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) have also explicitly acknowledged the right to academic freedom in their jurisprudence and public commentary, as well as in documents such as the Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy.^[2]

SAR has previously elaborated on the existing legal framework for academic freedom and the responsibility of the international community, states, and the higher education sector to uphold these standards. This discussion is available in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish here.^[3]

In 2020, the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and Expression emphasized that “academic freedom should be understood to include the freedom of individuals, as members of academic communities (e.g., faculty, students, staff, scholars, administrators and community participants) or in their own pursuits, to conduct activities involving the discovery and transmission of information and ideas, and to do so with the full protection of human rights law.”^[4] Academic freedom can be exercised both inside the academic community (“intramural expression”) or outside the academic community but within one’s expertise or area of focus (“extramural expression”).^[5] The exercise  of academic freedom carries with it “the obligation to seek truth and impart information according to ethical and professional standards, and to respond to contemporary problems and needs of all members of society.”^[6] The protections warranted by academic freedom thus arise not from the locus where it is exercised but from the application of training, experience, and expertise.

In 2023, at the 52nd Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UN HRC) 74 States issued an historic Joint Statement in support of Academic Freedom.^[7] The signatories recognized that academic freedom is not only key to human rights education but also “essential for technical and scientific progress and for the development of the creative industries and the arts” and numerous related rights and freedoms. The statement also called for enhanced international cooperation towards strengthening the protection and promotion of academic freedom in the spirit of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action.

In 2024, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to education affirmed that academic freedom should be recognized as an autonomous, self-standing, human right.^[8] For its advancement, and to ensure a better state of academic freedom worldwide, she called for the endorsement and implementation of Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom annexed to the report. The Principles elaborates on existing legal standards and norms and provides tools (a) to assist stakeholders assess existing protections and respect for academic freedom in a particular country or region; and (b) to give practical guidance to local stakeholders implementing the right to academic freedom. As the document points out, “When fully implemented, these principles would substantially guarantee protection, promotion, and enjoyment of the right of academic freedom.”

Principle 1:  Academic freedom is the right to develop knowledge and ideas.
Principle 2:  Academic freedom is protected by international human rights law.
Principle 3:  Academic freedom requires autonomy of institutions.
Principle 4:  Academic freedom includes intramural and extramural expression.
Principle 5:  Academic freedom requires access to information.
Principle 6:  Academic freedom requires freedoms of movement and association.
Principle 7:  Academic freedom is essential to all levels of education.
Principle 8:  Students have the right to academic freedom.
Principle 9:  Protection of academic freedom is a shared responsibility.

Complementing the emerging international framework recognizing a right to academic freedom are recognitions of academic freedom in state constitutions, national laws, decisions, and regulations, as well as in higher education policies and practices at the sectoral and institutional levels. As of 2023, 101 countries and territories had constitutional provisions that explicitly or implicitly protected academic freedom.^[9]

Taken together, the existing global, regional, and national standards provide a robust framework for states, national human rights institutions, courts, civil society actors, rights advocates, and the higher education sector itself to advance claims for academic freedom, asserting them wherever possible and explicitly acknowledging the grounding of academic freedom within international human rights law.

^[1] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf. Principle 1.

^[2] IACHR, “Gross human rights violations in the context of social protests in Nicaragua,” June 21, 2018, paras. 170–71. IACHR, “IACHR Observes Persistent Human Rights Issues in Venezuela,” April 5, 2019, www.oas.org/en/iachr/media_center/PReleases/2019/091.asp (expressing concern about attacks on professors and students, and stating that “academic freedom [and institutional autonomy] are crucial pillars to strengthen democratic structures and prevent politically driven pressures and interventions.”).

^[3] See: “Academic Freedom and Its Protection Under International Law,” https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/academic-freedom-and-its-protection-under-international-law/.

^[4] A/75/261, para. 8.

^[5]  SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, Principle 1.

^[6] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, Principle 4.

^[7] United Nations Human Rights Council ,“Joint statement on Academic Freedom,” March 29, 2023, https://onu-geneve.delegfrance.org/Joint-declaration-on-Academic-freedom

^[8] A/HRC/56/58, p .1.

^[9] Filtering for the variable, “v2caprotac,” in the 2023 V-Dem dataset, available at v-dem.net/vdemds.html. It should be noted that the apparent increase in constitutional protections for academic freedom in comparison to 2021 is because the variable was substantially revised in the 2023 V-Dem dataset, based on new information. It does not indicate a real increase in constitutional protections for academic freedom.

The 2024 Free to Think report assesses data collected from July 1, 2023, through June 30, 2024, and includes 391 attacks arising from 313 incidents in 51 countries and territories. This data is illustrative of current trends and highlights global and regional patterns and threats to higher education that warrant deeper attention from stakeholders, especially states, intergovernmental organizations, higher education leaders, the media, and civil society.

During the reporting period, the most prominent attacks on higher education included threats to scholars’ lives and academic work due to armed conflict, including in Israel and Gaza, or in retaliation for the teaching of disfavored topics or for political opinions expressed on social media. Renewed violence in the Middle East dramatically shaped the environment on university and college campuses across the globe. On October 7, 2023, the Palestinian group Hamas—which is both an armed group and a political party that governs the Gaza Strip—carried out a massacre on villages in southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people and abducting more than 200. Israel reacted with a military assault in the Gaza Strip that continued at the time of writing in September 2024 and had killed more than 40,000 Palestinians and injured more than 93,000.^[1] The violence inspired on-campus protests globally, from North America to Europe to North Africa to Asia, which lasted in some cases throughout the remainder of the reporting period and seemed likely to continue in the following months. In response, university or state police detained protesters on campus at dozens of higher education institutions—including 70 in the United States alone.^[2] In addition, dozens of universities canceled events and speaking engagements focused on the situation in the Middle East and disciplined faculty members and students who spoke out about it.

Government authorities and university authorities—often under pressure from external actors, including donors, politicians, or other community members—cracked down on dissent and disfavored speech, both in the classroom and outside of it, leading university students and scholars to lose their positions or to face arrest and detention. In many cases, such actions were bolstered by new illiberal laws and policies that undermined university autonomy, academic freedom, and international research collaboration.

The reporting period was also marked by growing awareness of the transnational nature of threats to higher education. Governments, particularly China’s, sought to silence scholars and students working and studying abroad with surveillance apparatuses and threats against their family members at home. Concerns over research security and human rights violations led universities and governments, in response, to develop restrictions on international collaboration with adversarial countries. In some instances these restrictions heightened the stigmatization of researchers from or with ties to those countries, posing a potential barrier to important academic collaboration and research. These trends and others are described through illustrative incidents below.

For the purpose of this report, “attacks” on higher education include threats or deliberate use of violent or coercive force or restrictions against higher education institutions and their affiliates, including leadership, administrators, academic and other staff, and students. These attacks include intentional acts resulting in wrongful death, physical harm, loss of liberty, limitations on academic travel, loss of professional or academic standing, or the destruction, damage, closure, or seizure of higher education institutions, facilities, or equipment. This definition also includes deliberate acts of coercion, intimidation, or threats of harm that undermine institutional autonomy, academic freedom, and educational functions, but it does not generally include other infringements of these values and functions that lack these violent, coercive, or restrictive dimensions.

While these incidents vary in their nature, they share common impacts. They undermine the security of higher education institutions and personnel, pose barriers to higher education, and contribute to “brain drain,” the flight of scholars and students, as well as to “brain drag,” the “lost personal, professional, and creative productivity that would have been, but for the rational fear of retaliation.”^[3] They often affect disadvantaged groups, especially in countries experiencing conflict, instability, or economic insecurity, exacerbating inequalities within the local and global knowledge economies. They disrupt international educational collaboration, depriving everyone of the fullest benefits of cross-border intellectual exchange and research. They undermine social, political, economic, and cultural development, and, particularly, democracy. A single incident typically has a chilling effect, extending its impact beyond those immediately affected to those who observe or learn of an attack and rationally alter their research, teaching, or expressive behavior—in other words, self-censor—for fear that the same could happen to them or those close to them.

This report is based on SAR’s Academic Freedom Monitoring Project, which investigates and reports attacks on higher education with the aim of raising awareness, generating advocacy, and increasing protection for scholars, students, and academic communities. The monitoring project organizes documented attacks into six categories: (i) killings, violence, and disappearances; (ii) wrongful imprisonment; (iii) wrongful prosecution; (iv) loss of position and expulsion from study; (v) improper travel restrictions; and (vi) other severe or systemic issues, that may significantly impair higher education functions, academic freedom, and the rights of entire higher education communities. These include attacks on higher education institutions related to armed conflict or military use, the cancellation of academic events due to pressure from community members or elected officials or in an apparent effort to prevent discussion on disfavored topics, and executive, legislative, and other policy-related changes intended to restrict access to higher education, free expression on campus, or the autonomy of higher education institutions—or of which the erosion of free expression or institutional autonomy is a foreseeable effect.

Given the limited resources available; the challenges of verifying reports received; the scope, variety, and complexity of attacks occurring; and a common fear among survivors about the consequences of reporting attacks, it should be emphasized that the figures cited in this report represent only a fraction of the total number of attacks that occur annually. A comprehensive accounting is not yet possible. Rather, Free to Think 2024 analyzes reported incidents that illustrate recurring themes, regional trends, and common factors that warrant deeper attention from stakeholders, especially states, intergovernmental organizations, higher education leaders, the media, and civil society.

This chapter provides an overview of the typology of attacks, using Monitoring Project data from the above-mentioned reporting period, to highlight relevant issues of concern. In addition to the six categories that the Monitoring Project tracks, we specifically highlight attacks on student expression. Such attacks often fall under one of the Monitoring Project’s six categories but are worth treating distinctly because they underscore the unique role that students play in the higher education space and as learners who carry skills of critical inquiry and expression into the wider public space.

Killings, Violence, and Disappearances

Violent attacks on scholars, students, staff, and their institutions are one of the most serious threats to the higher education sector. From large-scale explosive attacks that target university infrastructure, staff, and students to targeted killings and threats of violence against individuals or groups, these attacks result in loss of lives and injuries to many, compromise the safety of entire campuses, and incite fear in faculty, students, administrators, and society at large. This, in turn, can restrict access to higher education, threaten the functioning of the higher education space, and chill academic freedom.

Since the Monitoring Project’s inception in 2011, SAR has registered 1,074 violent attacks (roughly one third of total attacks documented), including 100 that occurred during this reporting period (about one quarter of the total number of attacks analyzed for this report). It is worth noting that this number includes attacks in which police or other security personnel use lethal or less lethal force^[4] against organized student expression or protests. These incidents are described below in the subsection of this chapter dedicated to student expression.

The current reporting period saw several different forms of violence targeting scholars and students. Security forces forcibly disappeared scholars. Student groups, members of the public, and unknown assailants violently attacked or threatened scholars or students because of the content of their teaching; their racial, ethnic, or religious identity; or their social or political activism. And armed groups opportunistically targeted students and scholars, taking advantage of university and college campuses and facilities as places where groups of people gather according to predictable schedules, especially when inadequate steps were taken to provide for the security of campuses, classrooms, transports, and dormitories. The following examples from the reporting period illustrate these forms of attack.

Two professors of Chinese origin working at universities in Japan went missing while visiting China. On March 18, 2024, Kobe Gakuin University announced that Hu Shiyun, the former head of the university’s Chinese language department, was missing after traveling to China in August 2023.^[5] A month later, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary announced that Fan Yuntao, a professor of international law and political science at Asia University, had disappeared while in China in February 2023.^[6]

In Bangladesh, student groups, particularly Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL), the student wing of the Awami League, the country’s ruling party, continued to violently target scholars, university staff members, and other students for their opposing political views or to pressure them into favoring the group.^[7] For example, On January 17, 2024, several BCL members assaulted Helal Uddin, a staff member of Government Ashek Mahmud College, Jamalpur, after he refused to enroll students without administrative approval.^[8]

Myanmar’s military forces continued to target student leaders engaged in the armed and civil resistance movement. On July 28, 2023, members of the military killed three Budalin Student Union (BSU) leaders involved in the nonviolent civil disobedience movement. During the week prior to the killing, BSU had hung banners throughout Budalin Township protesting the military junta.^[9]

In Israel, on October 28, 2023, three weeks after Hamas launched its brutal assault in the southern part of the country, members of the local community chanted “Death to Arabs” outside of dorms where Palestinian students lived at Netanya Academic College. The assailants accused the Palestinian students of throwing eggs at a local synagogue and playing loud music to interrupt a Shabbat service. A police investigation found the accusations unfounded. Police safely escorted the students out of the building.^[10]

In Nigeria, unidentified gunmen were responsible for a pattern of opportunistic attacks on higher education. Attackers took advantage of poorly secured campuses and dorms to abduct students, scholars, and staff and hold them for ransom. For example, on October 22, 2023, gunmen abducted Comfort Adokwe, a lecturer in the Faculty of Administration and Deputy Director of the Gender Studies program at Nasarawa State University, Keffi, from her residence. Adokwe was held for three days, until her family paid a ransom of 5 million naira (about $6,300 USD).^[11] Twelve days earlier, gunmen had also abducted four Nasarawa State University, Keffi, students from a private student hostel, demanding a ransom of 20 million naira (about $25,000 USD). The Nigerian military reportedly secured the students’ release.^[12]

SAR condemns targeted, violent attacks on higher education communities, as well as threats of violence. As articulated in the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, state authorities have the primary responsibility and duty to ensure that acts of violence do not abrogate students’ and scholars’ right to academic freedom.^[13] As such, SAR calls on state authorities to investigate these incidents, to make every effort to hold perpetrators accountable, and to ensure the security of all members of the community. State authorities must publicize investigations and accountability measures in order to inform constituents, positively influence state and non-state actors, and make these measures effective. SAR also calls on higher education institutions and civil society to press state authorities for greater protection and accountability and to contribute to efforts to understand and reinforce principles of autonomy and academic freedom.

Wrongful Imprisonment and Prosecution

Scholars and students bring attention to a variety of important issues and may question dominant discourse and figures of authority through their academic work, inquiry, expression, and associations. In an effort to maintain power and control, state authorities—sometimes at the request or with the assent of university authorities—may attempt to silence them with a range of coercive legal measures, including criminal investigations, arrests, prosecutions, imprisonment, and injunctions and other forms of pressure. Since the Monitoring Project’s inception, SAR has documented 973 incidents involving wrongful imprisonment or prosecution, 91 of which occurred during this reporting period.

Imprisonments and prosecutions of scholars and students are wrongful when they punish, deter, or impede nonviolent academic activity or the exercise of other protected rights, including freedoms of expression, association, or assembly. Such prosecutions are typically brought under laws aimed at restricting critical inquiry and expression. These include opaque and overbroad laws on blasphemy, lèse-majesté, civil and criminal defamation, sedition, espionage, national security, and terrorism that make illegal the mere expression of opinions or ideas on certain topics, without any link to violent or otherwise criminal acts or intentions whatsoever.^[14] Such laws raise concern for entire higher education communities in that they sanction and impose artificial boundaries on research, teaching, publications, and discussion, undermining quality, creativity, and innovation that can benefit society at large. Scholars also face legal actions brought under other laws of general application, including, for example, those proscribing financial impropriety, corruption, or immorality. Wrongful prosecutions under these laws damage the reputation of the targeted individuals and isolate them from their institutions, colleagues, and other sources of professional and personal support.

In many cases, legal proceedings and prosecutions of scholars and students involve forced confessions, fabricated evidence, arbitrary charges, and lengthy prison sentences or harsh penalties. Trials may be repeatedly delayed or held in secret or closed-door proceedings, denying access to media and family. Such actions raise serious due process concerns. Detained or imprisoned scholars and students may also be held in overcrowded cells or solitary confinement; denied access to appropriate medical care, family, or legal counsel; and subjected to lengthy interrogations, abuse, and torture.

During the reporting period, lecturers, researchers, and other academic personnel, as well as students, faced investigation, prosecution, imprisonment, and other legal actions for criticizing their governments or university administrations, participating in anti-government activism organizing to promote better conditions for students and teachers, and engaging in public commentary on current events, particularly the crisis in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank, among other things. The examples below from this reporting period demonstrate the diversity of alleged bases for coercive legal actions and the range of actions taken to silence and punish scholars.

It should be noted that a significant number of incidents involving wrongful imprisonment and persecution relate to student expression and appear in the subsection of this chapter on student expression. These include instances in which police detained large numbers of students, and some academics, for their involvement in protests expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people and calling for their universities to divest from companies that do business with Israel.

In Nicaragua, police arrested scholars and students who criticized the government. For instance, on November 28, 2023, police arrested sociologist Freddy Quezada, who was a professor at the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua until 2018, when he was fired for criticizing the government’s repression of student protests. The arrest took place after Quezada posted under a pseudonym to the social media platform X criticizing government policies. Quezada was given no opportunity for legal representation or access to medical care.^[15] In early 2024, Quezada was tried during a one-day trial, which he was permitted to join only via Zoom. He was found guilty of “incitement to hatred.”^[16] On September 5, 2024, the United States secured the release of 135 Nicaraguan prisoners, including Quezada, on humanitarian grounds. The prisoners were released to Guatemala.^[17]

On May 21, 2024, Étienne Fakaba Sissoko, an economist and professor at the University of Bamako in Mali was sentenced to two years in prison and fined three million CFA francs (about $4,900 USD) on charges “harming the reputation of the state,” “defamation,” and “dissemination of false news disturbing the public peace.” Sissoko’s 2023 book Propaganda, Agitation, and Harassment: Communication During the Transition in Mali describes the government’s use of propaganda and false information to influence public opinion.^[18]

In November 2023, Libya’s Internal Security Agency (ISA) arrested two faculty members for their union activities. On November 16, the ISA arrested Professor Abdel Fattah Al-Sayeh, the head of the General Syndicate of University Teaching Staff Members (GSUTSM), and on November 28, the ISA arrested Dr. Abdulkader Al-Lamoushi (also written Abdulghder Yusef Elamoushi), a faculty staff member at the University of Tripoli and the head of the National Association for Talented and Gifted People. The two arrests came as university teaching staff, led by the GSUTSM, engaged in a sit-in and strike to demand administrative sabbaticals and the resumption of a study-abroad delegation plan. The arrests appeared designed to put pressure on striking teachers to come to an agreement with the government. Both faculty members were released shortly after their arrests.^[19]

In Israel, on April 18, 2024, police arrested Professor Nadira Shalhoub-Kevorkian, the Lawrence D. Biele Chair in Law at the Faculty of Law-Institute of Criminology and the School of Social Work and Public Welfare at Hebrew University, on suspicion of incitement to terrorism, violence, and racism. Hebrew University’s administration had previously put pressure on Shalhoub-Kevorkian to resign and then temporarily suspended her for remarks that she made condemning Israeli military actions in Gaza and expressing doubt about Hamas fighters’ use of sexual violence on October 7, 2023.^[20] In early April, Israeli police gained approval from the prosecutor’s office for a criminal investigation against Shalhoub Kevorkian on the basis of her remarks. While in prison, Shalhoub-Kevorkian reported being strip-searched, handcuffed, and held in a cold cell without adequate clothing, food, water, or medication. Police released Shalhoub–Kevorkian the following day, but the case remained open at the time of writing.^[21]

In Afghanistan, on January 9, 2024, Taliban forces detained Javed Kakar, Vice-Chancellor of Student Affairs at Roshan Afghanistan Online University (RAO), an online university opened in December 2022 in response to the Taliban’s ban on women’s higher education. The university provides access to free higher education, with a focus on Afghan women. Taliban forces interrogated Kakar about RAO funding and affiliations, releasing him two weeks later. Kakar resigned from his role at the university.^[22]

Iran’s security forces continued to arrest scholars and students opposed to the regime. For example, on January 28, 2024, police arrested Sepehr Shirani, an 18-year old Baluch student, for his involvement in protests against the government. He died while in custody under unclear circumstances.^[23] On March 16, 2024, police arrested Sedigheh Vasmaghi—a professor of theology and Islamic jurisprudence in Iran, author, and women’s rights advocate—charging her with “propaganda against the system in cyberspace” and “public appearances without [the] Shari’a-compliant hijab.” Vasmaghi has openly opposed Iran’s mandatory hijab law, condemned the government’s crackdown related to the law, and criticized Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. Vasmaghi reported torture while in prison and denial of visitors or proper medical care. She was released on bail on April 29 because of deteriorating health concerns.^[24]

On August 23, 2023, Maidul Islam, a professor of sociology at Chittagong University in Bangladesh, received a show-cause letter—a court order that requires a party to appear before the court and explain why a certain course of action should not be taken against them. The letter apparently was related to Facebook posts that Islam had made criticizing Bangladesh’s ruling party, the Awami League.^[25]

In India, on February 14, 2024, the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B) sent Deepak Malghan, an associate professor in public policy, a gag order against publicly commenting about the university. Malghan had previously criticized caste discrimination and lack of transparency at IIM-B.^[26]

The incidents described above provide a disturbing accounting of the range of punitive legal actions that members of the academic community often suffer in connection with their research, publications, expressive activity, and associations. These actions—often at the hands of state authorities—undermine academic freedom, as stated in the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom.^[27] Such actions can leave them with physical and emotional scars and, in some cases, destroy careers. Beyond the immediate harm to those individual scholars and students, wrongful imprisonments and prosecutions send a message to higher education communities and society at large that expressing ideas or raising questions can result in grave consequences. As a result, society risks losing the benefits of a diverse community of scholars and students free to carry out their work or share their thoughts without fear of punishment by state authorities.

SAR urges state authorities around the world to release scholars and students imprisoned for their academic work or the nonviolent exercise of other protected rights. SAR calls on state authorities to immediately release wrongfully imprisoned scholars and students, especially those who have health conditions that elevate their level of risk or who are being held in unsanitary or crowded conditions. Pending this, states must uphold their obligations under domestic and international law, including those related to due process and the humane treatment of prisoners. SAR further urges state authorities to drop prosecutions against scholars in connection with nonviolent academic or expressive activity, to review laws that have been used wrongfully to prosecute scholars and students, and to amend or repeal them as necessary to ensure that scholars can think, question, and share ideas without fear of retribution.

Loss of Position

State and higher education authorities often use a range of disciplinary actions to punish, deter, and restrict the exercise of academic freedom and other protected rights of scholars. These include the loss of position by dismissal, suspension, denial of contract renewal or of promotions or other benefits to scholars. At times, actors external to the university, including alumni, donors, elected officials, members of the media, or community members, may put pressure on university authorities to punish scholars. State or university officials may point specifically to the content of research or teaching in explaining disciplinary actions. However, they may also attribute the action to regular administrative or employment decisions having nothing to do with academic content or conduct, such as budget cuts or lack of demand, or allegations of poor performance, violation of policy, violation of terms of employment or admission, fraud, or other dishonest or inappropriate behavior; they may also provide no explanation.^[28]

Since the Monitoring Project’s inception, SAR has reported 387 incidents involving permanent or temporary loss of position or threats of the same, including 81 during this reporting period. This includes cases affecting both scholars and students.^[29]  Such disciplinary actions were common during the reporting period. In particular, professors lost their positions or experienced other disciplinary actions either for teaching or researching politically sensitive topics or for commenting on them publicly. This was especially the case regarding expression concerning the ongoing violence in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). In addition, universities took a range of disciplinary actions against large numbers of students and faculty for participating in widespread protests. These latter incidents are described in the subsection of this chapter on student expression below.

The below examples illustrate a range of employment and administrative actions taken against lecturers, researchers, and other academic personnel during this reporting period.

In the United States, dozens of scholars and university staff members lost their jobs because their teaching, scholarship, or job focused on disfavored topics. Adjunct professors found their positions at particular risk, given the precarious nature of their jobs.^[30] For example, in May 2024, DePaul University terminated the contract of Anne d’Aquino, an adjunct professor in microbiology, who had been scheduled to teach a course examining the relevance of microbiology research to everyday life and current events. After students complained about an optional assignment d’Aquino gave analyzing the biological and health impacts of Israeli military action on Gaza, the university fired d’Aquino, effective immediately.^[31] At Catholic University, psychology professor Melissa Goldberg lost her job after a doula she invited to class spoke about providing abortion and about caring for transgender patients.^[32] In April 2024, the University of Texas branches in Austin and Dallas each closed their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) offices and laid off a combined total of 70 employees to comply with a new Texas law banning DEI activities at the state’s public colleges and universities.^[33]

In Israel, dozens of students and scholars were suspended or fired because of their public commentary on social media. For example, in October 2023, about a week after Hamas’s attack on southern Israel, Kaye Academic College of Education suspended and then fired Warda Sada—a professor, educator, and longtime peace activist involved in several Jewish-Palestinian groups—because of a series of social media posts that she published linking Hamas’s attack to Palestinian suffering, arguing against Israeli military action in Gaza, expressing support for hostage negotiations, and acknowledging the pain of both Israeli and Palestinian victims.^[34] Also in mid-October, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design suspended at least nine Palestinian students because of pro-Palestinian sentiments that they had allegedly expressed on social media.^[35]

In April 2024, Germany’s University of Cologne withdrew its 2024 Albertus Magnus Professorship after it became public that the intended recipient, Nancy Fraser, a professor of philosophy at The New School, had signed an open letter, “Philosophy for Palestine.”^[36]

Russian universities continued to purge professors who dissented with the war in Ukraine or appeared to align with the West.^[37] For example, on September 1, 2023, Russia’s Academy of Sciences (RAN) dismissed Valery Garbuzov, the director of RAN’s U.S. and Canada Studies Institute (ISKRAN). Garbuzov had published an opinion piece criticizing the Russian government’s foreign policy and use of propaganda in the news publication Nezavisimaya Gazeta.^[38]

Iran’s universities purged professors who expressed support for anti-government protests or criticized the government. For example, on December 28, 2023, Alireza Azad, a professor of theology at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, announced on Instagram that he had been dismissed for supporting protesting students.^[39]

In Hungary, Corvinus University of Budapest dismissed Dr. Zoltán Ádám, an associate professor of economics, in apparent retaliation for refusing to give an examination to a student who had not met the necessary requirements. The student’s family members are stakeholders of the MOL Group, a Hungarian energy company. Together with the Corvinus University administration, they pressured Ádám to give the exam. Ádám filed a complaint with the university’s ethics committee. While the committee initially condemned three university leaders, the Corvinus board of trustees later overturned the committee’s decision and dismissed Ádám.^[40]

In Bangladesh, Comilla University (CoU) suspended a student journalist, Mohammad Iqbal Monowar, after he published a story in a national daily newspaper that quoted a speech by the university’s vice-chancellor and claimed that the vice-chancellor had expressed appreciation for corruption in Bangladesh. The university claimed that Monowar had misreported the speech by the university’s vice-chancellor and damaged the university’s reputation.^[41]

Expulsions, dismissals, suspensions, and other forms of professional retaliation or silencing can have a corrosive effect on academic freedom and free expression generally. As noted in the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, “rules and practices for appointment, hiring, conditions of work, admissions, promotion, tenure and retention, and expulsion or dismissal of institutional leadership, administrative and academic, research, and teaching staff, and students must be free of political or outside influence.”^[42] When this principle is not followed, university autonomy is eroded, and the likelihood of self-censorship, and even brain drain, increases as scholars and students seek fairer and more transparent environments in which to conduct their research, teaching, and studying. Professional retaliation can also leave individuals isolated and vulnerable to more extreme forms of attack, including arrest, prosecution, and violence. Early attention to dismissals and expulsions may then help to forestall these attacks. Finally, to the extent that these forms of attacks are intended to silence critics and, in the case of students, eliminate their potential for effective criticism and dissent in the future, these forms of attacks threaten the foundations of democratic society and warrant a robust response.

To safeguard academic freedom and institutional autonomy and to maintain the highest standards of quality education, SAR calls on higher education leaders and state authorities to refrain from taking or compelling disciplinary actions intended to punish or restrict the exercise of academic freedom and other protected rights. SAR further calls on higher education leaders and administrators to ensure faculty and students due process in all disciplinary proceedings.

Travel Restrictions

The freedom of movement is fundamental to quality higher education, advancing the exchange of new ideas and bolstering international academic collaborations to address the world’s problems. However, the international and intrastate mobility of both students and scholars is routinely threatened by state actors seeking to limit the flow of knowledge. Governments deny scholars and students entry at their national borders, deport members of the academic community, and enact policies that seek to or unintentionally limit or frustrate academic travel, including for fieldwork, conferences, study abroad, and to take up employment offers.

To be clear, states have the right to control entry into their territories and to restrict travel to protect national security and public health; however, they must do so consistent with their obligations under domestic and international law. Restrictions on travel intended to limit particular academic content or conduct, or that of particular scholars or students, may violate academic freedom, freedom of expression, and other internationally recognized freedoms.^[43]

In addition to the free movement of people, the free flow of ideas is also essential for advancing knowledge and understanding. Technology has made virtual cross-border collaboration increasingly possible. To the extent that governments enact policies that function as barriers to international research cooperation, these policies also function as barriers to academic freedom.

Since the Monitoring Project’s inception, SAR has reported 104 incidents involving travel restrictions that have directly impacted thousands of scholars and students. Eight of these incidents took place during the current reporting period. These incidents involved cases in which scholars were denied entry to countries on the basis of their personal scholarship, as well as instances in which geopolitical tensions resulted in travel restrictions.

In India, on February 23, 2024, immigration officials denied entry to Nitasha Kaul, a professor of politics, international relations, and critical interdisciplinary studies and the head of the Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD) at the University of Westminster’s School of Social Sciences. Kaul grew up in India, is a British citizen, and holds an Overseas Citizen of India card—a multiple entry, multipurpose, and lifelong visa for visiting India. Kaul was traveling to India to speak at a two-day convention on the “Constitution and National Unity.” Immigration officials told Kaul that the central government had instructed them to deny her entry and referred to comments that she had made that were critical of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a right-wing Hindu nationalist paramilitary organization.^[44]

On April 12, 2024, immigration authorities in Germany denied entry to Ghassan Abu Sittah, a surgeon and the rector of the University of Glasgow, who was scheduled to speak about his recent experiences in Gaza at the Palästina Kongress (Palestine Congress), organized by the German nonprofit Jewish Voice for Just Peace in the Middle East, later that day.^[45]

In October 2023, the Chinese University of Hong Kong terminated the contract of historian Rowena He after Hong Kong’s Immigration Department declined to renew her visa. The decision appeared to be connected to foreign funding that she had received for past research projects and her previous employment with foreign universities. Chinese government-affiliated newspapers also accused He of slandering the Chinese government.^[46]

On February 17, 2024, Zimbabwe deported a group of researchers affiliated with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) who were conducting a study on governance in the country. The researchers included Loretta Bass, a professor of sociology at the University of Oklahoma; Norma Kriger, an independent scholar; researcher and policy expert Brenda Lee Pearson; and USAID Senior Rule of Law advisor. The four were in Zimbabwe to assess development and governance in the country to inform USAID’s work. They were accused of “sneaking” into the country in order to “inform Washington’s adversarial foreign policy towards Zimbabwe.” According to USAID, the researchers were detained overnight, subjected to prolonged interrogation, and transported under unsafe conditions. Their personal electronic equipment was also seized.^[47]

On February 12, 2024, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced sanctions, including entry bans, on 18 British citizens, among them 8 scholars and researchers. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed that the ban was a response to the United Kingdom’s alleged efforts to demonize Russia and promote anti-Russian narratives and accused the scholars of contributing to the UK’s “sabotage operations in Russia.”^[48]

In Afghanistan, on August 23, 2023, Taliban officials turned approximately 60 women away from the airport in Kabul when they arrived to travel to Dubai to study at the University of Dubai. One woman reported to the media that the Taliban told her that women holding student visas could not leave the country.^[49]

Healthy societies require the free movement of scholars, students, and their ideas. The Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom point out that “restrictions on movement,  including restrictions on entry, exit, return after exit, or right to remain, which intentionally punish, deter, or impede research, teaching or discourse of academic, research, and teaching staff and students, or otherwise sanction a member of the education sector for their exercise of protected rights,” repress and often penalize the international exchange of ideas that is a hallmark of modern academia, thereby undermining academic freedom.^[50] SAR calls upon state and international authorities to adopt and respect policies that fully protect the right to academic travel, including the “freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers.”^[51] State authorities should not deny scholars and students entry or exit visas, cancel their passports, force their return to their home countries, or otherwise attempt to impede or interfere with academic expression or conduct.

Student Expression

A substantial proportion of the incidents reported in SAR’s Monitoring Project relate to student expression. As noted in the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, “As members of education communities students have the right to academic freedom.”^[52] Incidents relating to student expression include violent attacks and threats that obstruct students’ freedom of expression, assembly, and association and incidents in which students take actions or call for violence, intimidation, or interference that may undermine academic freedom and free expression. During this reporting period, SAR reported 162 student expression–related incidents that directly impacted many hundreds of students and other victims.

In the first instance, individual and organized student expression is an integral part of the higher education process and an important contributor to public discourse generally. Students’ right to engage in such protests is protected under international human rights standards relating to academic freedom, freedom of expression, freedoms of assembly and association, and the right to education. Despite these protections, state and institutional actors frequently restrict and retaliate against student expression through the use of violent force, detentions, and coercive legal and disciplinary actions. Beyond violating internationally recognized human rights and endangering members of the campus community, attacks on student expression chill the learning environment and limit the free inquiry and expression required for open, democratically legitimate societies.

Police Use of Force Against Students

During the reporting period, students protested over the rising cost of tuition and education policy, among other concerns. However, in many countries student protest activity overwhelmingly focused on the ongoing violence in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. Across the globe, students protested en masse demanding that their universities call for a ceasefire in Gaza and divest from companies that do business with the Israeli military or support Israeli policies in the West Bank and Gaza. Students engaged in marches, sit-ins, and vigils; they set up encampments on their campuses; and they occupied campus buildings, renaming them in honor of places in Gaza. On April 18, 2024, Columbia University leaders requested that police disperse students who had established an encampment on campus, resulting in the arrests of 108 students.^[53] News of the arrests sparked a wave of protests that spread first across the United States and later to Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.^[54]

Most of the Palestinian solidarity protests observed were peaceful. Students set up encampments, held posters, chanted slogans, created artwork, and engaged in teach-ins. On many campuses, students engaged without serious incidents with fellow students, faculty, and administrators.^[55] Some protests did have negative impacts on campuses, ranging from minor debris requiring clean up to defacing or damaging of university grounds and facilities, the latter in the most egregious instances resulting in substantial financial costs.^[56]

Within or adjacent to some protests, individuals, including protestors, used slogans or expressions that were either overtly or interpreted by some to be antisemitic, anti-Muslim, or anti-Arab, and in some cases such expression crossed the line into harassment or physical intimidation.^[57] This resulted in an atmosphere on some campuses where some Israeli, Jewish, Arab, or Muslim students or their supporters reported feelings of insecurity that impeded their regular academic or other activities. Campus leaders have an obligation to take such concerns seriously, to ensure safety, and to develop reasonable accommodations to address subjective concerns, but must do so while still respecting the academic freedom, free expression, and protest rights of other members of the community. Some campus leaders did so successfully by engaging in dialogue-based responses with affected students, protesters, and faculty members.^[58] Other campus leaders, and sometimes protest leaders, rejected or abandoned dialogue in favor of more confrontational responses.

State and higher education officials in some cases called in police or security forces to break up protests. Not all arrests were violations of students’ rights. However, where police were present, the situation was more likely to turn violent,^[59] resulting in clashes, with police sometimes using less lethal methods of crowd control, including teargas and rubber bullets. In addition to being arrested, students and faculty members who participated in the protests were investigated by universities and were often suspended during the investigations or banned from campus facilities.^[60] International students, in particular, faced severe repercussions for engaging in activism, including the risk of deportation if suspended or expelled.^[61]

In the United States, at Washington University (WashU) in St. Louis, on April 27, 2024, police arrested around 100 people, including 23 WashU students and at least four WashU staff members, at a protest organized by WashU Resist, a student group, and the St. Louis branch of the Party for Socialism and Liberation. The arrests took place after the WashU police announced that the protest was “unlawful.” During the arrests, five officers grabbed a faculty member from Southern Illinois University who was present at the protest, leading him to be hospitalized with broken ribs and a broken hand. WashU reported that four police officers were also injured. Following the protest, the university placed six faculty members on paid leave pending an investigation into their participation in the protest. While under investigation, the faculty members are banned from campus, locked out of “university systems,” and forbidden from speaking with WashU staff and students, even in off-campus settings.^[62]

In India, on October 23, 2023, police detained more than two hundred students from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Jamia Millia Islamia University, and the University of Delhi as they protested outside of the Israeli embassy in solidarity with the OPT. Students claimed that police “manhandled” them, causing some injuries.^[63]

In France, on April 29, 2024, police dragged student protesters who had set up an encampment at Sorbonne University from campus. The request to remove protesters was reportedly made by French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal. Following the police intervention, Sorbonne University announced that its campus would be closed for the rest of the day.^[64]

On November 21, 2023, in Italy, police used riot shields to block student protesters from marching at the University of Florence and hit students with batons. The protest was led by the Studenti Di Sinistra (Students of the Left) and the Union of University Students to call for the university to take a clear position on a ceasefire and Gaza and to divest from Israeli institutions.^[65]

In several instances, members of the public used violence against student protesters. In the United States, at the University of California, Los Angeles, on April 3, a group of pro-Israel counterprotesters violently assaulted pro-Palestinian encampment in an attack that lasted for hours before police intervened. No counterprotesters were arrested.^[67] In mid-January 2024, at least two people allegedly sprayed Columbia University students with a foul-smelling chemical during a pro-Palestinian “divest now” rally on campus.^[68]

As pro-Palestine and Gaza solidarity encampments and the scenes of violent police intervention spread, universities began to turn to other means to quell the protests. Significantly, some universities sought to negotiate with protesters,^[69] occasionally going so far as to offer students “amnesty” from disciplinary action.^[70] Other universities engaged in legal action against student protesters. Universities in the United Kingdom and Canada, for instance, turned to the court systems.^[71] In the UK, the High Court concluded that students protesting at the universities of Birmingham and Nottingham, Queen Mary University of London, the London School of Economics, and University College London were trespassing on their campuses and allowed the universities to evict the protesters from their encampments.^[72]

State and private security forces also used force against and detained students protesting over other issues related to education, politics, and society.

A massive student uprising that took place in Bangladesh in July and August 2024—after the end of the reporting period for this report—resulted in the deaths of more than 200 people, mostly at the hands of state police. In addition more than 10,000 were arrested, most in “block raids,” during which police knocked on doors looking for students.^[73]

In Ethiopia, police beat student protests with batons and rifles, arresting 20 students from Mekelle University as they peacefully marched with banners from campus to the city center. Mekelle University is located in the conflict-affected Tigray region of Ethiopia. The students were protesting a delay in their graduation after the university revoked a decision to allow them to take additional courses beyond the usual limit in order to make up for the disruptions caused by the conflict.^[74]

On April 3, 2024, police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse students protesting a decision by the Cabinet of Ministers approving private medical universities near the University of Moratuwa in Sri Lanka.^[75]

Mauritania’s police forcibly dispersed a peaceful student protest organized by the National Union of Mauritanian Students outside of Mauritania’s Ministry of Higher Education, Scientific Research, and Information and Communication Technologies on January 8, 2024. The students were protesting for increased access to housing, transportation assistance, and the transparent allocation of scholarships. At least three students went to the hospital for injuries that they sustained.^[76]

In the Côte d’Ivoire, police used teargas to disperse students protesting at an event held by Côte d’Ivoire’s Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research Adama Diawara at the Université Félix Houphouët-Boigny on November 16, 2023.^[77]

In Greece, on August 24, 2023, security forces clashed with student protesters demonstrating for the resumption of classes amid an ongoing teachers’ strike and an increase in scholarship aid at the University of Antananarivo in Ankatso. The protesting students held up banners, blocked traffic, burned tires at the entrance of the university campus, and threw stones at police who entered the campus. Security forces used tear gas and arrested eight students.^[78]

On September 26, 2023, Armenian “red berets” (special forces) detained eight American University of Armenia students who were staging a peaceful protest on campus in support of Artsakh Armenians. Around 40 members of the red berets roughly removed the eight students and took them away in police vans.^[79]

SAR condemns violent and coercive attacks against students, from whatever source. SAR urges governments and higher education leaders to ensure that security officials, both state and private, exercise restraint and respond to student expression and protest activities in an appropriate and proportional manner, focused on de-escalation and consistent with recognized international human rights standards. States should not use weapons when responding to nonviolent student expression.^[80] If force is necessary, as a last resort to maintain safety, it must be proportionate and limited so as to reduce unnecessary risk of harm to protesting students and others. State authorities must further ensure appropriate protections for nonviolent student expression—especially when on a campus or in an academic setting. SAR calls on state authorities to immediately release students in custody and drop any charges that stem from their peaceful academic or expressive activity. SAR urges higher education leaders to refrain from taking disciplinary actions against students in retaliation for or to restrict nonviolent student expression, inquiry, assembly, or association.

Students too have a responsibility to ensure that protests remain peaceful. SAR calls on students to engage in expressive actions responsibly and refrain from violence, including by refraining from direct or threatened harm to others, or materially disrupting the operations of the university and truth-seeking of other students, faculty, or community members.

Disciplinary Actions Against Protesting Students

Students also face academic reprisals for expressive activity, including suspension, expulsion, and bans. Retaliations of this type can have lasting negative impacts on the students they affect: even if they are permitted to enroll elsewhere, other institutions may be hesitant to accept them, fearing government reprisals if they do so, and as a result, the students’ future prospects are reduced.

Students, meanwhile, may experience permanent or temporary expulsion, loss of scholarships or access to housing or other facilities, or suspension of the student groups that they participate in.

On May 14, 2024, in Morocco, the dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy in Rabat, the president of Abdelmalek Saadi University, and the administration of Mohammed I University in Oujda suspended for two years a combined total of 15 students for participating in a peaceful boycott of classes. The boycott came following two years of protests after the Moroccan Ministries of Health and Higher Education reduced the length of medical studies from seven to six years, a change that the students believe will reduce the quality of their education.^[81]

In Iran, as of May 2024, it was estimated that more than 700 students had been arrested, attacked, or beaten for participating in demonstrations at universities related to the anti-government “Women, Life, Freedom” movement that began in September 2022. For example, in June 2023, the University of Isfahan’s Disciplinary Committee banned Fahimeh Soltani from studying for two and a half semesters for her protest activities.^[82]

India’s Mahatma Gandhi Antarrashtriya Hindi Vishwavidyalaya suspended five students on January 27, 2024. for allegedly spreading misinformation and “anarchy” on social media about the university’s vice-chancellor (VC). Some of the students had protested against the VC for raising the Indian flag during the campus Republic Day celebrations; others had posted Facebook messages critical of the VC. In addition, the university called police, who detained two of the students and later evicted one student and barred another from a student hostel.^[83]

In Turkey, in December 2023, Boğaziçi University suspended 16 students for one month and revoked their ID cards in retaliation for their participation in a protest against a decision to restructure two of the university’s faculties. The students were left unable to access on campus housing.^[84]

In Germany, in January 2024, the University of Cologne temporarily banned a student from entering the university in order to prevent him from attending a talk by Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor. The banned student had “liked” a social media post that encouraged a boycott of the talk. He had also previously used the slogan “from the river to the sea”—or possibly had just shared a post using the slogan—on social media. The university stated that it was concerned that the student would disrupt Prosor’s talk and barred the student from entering the university on January 7 and 8. The Cologne Administrative Court declared the ban illegal.^[85]

University Policies Restricting Protest

Globally, universities—and, in some cases, government authorities—sought to develop new policies restricting students’ right to protest or, more broadly, to engage in politics on campus. While many of these policies appeared to be a direct response to protests over the violence in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank, they were not exclusively so. Often these policies used overly broad and vague language that left room for interpretation and discriminatory application.^[86] In some cases, they were adopted without transparency or consultation with the wider university community and they were put in place quietly, leaving students and faculty unaware of their existence.^[87] Some policies required that students provide advanced notice of their plans to protest and receive permission for those protests from their institutions, making it difficult for students to respond spontaneously to real-time events.

Some universities in the United States developed new policies restricting student protests—a trend that was expected to continue throughout the summer.^[88] For example, on February 13, 2024, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) suspended the student group Coalition Against Apartheid (CAA). The suspension came after MIT’s administration put in place new “time, place, and manner” restrictions on protests that specified that campus groups must meet with the Office of Student Organizations, Leadership, and Engagement (SOLE), a subunit of the Division of Student Life (DSL), at least three days before a planned protest. CAA objected, and the parties came to an agreement that, when CAA wanted to engage in an “emergency” demonstration with less than three days’ notice, the group would coordinate with DSL and SOLE as early as possible. On February 12, following Israeli airstrikes in southern Gaza, CAA notified SOLE and DSL of their intention to hold a demonstration on the same day. According to reports, SOLE gave tacit approval while DSL disagreed. On February 13, DSL sent CAA a suspension letter citing its demonstration the previous day.^[89] On April 24, 2024, at Indiana University (IU), Bloomington, after learning that a group of students planned to establish a pro-Palestinian encampment in IU’s Dunn Meadow, IU Provost Rahul Shrivastav formed an ad-hoc committee comprised of a small group of IU administrators, including President Pamela Whitten. The committee quietly changed the university’s assembly ground policy to prohibit the “temporary or permanent installation of outdoor structures” without approval from the board of trustees and to prohibit the use of “signage” and “tents.” The changes were directly to the university undergraduate events website and posted a physical copy of the new policy on the lawn where the students planned to gather. Having changed the policy, IU later called police to disperse protesters, resulting in the arrests of 56 protesters over the course of two days.^[90]

In May 2024, the University of Melbourne in Australia responded to student protests by developing a new policy on campus access that bans students from protesting without advanced notice. It was reported at the same time that the university was using surveillance technology to identify those students who did protest. Groups, including Amnesty International, decried the new policies and the breach of privacy caused by the use of surveillance technology.^[91]

In India, during the summer of 2023, South Asian University began requiring that new students admitted to the university sign a 13-point pledge to refrain from protesting, agitating, or striking on campus and to declare that they are physically and mentally healthy. The pledge was included in the admissions guidelines emailed to students provisionally admitted to the university under the condition that they agree to follow the guidelines. The new policy appeared to be a direct response to student protests that had taken place at the university over the previous academic year.^[92]

Similarly, Iran’s Shahid Beheshti University announced a new policy in January 2024 that left students with prior disciplinary convictions ineligible to enroll in the university’s “exceptional talents program.” The policy also stated that some students would be required to receive approval from university security for admission to postgraduate studies.^[93]

In Namibia, in May 2024, the University of Namibia issued an internal memorandum that banned political activities from taking place on campus. The university later used the new directive to prevent the Affirmative Reposition Student Command from holding a meeting on campus.^[94]

While university authorities have an obligation to take all reasonable measures to ensure the safety of students and university personnel and should endeavor to prevent disruptions that inappropriately inhibit the functioning of or access to higher education, they must do so consistent with their responsibility to ensure academic freedom and free expression on campus.

Students as Perpetrators of Violations

In addition to being subjected to violations, students can also become perpetrators of violations that damage academic freedom and free expression on campus. A minority of incidents involve some students—often subsets of a broader group—engaging in physical violence directed at fellow students, higher education personnel, or campus facilities. In particular, clashes between student groups disrupted education on college and university campuses and made the learning environment unwelcoming and unsafe. The following incidents illustrate the kinds of student clashes that occurred on campus during the current reporting period.

In Bangladesh, around 20 Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) members assaulted six law students at the University of Dhaka (DU) on March 13, 2024. The law students had gathered at a mosque located in Bangabandhu Tower, an on-campus residential building for DU employees, for a seminar. As they were leaving, DU BCL General Secretary Tawhidul Islam Sujan and around 20 other BCL members confronted the law students, accusing them of being members of a rival political student group, throwing them to the ground and beating them. At least one student was transported to the hospital with serious injuries.^[95] Significantly, political groups have been banned on campuses since 2019 in Bangladesh, which has a long history of on-campus violence between student branches of political parties. But on April 1, 2024, the High Court of Bangladesh stayed the ban to consider whether it was unconstitutional. While the majority of students in Bangladesh reported supporting a ban on political groups at universities,^[96] bans of any kind of student groups risk violating students’ right to free association on campus.

In India, on January 17, 2024, members of the Fraternity Movement, the student wing of the Welfare Party of India, accused an assistant professor at Maharajas College of preferential treatment of Student Federation of India members before stabbing him.^[97] The following day members of the Fraternity Movement together with members of the Kerala Students Union, the student wing of the Congress Party, stabbed a student at the same college.^[98]

In Canada, on November 8, 2023, pro-Palestine and pro-Israel groups clashed at Concordia University. Three students and one guard were injured, and one student was arrested.^[99]

Meanwhile, in the United States, one student injured another student as he was hanging flyers on campus on October 12, 2023. The flyers showed the name and photos of Israelis who Hamas had abducted. The injured student suffered a fractured finger and cuts.^[100]

The Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom point out that “Threats to, or violations of the rights of students and organized student groups, including by means of suspensions and expulsions; arrests and prosecutions; imprisonments and violence; infiltration, surveillance, interference with or dissolution of student associations, unions, and assemblies, by state and non-state actors, undermine academic freedom.”^[101] SAR calls on members of higher education communities and civil society to commit to respecting the campus space, both physical and virtual, as a safe, free arena where ideas can be expressed and debated without fear of physical harm or undue restriction. SAR further calls on students engaged in expressive activity, on or off campus, to do so consistent with higher education values and human rights principles. This includes abstaining from using physical violence to advance the objectives of student expression.

Regardless of the type of perpetrator, the frequency and severity of incidents involving student expression underscore the importance and vulnerability of student expression around the world. (Indeed, student expression incidents constitute roughly 50 percent of the incidents SAR reported this year, although this may reflect in part greater visibility and reporting on attacks on students relative to other attacks.) Understanding student expression—its forms, presence around the globe, and significance to education and society—and working to protect it are essential to ensuring quality higher education that provides the maximum societal benefit.

Other

The types of attacks discussed above capture the most severe incidents (killings, violence, disappearances; prosecution and imprisonment) and those that, despite the difficulty in documenting them, likely impact large numbers of scholars and students (loss of position/expulsion; travel restrictions). The “other” type captures incidents that do not fall squarely within these but may nevertheless significantly impair higher education functions, academic freedom, and the rights of entire higher education communities. Forms of “other” attacks typically include military raids on and occupations of higher education facilities; damage to or destruction of higher education facilities, often during armed conflict; legislative and administrative actions that erode institutional autonomy; systematic or repeated harassment intended to intimidate and undermine the academic freedom of scholars, students, and other personnel but lacking the overt element of violence or coercion present in the enumerated type discussed earlier; and efforts to restrict or otherwise impede higher education events. Since the Monitoring Project’s inception, SAR has reported 496 “other” incidents, including 96 during this reporting period.

Military Use and Armed Attacks on Higher Education Institutions

Among the cases SAR documents in the “other” category are those in which military, paramilitary, or organized criminal groups target, occupy, or use higher education facilities, often during armed conflict. This includes the use of higher education facilities such as barracks, weapons caches, firing ranges, and interrogation and detention centers. Such uses can disrupt or completely impede education in the short term. They can also trigger attacks by opposing forces, which damage or destroy higher education infrastructure. During the current reporting period, SAR documented cases, including the following.

In Gaza, Israel’s aerial and ground bombardment resulted in the destruction of thousands of buildings, including universities.^[102] By January 17, 2024, the media reported that Israeli military forces had destroyed the last standing university in Gaza, Al Israa University. Israeli forces had targeted the university in early November 2023, claiming that Hamas fighters had used it as a hideout. The Israeli military subsequently occupied the university for approximately two and a half months, using it as a military base and detention and interrogation center, before using landmines to destroy it.^[103] In addition, on January 24, 2024, the UN reported that direct fire had struck United Nations Relief and Works Agency’s (UNRWA’s) Khan Younis Training Center, which provides post-secondary training and vocational education and was serving as a shelter for around 800 displaced Palestinians at the time of the attack. According to UNRWA, 13 people sheltering at the training center were killed and 56 injured. The agency reported that military activity had directly and indirectly impacted the center twenty-two times since October 7, and that the January 24 strike was the third direct hit.^[104]

In the West Bank, Israeli forces damaged university infrastructure at Palestine Technical University on November 16, 2023, and at Birzeit University on November 8, 2023, when they stormed and raided the institutions.^[105]

In Myanmar, where three years of war had taken a toll on higher education,^[106] the military junta commonly deployed forces on university campuses, prompting attacks by local People’s Defense Forces (PDF), the armed resistance, and catching students and faculty members in the crossfire.^[107] On October 1, 2023, PDF conducted a sniper attack against military junta forces stationed at Pakokku Technological University.^[108]

In Ukraine, two years since Russia invaded, one in five higher education institutions had been destroyed, most in airstrikes.^[109] On January 1, 2024, Russian drones struck the National Agrarian University in Lviv, damaging the roof and windows.^[110]

In several cases, bombs planted at universities, or the threat of bombs, caused universities to temporarily close their doors or cancel events.

In the Philippines, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for a bomb that exploded on December 3, 2023, in Mindanao State University during a Catholic mass, killing four people and injuring around 50. The university suspended all academic activities until further notice.^[111]

Japan’s Meisei University canceled its April 1 student entrance ceremony because of a bomb threat.^[112] Meanwhile, on January 22, four universities in Islamabad, Pakistan, closed temporarily because of threats of suicide attacks.^[113]

Armed groups took advantage of the conditions of war in Sudan to vandalize universities. For instance, in early January, Rapid Support Forces looted the University of Gezira’s academic and administrative facilities, as well as the university’s bank and farm.^[114]

In Haiti, between February and May 2024, armed individuals conducted a series of attacks on State University of Haiti facilities, storming, looking, and vandalizing them.^[115] A student was shot during one of these attacks on February 29, 2024, at the State University of Haiti’s Faculty of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine, during which gunmen held students for an unspecified period.^[116]

Similar attacks took place in Mexico. On February 23, 2024, more than 20 hooded individuals stormed and looted the Autonomous University of Tamaulipas’s Multidisciplinary Academic Unit. Several staff members were injured, including the director and secretary of the administration.^[117]

As noted in the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, states and other parties must ensure that even in times of war, armed conflict, civil unrest, or emergency, academic freedom is respected. Doing so “requires scrupulous adherence to human rights and humanitarian law principles by all parties, including strict prohibition on the targeting of civilian objects, including schools, universities, and educational facilities under normal educational uses, as well as prohibition on any disproportionate harms to such facilities or personnel that might result from otherwise permissible military action.”^[118] Moreover, to ensure that academic freedom is upheld, states must “refrain from militarization, surveillance, or other measures which undermine academic freedom and autonomy.”^[119]

Cancellations of Academic Events

Particularly common during the reporting period were efforts to cancel or impede participation in lectures, seminars, conferences, or other events hosted by members of the higher education community. In some of these cases, university authorities cancel events; in others, individuals, who are either members of the university community or not, harass or threaten organizers or speakers, prompting an event’s cancellation. A large number of the events canceled this year focused on the violence in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza; however, universities also canceled events focused on disfavored and other politically controversial topics or speakers. Often universities justified the event cancellations by pointing to unspecified security concerns, without offering alternative venues or security arrangements, or concerns that the event would be divisive for the university community. In any case, cancellation of nonviolent public events restricts or deters scholarly discussion and the free exchange of ideas and information.

In the United Kingdom, data collected and published by the Office for Students (OfS) under the government’s new free speech law showed that the number of event or speaker requests that universities have denied has more than tripled since 2020.^[120] For example, in October 2023, Liverpool Hope University (LHU) officials “indefinitely postponed” a lecture by Avi Shlaim, a “new historian” of Israel who had been scheduled to speak about his newly published book Three Worlds: Memoirs of an Arab-Jew. The book is part-history and part-memoir, describing Shlaim’s family’s forced migration from Iraq to Israel and analyzing evidence that the Mossad, Israel’s spy agency, played a role in terror attacks on Iraq’s Jewish community in an effort to coerce Jews into migrating to Israel. The postponement reportedly came following pressure from LHU’s Jewish community to cancel the event; according to an LHU spokesperson, the talk was postponed to protect “the well-being and safety of our students and staff.”^[121]

The University of Delhi in India, in April 2024, canceled a pre-approved event titled “Let Us Hear a Palestinian Word,” which was intended to feature Palestinian poetry. The noted poet and former chairman of India’s National Academy of Arts Ashok Vajpeyi was scheduled to speak at the event. Two days prior to the event, the university canceled it, providing no explanation.^[122]

In the United States, on December 20, 2023, Indiana University (IU) canceled an on-campus exhibit by Samia Halaby, a Palestinian-American artist and former tenured professor and alumna of IU. The exhibition—the first American retrospective of Halaby’s work, titled “Samia Halaby: Centers of Energy”—had been approved three years prior. The leadership of the university museum where the exhibit was to be shown sent Halaby a two-sentence letter stating that the exhibit had been canceled because of unspecified “safety concerns.”^[123] On November 21, 2024, the University of Pennsylvania postponed a showing of the film Israelism, which follows two young Jewish Americans as they travel to Israel and Palestine and developed critical perspectives on Israeli government policies as a result of their experiences. The university had initially approved the screening of the film during the summer of 2023 and later said that the screening would be postponed until February 2024, stating that showing could inflame tensions on campus. On November 28, students went ahead with the screening despite the lack of permission. It was attended by around 100 students and faculty with no incidents or conflicts reported. Following the event, the university announced that the students who organized the screening would be referred to the school’s Office of Community Standards and Accountability to determine whether they violated the Code of Student Conduct.^[124]

On October 30, 2023, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong announced the cancellation of a lecture by James Frankel, who also goes by Fu Jianshi. Frankel, a professor in the Department of Culture and Religious Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, was scheduled to give a talk titled “Gaza Humanitarian Crisis—Save the Children of Gaza.” Frankel reported that he had received an email suggesting that members of the local community had planned to disrupt the event to combat “Palestinian propaganda.”^[125]

Unrelated to the OPT, universities also canceled events in the face of external pressure from community members or government authorities. Such events ranged in topic from national and international politics to culturally divisive issues like abortion. In the United States, in February 2024, an anti-abortion group called for people to boycott the opening celebration of an on-campus exhibition by Shahzia Sikander, a Pakistani-American artist, at the University of Houston. The works to be featured had been commissioned by Public Art University of Houston System and New York City’s Madison Square Park Conservancy in response to the US Supreme Court overturning its prior decision in Roe v. Wade recognizing a federal right to abortion. In the face of outside pressure, the university canceled the opening ceremony.^[126]

In Malaysia, on January 4, 2024, the International Institute of Advanced Islamic Studies Malaysia (IAIS) canceled a planned book launch by Ahmet T. Kuru, the director of Islamic and Arabic Studies at San Diego State University. IAIS gave no official reason for canceling the launch. However, Kuru received online backlash before the event, including accusations of “liberalism,” a term some use to discredit fellow Muslims. According to reports, the Turkish ambassador to Malaysia pressured the institute to cancel the event. Kuru, who is Turkish but lives in the US, has been publicly critical of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.^[127]

On November 2, 2023, the National University of Singapore (NUS) disinvited Sol Iglesias, an assistant professor of Political Science at the University of the Philippines-Diliman, from participation in a panel. Iglesias’s NUS colleague called her and told her that his dean had informed him that “higher ups” at NUS had rejected her participation as a speaker. The cancellation appeared to be related to Iglesias’s marriage to Dr. Thum Ping Tjin, a historian, democracy activist, and prominent critic of Singapore’s government.^[128]

In the United States, the University of California, Berkeley police cancelled a February 26, 2024, lecture organized by three Jewish, pro-Israel student groups: Students Support Israel at Berkeley, Bears for Israel, and Berkeley Tikvah. The cancellation occurred shortly before the start of the event, after pro-Palestinian demonstrators broke a door and shattered two windows of the Zellerbach Playhouse building.^[129] On September 7, 2023, Washington College officials shut down an academic event featuring remarks from Robert P. George, the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. Students protested the event because of George’s affiliation with the Heritage Foundation and disapproval of same-sex marriage and transgender rights. Prior to the event, several dozen students, faculty, and staff held a rally, holding pride flags and posting signs supportive of transgender rights. As George gave his remarks, the protesters entered the room where he was speaking, shouting, blowing whistles, and playing loud music. Campus security officers, who had been briefed on the potential for disruption and were present at the event, did not intervene. After approximately 15 minutes, George left the stage.^[130]

In India, on March 12, 2024, students affiliated with Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad shouted slogans, such as “Bharat Mata ki Jai” (“Long live mother India”), “Nivedita Menon Go Back,” and “anti-national” during an on-campus lecture at Gangadhar Meher University by Nivedita Menon, a professor in political theory at Jawaharlal Nehru University, author, and advocate for gender equality and social justice. The interruption forced Menon to leave the stage and ended the event early.^[131]

According to the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, “Academic, research, and teaching staff and students have a right and social responsibility to engage with the public,” including through academic and public events.^[132] The attacks described above restrict or deter scholarly discussion and the exchange of ideas and information. SAR calls on higher education officials to take all reasonable steps to protect and ensure the exercise of academic freedom, including during on-campus events. While students have the right to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, including the right to protest content and events with which they disagree, they must exercise those rights responsibly and with respect for the free expression rights and academic freedom of other members of the higher education community and society at large.

Administrative Actions, Laws, and Policymaking

Governments across the world are increasingly using their regulatory powers to encroach on academic space. This includes outright bans on education, measures interfering with university autonomy, and laws and policies limiting free speech or international research collaboration. In some of the most closed and authoritarian contexts, higher education is being used as a space to promote specific dominant ideologies. In other contexts—including those that are more open and particularly where neoliberal models guide higher education management and governance—the financing of higher education has become a tool for restricting academic freedom. Such policies are attacks on higher education insofar as they are specifically intended to restrict research, discourse, teaching, and learning on campus. Moreover, because these policies have a veneer of legitimacy (which obscures their improper intent), they are a particularly insidious form of attack on academic freedom and free expression on campus.

In the United States, state governments undermined university autonomy through executive orders, new legislation, and by leveraging state budgets. For example, state lawmakers engaged in a concerted attack against diversity, equity, and inclusion by undermining university autonomy and governance.^[133] The governor of Indiana signed into law SB 202, essentially eliminating tenure. The law requires colleges and universities to require “neutrality statements” in lieu of diversity statements and institutes a post-tenure review process led by a board of trustees—including many appointed by Indiana’s governor—that requires professors to promote “intellectual diversity” in the classroom. The bill would enable the trustees to define intellectual diversity and to determine whether or not faculty members met that criteria, opening the possibility that tenure decisions will be based on political criteria rather than according to disciplinary standards.^[134] Idaho’s Senate File 2435 (a budget bill), which the governor signed into law, similarly undermines university autonomy by allowing state lawmakers to leverage the budget to prohibit disfavored topics at public universities. Specifically, the bill bars public universities from establishing or running DEI offices and from requiring diversity statements.^[135]

Meanwhile, Texas’s government targeted free speech on campus. On March 27, 2024, Governor Greg Abbott of Texas signed an executive order requiring all the state’s higher education institutions to update their policies on free speech to conform to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) contested definition of antisemitism. Organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union, Middle East Studies Association, and Human Rights Watch view the IHRA’s definition as overly broad and restrictive of protected political speech, particularly that critical of policies of the State of Israel.^[136] The order required higher education institutions to establish specific punishments for violating the updated free speech policies and to ensure that university administrators enforce those punishments. Moreover, the executive order singled out two student groups for punishment: the Palestine Solidarity Committee and Students for Justice in Palestine. The order appeared to be ideologically driven and functioned as an encroachment by the government into universities’ authority to set policies regarding activities and speech on campuses.^[137]

In Afghanistan, on December 14, 2023, Sheikh Shakirullah Wahdat, the head of the Taliban Ministry of Education’s Invitation and Guidance department, signed a directive instructing that higher education institutions and libraries remove all texts contrary to Sunni Hanafi jurisprudence and replace them with books focused on the Prophet Muhammad’s biography.^[138]

Nicaragua’s National Assembly passed changes to Law 89, the Law of Autonomy of Higher Education Institutions, and Law 582, the General Education Law, that severely limited the university’s control over core academic functions, such as curricula, hiring and firing of personnel, and students. Together, the changes gave the government-run National Council of Universities the authority to appoint all university personnel and the Nicaraguan Ministry of Finance and Public Credit the power to administer the state’s budget for universities.^[139] The government of Nicaragua also forcibly closed institutions, pointing to alleged security concerns or failure to meet reporting requirements without providing clear evidentiary support and suggesting pretext. For example, in August 2023, the government shut down the Central American University (UCA), a major independent institution, under accusations of terrorism.^[140] The UCA provided essential support for the 2018 protests and was considered one of the last-standing hubs for freedom and democratic thought in the country.^[141] Even in circumstances where they are a response to legitimate security concerns and not aimed at restricting expression, closures are an extreme measure that may protect lives and property but fail to protect higher education as an open, functioning space for research, teaching, and learning.

In China, the Chinese Communist Party imposed restrictions on academics’ ability to express dissent. On August 2, 2023, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) updated its code of conduct to require that CAS members adhere to the policies of the Communist Party’s Central Committee and contribute to Chinese national security.^[142]

States also sought to address concerns over foreign espionage by developing new policies and regulations that had the effect of limiting research collaboration with scholars and institutions from particular stigmatized countries. In some cases, these regulations prompted higher education leaders to take their own actions to cut ties with researchers from those countries. To a large extent, such decisions occurred in the Global North. One survey of 700 universities found that most universities that cut research partnerships in response to government policies or geopolitical tensions were located in North America or Europe, where more than half of the universities surveyed had done so. The majority such decisions were made because of concerns over research security: fears that sensitive information might be leaked that could technologically or militarily bolster China, in particular.^[143] Notably, policies barring research collaboration with “pariah” countries may serve to reinforce geopolitical divisions. For instance, since 2021, China has become Russia’s largest research partner, replacing the United States and Germany.^[144]

Observers have expressed concerns that Canada’s proposed foreign influence transparency registry, aimed at preventing the sharing of sensitive information, includes reporting requirements that would chill international research collaboration.^[145] The proposed registry follows a 2023 announcement by the Canadian government that it would no longer fund research collaboration in key scientific fields if the research partners are linked to the military, defense, or state security organizations of China, Iran, or Russia.^[146]

Likewise, a United Kingdom proposal to require increased security vetting for scholars with access to sensitive technologies could have similar effects,^[147] as could efforts by the United States Department of Homeland Security to address research security.^[148]

In contrast, universities in Latin America, the Caribbean, sub-Saharan Africa, North Africa, and the Middle East reported that they had not altered their partnerships,^[149] although the government of Sri Lanka banned foreign research vessels over concerns about Chinese espionage.^[150]

Geopolitical tensions, practices of transnational repression—foreign government’s intimidation of students and scholars living, studying, or working abroad—and concerns over human rights violations similarly functioned as barriers to cross-border academic collaboration, with researchers and students from stigmatized or pariah countries increasingly isolated. For example, geopolitical tensions between the United States and China, including reports of China’s extensive practices of transnational repression,^[151] resulted in Chinese students being detained, harassed, interrogated, or turned away at the US border.^[152] Likewise, new anti-espionage laws introduced by the Chinese government were reportedly deterring foreign students from studying in China.^[153]

Meanwhile, in February 2024, the Australian foreign minister wrote to more than 30 university vice-chancellors and presidents in Australia asking them to pause research partnerships with Iranian institutions because of concern over the human rights situation in the country and security risks.^[154]

Geopolitical tensions harmed academic collaboration between Japan and Russia as well. A branch of Russia’s Far Eastern Federal University, established in 1994 in Hakodate city on Japan’s far north island of Hokkaido, announced that it would not accept new enrollments for 2025. The university pointed to financial constraints as influencing the decision; these constraints relate at least partially to sanctions that Japan has levied on Russia, including freezing the assets of financial institutions and individuals who are involved in Russia’s war in Ukraine.^[155]

Russia too cracked down on higher education institutions, associations, universities, and scholars seen as having ties that are too close to the United States and Europe. For example, in March 2024, the Russian government labeled the US-based Institute of International Education as an “undesirable” organization (joining a number of other US-based higher education entities so designated in prior years).^[156] The undesirable designation bans an organization from operating in Russia and puts individuals associated with the organization at risk of arrest in Russia. Meanwhile, in June 2024, it was reported that, in recent years, the Russian government has arrested 12 Russian physicists since 2015, charging them with high treason. The charge can include espionage for foreign countries.^[157]

In Israel, scholars and students increasingly found themselves alienated as members of academic communities abroad rallied to pressure Israel to halt its military activity in Gaza by withdrawing from research and study partnership with Israeli institutions.^[158]

While states and higher education institutions have the responsibilities to safeguard sensitive security information, they must fully respect academic freedom when doing so. This requires the narrow and precise drafting of any guidance or restrictions to minimize harms to free inquiry and free expression or to avoid stigmatizing researchers of particular nationalities. It also requires that when states and higher education institutions take actions against scholars or students, they do so with adequate evidentiary basis and refrain from blanket bans on collaboration with all scholars, students, or research institutions from a foreign country.

The administrative, legislative, and policy-related changes described here are detrimental to intellectual freedom, independent thought, and a free and democratic society. They build a climate of fear and persecution. They encourage scholars and students to self-censor, and they give the government a greater say in the functioning of higher education institutions. In this sense, not only are such laws and policies themselves attacks on higher education, but they also contribute to an illiberal environment that increases the likelihood of more violent and coercive attacks targeted at specific scholars, students, or institutions.

The Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom recognize that “The protection, promotion, and enjoyment of academic freedom require the autonomy of academic, research, and teaching institutions.” This includes ensuring that external actors, along with institutional education leaders, oversight boards, and governing councils, respect the principle of self-governance, “which is an essential component of  autonomy.”^[159] SAR urges governments and higher education leaders to fight back against this form of authoritarian encroachment by refraining from actions that erode academic freedom or university autonomy, such as increasing external authority over higher education; imposing ideological obligations on the administration or content of academic teaching or research; or otherwise coercively intervening in the higher education space. SAR calls on government and higher education leaders to bolster existing norms of democracy, human rights, and academic freedom by fighting and, where necessary, repealing such executive, legislative, or policy actions that infringe upon academic freedom, free expression on campus, and university autonomy.

These “other” attacks are diverse in form and impact but share with the five types described earlier an intent to punish or control expression and inquiry within the academic community. They have the potential to severely undermine the rights of individual scholars and students and, when targeting entire institutions, they can impede core higher education functions and erode the autonomy universities and colleges need to operate without the undue influence of political actors.

States, higher education leaders, and civil society should take steps to understand and prevent the range of attacks described here, including by publicly reporting and condemning such attacks and by promoting the importance of academic freedom and institutional autonomy.

^[1] United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, “Humanitarian Situation Update #209 | Gaza Strip,” August 26, 2024, https://www.ochaopt.org/content/humanitarian-situation-update-209-gaza-strip.

^[2] Isabelle Taft, Alex Lemonides, Lazaro Gamio, and Anna Betts. “Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped,” New York Times, July 21, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/21/us/campus-protests-arrests.html.

^[3] Robert Quinn, “Academic Self-Censorship Is a ‘Brain Drag’ on Arab Universities and Societies,” A– l-Fanar Media, April 18, 2021, www.al-fanarmedia.org/2021/04/academic-self-censorship-is-a-brain-drag-on-arab-universities-and-societies/.

^[4] The use of less lethal weapons, including teargas and batons, while less dangerous than more lethal alternatives, such as firearms, may nevertheless result in injuries and fatalities, especially when used improperly. See Office of the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “Guidance on Less-Lethal Weapons in Law Enforcement,” 2020, www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CCPR/LLW_Guidance.pdf.

^[5] SAR AFMP, Kobe Gakuin University, March 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-03-18-kobe-gakuin-university/.

^[6] SAR AFMP, Asia University, April 22, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-22-asia-university/.

^[7] See Free to Think 2023 for more detail on the history of BCL violence: https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/free-to-think-2023/#bangladesh.

^[8] SAR AFMP, Government Ashek Mahmud College, January 17, 2024.  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-government-ashek-mahmud-college/.

^[9] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, July 28, 2023,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-multiple-institutions/.

^[10] SAR AFMP, Netanya Academic College, October 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-28-netanya-academic-college/.

^[11] SAR AFMP, Nasarawa State University, Keffi, October 22, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-22-nasarawa-state-university-keffi/.

^[12] SAR AFMP, Nasarawa State University, Keffi, October 10, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-10-nasarawa-state-university-keffi/.

^[13] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 7, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[14] When narrowly drafted, limited in use, and conscientiously applied through fair and transparent legal proceedings fully compliant with recognized human rights standards, such laws might still chill academic freedom, freedom of expression, and other rights in some contexts. In practice, however, such limits on state prosecution authority are rarely in place.

^[15] SAR AFMP, Unaffiliated, November 29, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-29-unaffiliated-insitution/.

^[16] Por Wilfredo Miranda Aburto, “Philosopher on trial via Zoom: Professor Freddy Quezada found guilty of “incitement to hatred”,” Divergents, February 23, 2024, https://www.divergentes.com/philosopher-on-trial-via-zoom-professor-freddy-quezada-found-guilty-of-incitement-to-hatred/.

^[17] “Retired Professor Freddy Quezada: “I Didn’t Think My Opinions Represented Danger”,” Redacción Confidencial, September 10, 2024, https://confidencial.digital/english/retired-professor-freddy-quezada-i-didnt-think-my-opinions-represented-danger/. Anthony J. Blinken, “Release of Political Prisoners from Nicaragua to Guatemala,” US Department of State, Press Release, September 5, 2024, https://www.state.gov/release-of-political-prisoners-from-nicaragua-to-guatemala.

^[18] SAR AFMP, University of Bamako, May 21, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-21-university-of-bamako/.

^[19] SAR AFMP, University of Tripoli, November 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-university-of-tripoli/. SAR AFMP, University of Tripoli, November 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-28-university-of-tripoli/.

^[20] SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, March 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-12-hebrew-university-of-jerusalem/. SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, October 29, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-29-hebrew-university-of-jerusalem/.

^[21] SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, April 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-18-hebrew-university.

^[22] SAR AFMP, Roshan Afghanistan Online University, January 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-09-roshan-afghanistan-online-university/.

^[23] SAR AFMP, Unknown, January 31, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-01-31-unknown-institution/.

^[24] SAR AFMP, Unaffiliated, March 16, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-16-unaffiliated/.

^[25] SAR AFMP, Unaffiliated, March 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-23-chittagong-university/.

^[26] SAR AFMP, February 14, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-14-indian-institute-of-management-bangalore/.

^[27] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 7, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[28] This presents significant challenges in reporting, given the need to look for evidence of pretext by examining the timing of the action, its context, any history or pattern of similar actions against the victim(s) or others, the fairness and transparency of any process leading to the action, and any available statements and supporting information from the parties involved, witnesses, and independent experts.

^[29] While the Free to Think report makes a distinction between cases affected scholars and students, the AFMP does not currently disaggregate the two.

^[30] Paul Basken, “US campus protests expose special risk for adjuncts,” Times Higher Education, June 5, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/us-campus-protests-expose-special-risk-adjuncts.

^[31] SAR AFMP, De Paul University, May 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-08-depaul-university/.

^[32] SAR AFMP, Catholic University of America, January 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-30-catholic-university-of-america/.

^[33] SAR AFMP, University of Texas, Dallas, April 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-09-university-of-texas-dallas/. SAR AFMP, University of Texas, Austin, April 2, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-02-university-of-texas-austin/.

^[34] SAR AFMP, Kaye Academic College of Education, October 15, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-15-kaye-academic-college-of-education/.

^[35] SAR AFMP, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, October 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-14-bezalel-academy-of-art-and-design/.

^[36] SAR AFMP, University of Cologne, April 4, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-05-university-of-cologne-the-new-school/.

^[37] Mary Ilyushina, “To please Putin, universities purge liberals and embrace patriots,” Washington Post, May 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/07/russia-universities-education-putin-overhaul/.

^[38] SAR AFMP, Russian Academy of Sciences, September 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-01-russian-academy-of-sciences/.

^[39] SAR AFMP, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, December 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-28-ferdowsi-university-of-mashhad/.

^[40] SAR AFMP, Corvinus University of Budapest, October 24, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-24-corvinus-university-of-budapest/.

^[41] SAR, AFMP, Comilla University, August 2, 2023,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-02-comilla-university/.

^[42] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 4, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[43] Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) speaks directly to this issue, providing that the right to freedom of expression “shall include [the] freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers…”.

^[44] SAR AFMP, University of Westminster, February 23, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-23-university-of-westminster/.

^[45] SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/.

^[46] SAR AFMP, Chinese University of Hong Kong, October 27, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-27/.

^[47] SAR AFMP, US Agency for International Development, February 17, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-17-united-states-agency-for-international-development-unspecified/.

^[48]  SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, February 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-12-multiple-institutions/.

^[49] SAR AFMP, University of Dubai. August 23, 2023. https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-23-university-of-dubai/.

^[50] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 6, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[51] See Article 19 in “International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,” December 19, 1966, www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/ccpr.aspx.

^[52] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 7, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[53] SAR AFMP, Columbia University, April 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-18-columbia-university/.

^[54] Ashifa Kassam, “Clashes and arrests as pro-Palestinian protests spread across European campuses,” The Guardian, May 8, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/08/pro-palestine-student-protests-campuses-europe-arrests-police. Shuriah Niazi, Ameen Amjad Khan, and Mohiuddin Alamgir, “Asian students swell ranks of ‘global’ anti-war protesters,” University World News, May 9, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024050917120630. Wagdy Sawahel, “MENA universities join global protests over war in Gaza,” University World News, May 3, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240503162533493.

^[55] Lois Beckett, “Nearly all Gaza campus protests in the US have been peaceful, study finds,” The Guardian, May 10, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/10/peaceful-pro-palestinian-campus-protests.

^[56] Susan H. Greenberg, “Protests Cost University of California $29M,” Inside Higher Education, July 22, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/07/22/protests-cost-university-california-29-million.

^[57] Chris McGreal, “How pervasive is antisemitism on US campuses? A look at the language of the protests,” The Guardian, May 3, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/03/college-gaza-protests-antisemitism.

^[58] Gabrielle Canon, “The US universities that allow protest encampments – and even negotiate,” The Guardian, May 4, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/04/universities-allow-student-campus-protest-encampments.

^[59] Lois Beckett, “Nearly all Gaza campus protests in the US have been peaceful, study finds,” The Guardian, May 10, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/10/peaceful-pro-palestinian-campus-protests.

^[60] Isabelle Taft, Alex Lemonides, Lazaro Gamio, and Anna Betts, “Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped,” New York Times, July 21, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/21/us/campus-protests-arrests.html. Jocelyn Gecker, “College protesters want ‘amnesty.’ At stake: Tuition, legal charges, grades and graduation,” Associated Press, April 28, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/student-protest-gaza-war-arrest-amnesty-ae235703d6a9b99114078fca13a530a0. SAR AFMP, Trinity College, Dublin, May 2, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-02-trinity-college-dublin/.

^[61] Maham Javaid, “For international students, protesting on campuses has higher stakes,” Washington Post, May 3, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/05/03/international-students-campus-protest-visas/. Katy Fallon, “‘Audacious, outrageous’: Gaza protesters slam Greek deportation order,” Al Jazeera, May 27, 2024, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/5/27/audacious-outrageous-gaza-protesters-slam-greek-deportation-order.

^[62] SAR AFMP, Washington University in Saint Louis, April 27, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-27-washington-university-saint-louis/.

^[63] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-multiple-institutions/.

^[64] SAR AFMP, Sorbonne University, April 29, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-29-sorbonne-university/.

^[65] SAR AFMP, University of Florence, November 21, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-21-university-of-florence/.

^[67] SAR AFMP, University of California, Los Angeles, April 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-30-university-of-california-los-angeles/.

^[68] SAR AFMP, Columbia University, January 19, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-19-columbia-university/.

^[69] Gabrielle Canon, “The US universities that allow protest encampments – and even negotiate,” The Guardian, May 4, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/04/universities-allow-student-campus-protest-encampments. Rachel Treisman, “What we can learn from 4 schools that have reached agreements with Gaza protesters,” NPR, May 7, 2024, https://www.npr.org/2024/05/07/1249368151/gaza-college-protest-deal-brown-rutgers.

^[70] “U of T gave amnesty to protesters before encampment taken down,” CBC News, July 10, 2024, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/university-toronto-amnesty-encampment-protesters-1.7260246.

^[71] Hannah Liddle, “Timeline: Protest encampments,” University Affairs, May 31, 2024, https://universityaffairs.ca/features/feature-article/timeline-encampments/?utm_source=University+Affairs+e-newsletter&utm_campaign=6f57742b78-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2024_06_05&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_314bc2ee29-6f57742b78-425257169. “Vancouver Island University tells pro-Palestinian protesters to vacate encampment,” Global News, July 13, 2024, https://globalnews.ca/news/10620126/vancouver-island-university-trespass-no

^[72] Shyamantha Asokan and Tom Pilgrim, “Universities win court order on Gaza protest camps,” BBC, July 10, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0jqgqe3wjno. Richard Adams and Geneva Abdul, “Gaza protest camps at UK universities wind down amid legal action,” The Guardian, July 7, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/education/article/2024/jul/07/gaza-protest-camps-uk-universities-legal-action. Imogen Garfinkel, “Pro-Palestine protesters evicted from Queen Mary University of London following High Court possession order,” Roman Road London, July 12, 2024, https://romanroadlondon.com/queen-mary-university-of-london-evict-palestine-encampment-after-securing-possession-order/. Callum Parke, “LSE given court order blocking encampments in its building after student protest,” The Independent, June 28, 2024, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/lse-london-central-london-county-court-apartheid-assets-b2570711.html. Tony Grew and PA Media, “UCL wins court order on Gaza protest camps,” BBC, August 6, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0jpp0w88w5o.

^[73] SAR AFMP, Various Institutions, July 15, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-07-15-various/.

^[74] SAR AFMP, Mekelle University, April 5, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-05-mekelle-university/.

^[75] SAR AFMP, University of Moratuwa, April 3, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-03-university-of-moratuwa/.

^[76] SAR AFMP, January 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-08-ministry-of-higher-education-scientific-research-and-information-and-communication-technologies/.

^[77] SAR AFMP, Université Félix Houphouët-Boigny, NOvember 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-universite-felix-houphouet-boigny/.

^[78] SAR AFMP, University of Antananarivo, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-24-university-of-antananarivo/.

^[79] SAR AFMP, American University of Armenia, September 26, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-26-american-university-of-armenia/.

^[80] The use of less-lethal weapons, including teargas and baton, while less dangerous than more lethal alternatives such as firearms, may nevertheless result in injuries and fatalities, especially when used improperly. See Office of the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “Guidance on Less-Lethal Weapons in Law Enforcement,” 2020, www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CCPR/LLW_Guidance.pdf.

^[81] SAR AFMP, Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy, Rabat, May 14, 2024 https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-14-faculty-of-medicine-and-pharmacy-rabat/. SAR AFMP, Abdelmalek Saadi University, May 14, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-14-abdelmalek-saadi-university/. SAR AFMP, Mohammed I University, May 14, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-14-mohammed-i-university/.

^[82] SAR AFMP, University of Isfahan, April 6, 2024,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-06-university-of-isfahan/.

^[83] SAR AFMP, Mahatma Gandhi Antarrashtriya Hindi Vishwavidyalaya, January 27, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-27-mahatma-gandhi-antarrashtriya-hindi-vishwavidyalaya/.

^[84] SAR AFMP, Boğaziçi University, December 25, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-25-bogazici-university/.

^[85] SAR AFMP, University of Cologne, January 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-07-university-of-cologne/.

^[86] For example, SAR AFMP, American University, April 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-08-american-university/.

^[87] For example, SAR AFMP, Indiana University, Bloomington, April 25, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-25-indiana-university-bloomington/; SAR AFMP, Barnard College, November 13, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-13-barnard-college/.

^[88] Anemona Hartocollis, “Penn Bans Protest Encampments From Its Campus for the First Time,” New York Times, June 6, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/us/penn-ban-encampments-campus-protests-gaza.html. Josh Moody, “Colleges Eye Rule Changes in the Wake of Spring Protests,” Inside Higher Education, May 31, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/governance/executive-leadership/2024/05/31/protests-are-mostly-over-whats-next-colleges. Michael Vasquez, “Indiana U. Joins the Ranks of Colleges Imposing New Limits on Protest,” Chronicle of Higher Education, July 29, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/indiana-u-joins-the-ranks-of-colleges-imposing-new-limits-on-protest.

^[89] SAR AFMP, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, February 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-13-massachusetts-institute-of-technology/.

^[90] SAR AFMP, Indiana University, Bloomington, April 24, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-25-indiana-university-bloomington/.

^[91] Amnesty International Australia, “Australian Universities’ Moves to Restrict Student Protests May Breach Human Rights Law,” July 11, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org.au/australian-universities-restrict-student-protests-may-breach-human-rights-law.

^[92] SAR AFMP, South Asian University, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-south-asian-university/. SAR AFMP, South Asian University, June 16, 2023,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-06-16-south-asian-university/.

^[93] SAR AFMP, Shahid Beheshti University,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-15-shahid-beheshti-university/.

^[94] Envaalde Matheus, “Unam under fire for banning political activism on campus,” The Namibian, May 2, 2024, https://www.namibian.com.na/unam-under-fire-for-banning-political-activism-on-campus/. Zachariah Mushawatu, “Ban on political activities on campus angers students,” University World News, May 8, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240508214328357.

^[95] SAR AFMP, University of Dhaka, March 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-13-university-of-dhaka/.

^[96] Helen Packer, “Bangladeshi students urge end to violent campus politics,” Times Higher Education, April 12, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/bangladeshi-students-urge-end-violent-campus-politics.

^[97] SAR AFMP, January 17, 2024, Maharajas College https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-maharajas-college/. SAR AFMP, January 18, 2024, Maharajas College, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-18-maharajas-college/.

^[98]

^[99] SAR AFMP, Concordia University, November 8, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-08-concordia-university/.

^[100] SAR AFMP, Columbia University, October 12, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-12-columbia-university/.

^[101] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 7, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[102] Kiara Alfonseca, Kerem Inal, and Chris Looft, Destruction in Gaza: Side-by-side aerial look at the Israel-Hamas war’s devastating damage,” ABC News, May 9, 2024, https://abcnews.go.com/International/destruction-gaza-side-side-israel-hamas-wars-damage/story?id=109958458.

^[103] SAR AFMP, Al Israa University, January 17, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-al-israa-university/. Laura Pollack, “Israel destroys last university in Gaza as strikes continue,” The National, https://www.thenational.scot/news/24059315.israel-destroys-last-university-gaza-strikes-continue/.

^[104] SAR AFMP, Khan Younis Training Center, January 24, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-24-khan-younis-training-center/.

^[105] SAR AFMP, Palestine Technical University, Kadoorie, November 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-palestine-technical-university-kadoorie/. SAR AFMP, Birzeit University, November 8, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-08-birzeit-university/.

^[106] “University student population has plunged 90% since coup,” Radio Free Asia, January 8, 2024, https://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/universities-01082024154241.html.

^[107] Padone, “Military deployment on campuses put staff, students at risk,” University World News, March 12, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240312120550473.

^[108] SAR AFMP, Pakokku Technological University, October 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-1-pakokku-technological-university/.

^[109] Dylan Carter, “One in five HE institutions damaged or destroyed in war,” University World News, March 1, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240301072602780.

^[110] SAR AFMP, National Agrarian University, Lviv, January 1, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-01-national-agrarian-university-lviv/

^[111] SAR AFMP, Mindanao State University, Marawi, December 3, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-03-mindanao-state-university-marawi/.

^[112] SAR AFMP, Meisei University, March 25, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-25-meisei-university/.

^[113] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, January 22, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-22-multiple-institutions/.

^[114] SAR AFMP, University of Gezira, January 3, 2024,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-03-university-of-gezira/.

^[115] SAR AFMP, State University of Haiti, May 22, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-22-state-university-of-haiti/. SAR AFMP, State University of Haiti, April 20, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-20-state-university-of-haiti/. SAR AFMP, State University of Haiti, March 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-09-state-university-of-haiti/. AR AFMP, State University of Haiti, February 29, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-29-state-university-of-haiti/.

^[116] SAR AFMP, State University of Haiti, February 29, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-29-state-university-of-haiti/.

^[117] SAR AFMP, Autonomous University of Tamaulipas, February 23, 2024,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-23-autonomous-university-of-tamaulipas/.

^[118] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 3, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[119] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 3, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[120] Patrick Jack, “More campus events and speakers barred by English universities,” Times Higher Education, June 4, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/more-campus-events-and-speakers-barred-english-universities.

^[121] SAR AFMP, Liverpool Hope University, October 20, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-20-liverpool-hope-university/.

^[122] SAR AFMP, University of Delhi, April 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-13-university-of-delhi/.

^[123] SAR AFMP, Indiana University, December 20, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-20-indiana-university/.

^[124] SAR AFMP, University of Pennsylvania, November 21, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-21-university-of-philadelphia/.

^[125] SAR AFMP, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong, October 30, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-30-hang-seng-university-of-hong-kong/.

^[126] SAR AFMP, University of Houston, February 26, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-26-university-of-houston/.

^[127] SAR AFMP, International Institute of Advanced Islamic Studies, January 4, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-04-international-institute-of-advanced-islamic-studies-malaysia/.

^[128] SAR AFMP, National University of Singapore, November 2, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-02-national-university-of-singapore/.

^[129] SAR AFMP, University of California, February 26, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-26-university-of-california-berkeley/.

^[130] SAR AFMP, Washington College, September 7, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-07-washington-college/.

^[131] SAR AFMP, Gangadhar Meher University, March 12, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-12-gangadhar-meher-university/.

^[132] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, p. 3, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

^[133] PEN America, “How So-Called DEI Bans Serve as Pretexts for Censorious Takeovers of University Governance,” May 25, 2023, https://pen.org/more-than-meets-the-dei/.

^[134] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, March 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-13-multiple-institutions/. Campbell Robertson and Anna Betts, “Indiana Law Requires Professors to Promote ‘Intellectual Diversity’ or Face Penalties,” New York Times, March 23, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/23/us/indiana-professors-tenure-diversity.html. Ryan Quinn, “Indiana Bill Threatens Faculty Members Who Don’t Provide ‘Intellectual Diversity’,” Inside Higher Education, February 21, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/academic-freedom/2024/02/21/bill-threatens-profs-who-dont-give-intellectual.

^[135] Megan Zahneis, “Colleges Would Have to Eliminate Dozens of Jobs Under a New DEI Bill in Idaho,” Chronicle of Higher Education, February 21, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/colleges-would-have-to-eliminate-dozens-of-jobs-under-a-new-dei-bill-in-idaho.

^[136] American Civil Liberties Union, “Reject Definitions of Antisemitism that Encompass Protected Speech,” February 6, 2024, https://www.aclu.org/documents/reject-definitions-of-anti-semitism-that-encompass-protected-speech. MESA, “MESA Board Statement regarding the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism (and “Contemporary Examples”),” March 31, 2024, https://mesana.org/advocacy/letters-from-the-board/2021/03/31/mesa-board-statement-regarding-the-ihra-working-definition-of-antisemitism-and-contemporary-examples. Human Rights Watch, “Human Rights and other Civil Society Groups Urge United Nations to Respect Human Rights in the Fight Against Antisemitism,” April 4, 2023, https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/04/04/human-rights-and-other-civil-society-groups-urge-united-nations-respect-human.

^[137] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, March 27, 2024.  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-27-multiple-institutions/.

^[138] Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project. Multiple Institutions. December 14, 2023. https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-14-multiple-institutions/.

^[139] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, November 30, 2023,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-30-multiple-insitutions/.

^[140] SAR AFMP, Central American University, August 18, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-18-central-american-university-managua/

^[141] “Daniel Ortega acusó de terrorismo a una universidad jesuita de Nicaragua y ordenó la confiscación de todos sus bienes,” Infobae, August 16, 2023, https://www.infobae.com/america/america-latina/2023/08/16/daniel-ortega-acuso-de-terrorismo-a-una-universidad-jesuita-de-nicaragua-y-ordeno-la-confiscacion-de-todos-sus-bienes/

^[142] SAR AFMP, Chinese Academy of Sciences, August 2, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-02-chinese-academy-of-sciences/

^[143] David Matthews, “Restricting international research is largely a European and North American trend, global survey finds,” Science Business, April 9, 2024, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/international-news/restricting-international-research-largely-european-and-north-american.

^[144] David Matthews, “China becomes Russia’s biggest collaborator after war decimates science ties with the west,” February 22, Science Business, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/international-news/china-becomes-russias-biggest-collaborator-after-war-decimates-science-ties. Patrick Jack, “Russian research ‘increasingly isolated’ amid Ukraine war,” Times Higher Education, July 31, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/russian-research-increasingly-isolated-amid-ukraine-war.

^[145] Jim Bronskill, “Canadian universities say foreign influence registry could harm research partnerships,” CBC Canada, June 10, 2024, https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/universities-foreign-influence-registry-1.7229929.

^[146] Jeffrey Mervis, “Canada moves to ban funding for ‘risky’ foreign collaborations,” Science, February 17, 2023, https://www.science.org/content/article/canada-moves-ban-funding-risky-foreign-collaborations.

^[147] Chris Havergal, “Security vetting plan for researchers of sensitive technologies,” Times Higher Education, April 26, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/security-vetting-plan-researchers-sensitive-technologies.

^[148] Karin Fischer, “Latitudes: Amid concern over foreign influence on campus, panel urges government and higher ed to coordinate,” Chronicle of Higher Education, June 5, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2024-06-05?sra=true.

^[149] David Matthews, “Restricting international research is largely a European and North American trend, global survey finds,” Science Business, April 9, 2024, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/international-news/restricting-international-research-largely-european-and-north-american.

^[150] Dinesh De Alwis, “Ban on foreign research boats is bad for research – Experts,” University World News, July 18, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240718125912351.

^[151] Yana Gorokhovskaia and Grady Vaughan, Addressing Transnational Repression on Campuses in the United States, Freedom House, January 2024, https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/TNR_UniversityReport_2024F.pdf. Amnesty International, “On My Campus I am Afraid”: China’s Targeting of Overseas Students Stifles Rights, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ASA1780062024ENGLISH.pdf.

^[152] Yojana Sharma, “Geopolitical tensions dim prospects for US-China exchanges,” University World News, June 28, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024062819490812. Neil Savage, “FBI asks scientists for trust in taking anti-Asian bias seriously,” Nature, June 7, 2024, https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01704-2.

^[153] Yojana Sharma, “Overseas students, exchanges deterred by spy laws – Academic,” University World News, March 12, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024031215292831. Karin Fischer, “Latitudes: Among Chinese students at U.S. colleges, political pressures and discrimination grow more acute,” Chronicle of Higher Education, September 13, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2023-09-13.

^[154] Jonathan Yerushalmy, “Where freedom meets repression: Australian academics tread a fine line over ties to Iran,” The Guardian, February 24, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/25/where-freedom-meets-repression-australian-academics-tread-a-fine-line-over-ties-to-iran.

^[155] Suvendrini Kakuchi, “Geopolitical tensions could close Russian branch campus,” University World News, June 27, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240627155346767.

^[156] SAR AFMP, Institute of International Education, March 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-07-institute-of-international-education/.

^[157] Sergei Goryashko, “’Spy mania’: Why is Russia accusing its own physicists of treason?,” BBC, June 8, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8001gvp4dpo.

^[158] Karin Fischer, “Latitudes: Amid boycott calls, Pitzer College pulls back from a study-abroad program in Israel,” Chronicle of Higher Education, April 3, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2024-04-03. Michele Chabin, “Fallout from Israel-Hamas war causing ‘significant harm’ to researchers in Israel, survey finds,” Science, February 28, 2024, https://www.science.org/content/article/fallout-israel-hamas-war-causing-significant-harm-researchers-israel-survey-finds.

^[159] SAR, Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, March 2024, pp. 3-5, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Principles-for-Implementing-the-Right-to-Academic-Freedom_FINAL.pdf.

Attacks on higher education communities occur across the globe. They violate the rights of those targeted and have the potential to limit academic freedom and the right to education for large numbers of scholars and students at higher education institutions worldwide. Countries and territories suffering from heightened attacks and pressures warrant the attention of the international community.

In this edition of Free to Think, Scholars at Risk (SAR) reported 391 attacks on higher education communities in 51 countries and territories from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024. This year’s Monitoring Project data^[1] includes attacks in authoritarian contexts, such as Afghanistan, China, Iran, and Russia, as well as in classically liberal democracies, such as Germany, the United States, and the United Kingdom. That attacks on higher education occur across contexts is evident from the Academic Freedom Index (AFi) scores of the countries highlighted below. While the 2023 AFi data, published in 2024, puts many of the countries highlighted below into the 10 percent of countries with the lowest levels of academic freedom, some of the highlighted countries, such as Colombia, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States, rank comparatively higher. While this indicates that countries like the United States and Colombia may have stronger protections for academic freedom and institutional autonomy, as well as more avenues for redress, it also means that there are still actors in those countries that seek to constrain academic freedom despite these baseline protections.

In this section, SAR examines diverse country-level developments and trends from this reporting period. These include patterns of attacks found in SAR’s Monitoring Project data, such as arrests and disciplinary actions targeting scholars or repeated violations of students’ right to peacefully assemble and express themselves. They also include particular events, novel pressures, or under-discussed phenomena that threaten academic freedom and related values for entire higher education communities, such as restrictive legislative and administrative actions and threats to university governance.

Given resource constraints and challenges in gathering and verifying information, this report features only a representative and illustrative sample of the global state of attacks on higher education. Countries and territories not highlighted in Free to Think 2024 are not necessarily free of attacks on higher education communities or restraints on academic freedom, and countries highlighted in previous years but not included here have not necessarily seen improved conditions. Rather, decisions about highlighting the countries that follow were based on factors including severity of attacks during the current reporting period, diversity of geography, political systems, and forms of attacks on higher education.

Readers interested in learning more about attacks on higher education and academic freedom conditions around the world are encouraged to review national-level incident data on SAR’s website and country-level expert assessments in the Academic Freedom Index, a tool co-developed by the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi), the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), the V-Dem Institute, and SAR.^[2] SAR invites readers to contribute information on attacks on higher education communities wherever and whenever they occur. By building a more comprehensive dataset, SAR can more effectively expose this global phenomenon and work with governments, higher education communities, and civil society to protect higher education from attack and to promote academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and related higher education values.

Afghanistan

In Afghanistan, the Taliban government further entrenched its control over the higher education system, with academic freedom continuing to decline in the country, as measured by the Academic Freedom Index.^[3] Among the actions the Taliban took were continuing to bar women from accessing higher education, empowering its own allies, and persecuting dissenters at universities.

Figure 2: Academic freedom has declined substantially in Afghanistan since the Taliban took over the government in August 2021. In 2020, the AFi rated Afghanistan as “somewhat free” (0.55); in 2021, the country fell to “mostly restricted” (0.29). Since 2022, Afghanistan has been rated as “completely restricted,” with a score of 0.09 in 2023. This rating puts Afghanistan in the bottom 10 percent of all countries with respect to its level of academic freedom.^[4]

While December 2023 marked one year since the Taliban officially banned women from accessing higher education,^[5] June 2024 marked the third consecutive year that women were absent from university entrance exams in Afghanistan.^[6] In addition to banning women from accessing higher education inside Afghanistan, the Taliban also prevented women from leaving the country to study abroad. On August 23, 2023, Taliban officials turned approximately 60 women away from the airport in Kabul when they arrived to travel to Dubai to study at the University of Dubai. One woman reported to the media that the Taliban told her that women holding student visas could not leave the country.^[7]

Inside Afghanistan and globally, higher education actors developed online initiatives in an attempt to fill the gap left by the Taliban’s ban. Arizona State University, together with Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan, developed a program to provide online English-language courses to Afghan women.^[8] However, efforts to extend educational opportunities to women inside Afghanistan came with risks. On January 9, 2024, Taliban forces arrested Javed Kakar, the vice-chancellor of Roshan Afghanistan Online University (RAO), which opened in December 2022, with the aim of continuing to enable women’s education in direct response to the Taliban’s ban. Taliban forces held Kakar for two weeks, during which they searched his phone, tortured him, and interrogated him about RAO funding and affiliations. In exchange for his release on bail, Kakar guaranteed that he would resign from his position at RAO. A university spokesperson later confirmed Kakar’s resignation along with those of other members of the university’s leadership.^[9]

More broadly, the Taliban sought to transform the content of higher education in Afghanistan. On December 14, 2023, Sheikh Shakirullah Wahdat, the head of the Taliban Ministry of Education’s Invitation and Guidance Department, signed a directive instructing that higher education institutions and libraries remove all texts contrary to Sunni Hanafi jurisprudence and replace them with books focused on the Prophet Muhammad’s biography.^[10] The Taliban also took steps to undermine secular university education. In the spring of 2024, 51,000 clerics participated in an exam that would give them a master’s degree, enabling them to work in government agencies without attending university. The move was widely seen as an effort to elevate religious education over secular higher education.^[11] Such changes led one Afghan scholar to write in December 2023 that “Genuine scholarly life has ground to a halt” in the country.^[12]

China

In 2023-2024, the Chinese government continued to use arrest, detention, surveillance, and policy measures to limit students’ and scholars’ academic freedom. China’s score on the AFi reflected this repressive environment: as in previous years, the country remained “completely restricted.” (Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of China with a unique legal status. Consistent with this status and with prior editions of Free to Think, attacks on higher education in Hong Kong are highlighted in a separate section below.)

Figure 3: China’s level of academic freedom has remained “completely restricted” over the past decade. In 2023, the AFi gave the country a score of 0.07.

Chinese authorities continued to imprison and prosecute prominent scholars, including those from the Uyghur community and those commenting on Chinese society and culture. In September 2023, a source in the Chinese government confirmed that Uyghur studies scholar Rahile Dawut, imprisoned since December 2017, had been sentenced to life imprisonment for allegedly “endangering state security.” Information on her condition and whereabouts are unknown.^[13] Likewise, the whereabouts and conditions of detained Uyghur scholars economist Ilham Tohti,^[14] geographer  Tashpolat Tiyip,^[15] and literary scholar Abdulqadir Jalaleddin^[16] remained unknown. In March 2024, Japan’s Kobe Gakuin University announced that one of their professors had disappeared in August 2023 while visiting China. The professor, Hu Shiyun, is originally from Jiangsu, a province in eastern China. He heads the Chinese language department at Kobe Gakuin and has authored Chinese language textbooks that circulate in Japan. According to his family, Shiyun went missing while visiting his home province; they believe that he was detained by Chinese authorities.^[17] Shiyun was the third Chinese academic living and working in Japan to disappear in the past decade while visiting China.^[18]

In at least one case, a scholar of Chinese politics lost his job. In May 2024, Jilin University terminated the contract of Björn Alexander Düben, a German citizen and assistant professor at the university’s School of Public Diplomacy. Düben has commented publicly on China’s foreign relations. His dismissal came in apparent retaliation for comments that he made to Voice of America on May 11, 2024, about a recent visit by Chinese president Xi Jinping to Europe.^[19]

The Chinese government also sought to limit university autonomy. Historically, the government has wielded influence over universities by establishing government-appointed university party committees that operate as parallel administrative structures within the institutions. However, in 2023-2024, these parallel structures began merging at some universities. For example, in December 2023, Tsinghua University announced that its Community Party committee would merge with the office of the president—a change that was reported at eight other universities. Observers warned that these changes would severely undermine academic freedom.^[20]

The Chinese Communist Party also imposed restrictions on academics’ ability to express dissent. On August 2, 2023, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) updated its code of conduct to require that CAS members adhere to the policies of the Communist Party’s Central Committee and contribute to Chinese national security. Chinese scholars have a strong incentive to abide by the CAS code of conduct. CAS is the largest and most prestigious scientific organization in China and its members receive greater access to research funding and to senior university leadership positions.^[21]

The Chinese government’s efforts to impose restrictions on the scholarship, teaching, and speech of students and academics extended abroad. Freedom House and Amnesty International both published reports in 2024 describing how China uses an extensive foreign surveillance apparatus, combined with assaults and threats against faculty and students abroad and against their family members back at home, to silence dissent.^[22] Chinese students abroad who have attended protests against the Chinese government or memorials of the Tiananmen Square massacre have commonly described Chinese authorities making threatening phone calls to family members still living in China.^[23] These pressures have a significant impact on Chinese students abroad. A recent survey conducted by the China Education Trust and the China Data Lab of the University of California found the number of Chinese students studying in the US who report feeling pressured by Chinese sources to express particular political opinions more than double from 13.2 percent of respondents prior 2004 to 30 percent of respondents after 2016.^[24] Both the Freedom House and Amnesty International reports argued that universities in the United States, Canada, and Europe have largely ignored these threats against their students.^[25]

The Chinese government’s efforts to restrict academic freedom abroad have extended to students and scholars who are not of Chinese-origin. A British documentary, Secrets and Power: China in the UK, released in November 2023 claimed that the Chinese government had exerted pressure on British universities and academics, allegedly resulting in the closure in 2016 of the University of Nottingham’s School of Contemporary Chinese Studies.^[26] There are also some indications that China’s anti-espionage laws have deterred foreign students from studying in the country.^[27]

Colombia

In Colombia, university campuses remained sites of protest, with students engaging in action on issues related to higher education and to broader economic, social, and political challenges. Similar to the previous year, the AFi ranked Colombia as “mostly free.” Nevertheless, conflicts in the wider society continued to play out on university campuses, in the form of violence, vandalism, and protests.

Figure 4: Colombia’s level of academic freedom has remained “mostly free” over the past decade. In 2023, the AFi scored Colombia at 0.68.

Incidents of violence affected campuses across the country. On March 15, 2024, unidentified hooded men stormed the campus of the University of Antioquia. One of the men shot a student, injuring him.^[28] On November 29, 2023, unidentified hooded people stormed Santander Industrial University and vandalized several buildings in protest of a proposed change in the university’s tuition policy.^[29]

In addition to violence affecting university campuses, the National University of Colombia system, specifically the Bogotá, Manizales, Medellín, Palmira, De la Paz, and Tumaco campuses, saw four months of course interruptions related to student and faculty strikes demanding better “academic and well-being guarantees” for students, as well as canceling the election of the new university rector.^[30] The university announced that courses would resume on July 22, 2024, after negotiations with the students proved successful.^[31]

Germany

Despite a very slight drop in academic freedom in 2023, Germany is the only country highlighted in this report that the AFi ranks as “fully free.” Yet, scholars and students found their academic freedom and ability to engage in free expression on campus constrained in 2023-2024, particularly as it related to Israeli military action in Gaza. In addition, amid concerns over Chinese espionage, the Germany government exerted increased restrictions on scholars’ research collaboration with Chinese academics and institutions.

Figure 5: Germany is rated “fully free” with respect to academic freedom. In 2023, the AFi gave Germany a score of 0.93.

German higher education campuses experienced heightened emotions and tensions against the backdrop of Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel and Israel’s military action in Gaza. In Germany, the historical legacy of the Holocaust has created a divisive environment in which criticism of Israeli policies and actions have been labeled “antisemitic.”^[32] Debated slogans, such as “from the river to the sea,” which some observers understand to be a call for the annihilation of Israel and others understand as a call for Palestinian rights and self-determination not necessarily dependent on the destruction of the Israeli state, have been banned, with one protester prosecuted and fined for chanting it.^[33] Accordingly, German police strongly curtailed protests against Israeli military action in Gaza by students and other members of the public.^[34]

Against this backdrop, antisemitic incidents took place at German universities.^[35] In early February, a student at the Freie Universität Berlin beat up a Jewish classmate, Lahav Shapira, after the two argued over the war on Gaza while out at a bar.^[36] In the wake of the attack, in March 2024 the Berlin Senate introduced amendments to the Berlin University Act that imposed a graduated set of disciplinary measures on students accused of attacks or discrimination on campus. The most serious of the penalties is expulsion.^[37] The amendments sparked controversy, with some observers welcoming them as necessary for preserving peaceful democracy, and others expressing concern that they would limit political expression on campus.^[38]

The charge of antisemitism was used to justify the termination of professors’ contracts, withdrawal of job offers, and denial of entry into the country by professors who made public statements on the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). On February 7, 2024, the Max Planck Institute (MPG) for Social Anthropology announced that it was terminating the contract of Ghassan Hage, an Australian-Lebanese professor and anthropologist, in response to Hage’s commentary on social media. The announcement came after a right-wing media campaign calling Hage antisemitic for his online commentary. On October 7, the day of the Hamas attack, Hage posted to his personal blog a poem that ostensibly sought to contextualize the attack in the context of the Israeli occupation. On January 14, 2024, Hage posted on social media describing Israel’s assault on Gaza as “genocide,” “ethnic cleansing,” and “misery, racism, inhumanity and concentration camps.” MPG announced that it would “[end] its working relationship with” Hage, saying that the professor’s views were “incompatible with the fundamental values of the Max Planck Society.”^[39]

On April 5, 2024, the University of Cologne (UoC) announced that it would withdraw its 2024 Albertus Magnus Professorship after learning that its awarded recipient, Nancy Fraser, a professor of philosophy at the New School, had signed an open letter titled “Philosophy for Palestine.” The letter, dated November 2, 2023, expressed solidarity with the Palestinian people, contextualized the October 7 attack in the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, condemned Israeli military action in Gaza, and called for an academic and cultural boycott of Israeli institutions. Similar to MPG, UoC explained that the letter could not “be reconciled with the statements of the University of Cologne.”^[40]

On April 12, 2024, German authorities denied entry to Ghassan Abu Sittah, a surgeon and the rector of the University of Glasgow, who was scheduled to speak later that day the Palästina Kongress (Palestine Congress), organized by the German nonprofit Jewish Voice for Just Peace in the Middle East. Abu Sittah planned to speak about his recent experiences working as a surgeon with the humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders during Israel’s ongoing military action in Gaza. He reported that border officials questioned him about his experience in Gaza and testimony that he had made before the International Criminal Court. They informed him that in order to ensure “the safety of the people at the conference and public order,” he was banned from entering Germany until after the conclusion of the Palästina Kongress.^[41] Congress organizers invited Abu Sittah to give his talk via Zoom instead. However, German police shut down the Congress shortly after it began, apparently to prevent Abu Sittah from speaking.^[42] (The following month, Abu Sittah was denied entry to France, where he was scheduled to speak to the Senate. According to French officials, Germany had requested that Abu Sittah be banned from entering all countries in the Schengen Area for a period of one year.^[43])

Despite Germany’s restrictions on protest and public expression critical of Israel, peaceful university-based protests against Israeli military action spread over the course of the academic year. These protests intensified in late April and early May 2024, alongside similar protests in the United States and Europe (for more details, see the section on the United States, below).^[44]

Police violence against protesters at the Freie Universität (FU) Berlin sparked a scandal that resulted in calls for German Federal Education and Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger to resign.^[45] A protest of over 100 students from multiple Berlin universities began in the courtyard of FU around 10 a.m. on May 7, 2024. Almost immediately, the university called police to clear the encampment. By around noon, approximately 200 police officers had surrounded the protesters. While police were dispersing protesters, officers and protesters scuffled, resulting in the temporary arrests of 79 people.^[46] Prosecutors opened preliminary proceedings against some protesters for trespassing, resistance, suspected incitement, and participation in an unauthorized assembly.^[47] Following the incident, around 400 Berlin lecturers signed a “Statement by Teachers at Berlin Universities.”^[48] The document—which over 1,000 teachers had signed by the end of July 2024—stated, “Regardless of whether we agree with the specific demands of the protest camp, we stand up for our students and defend their right to peaceful protest, which also includes the occupation of university grounds.” It called on Berlin university administrators to refrain from calling the police against or criminally prosecuting their own students.^[49]

German politicians, including Stark-Watzinger, criticized the letter, publicly implying that the statement and the political opinions expressed were unaligned with the German constitution and accusing those who signed it of dismissing antisemitism and of condoning the use of violence.^[50] The conservative tabloid newspaper Bild published a front-page article that called the signatories of the letter “perpetrators” and included their pictures.^[51]

A month later, in early June, an investigative media report by NDR uncovered documents showing that Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) had called for an investigation into whether the letter included incitement to hatred, as defined by the legal code, and had conducted a legal review to determine whether the professors who had signed the letter could be disciplined under either civil service code or criminal law and whether their funding could be cut by BMBF.^[52] Following NDR’s exposé, the BMBF asserted that State Secretary for Education Sabine Döring was responsible for the legal review and fired her.^[53] Arguing that Stark-Watzinger—and not Döring—was responsible, German academics wrote another letter decrying “an unprecedented attack on their fundamental rights” and calling for Stark-Watzinger resignation.^[54] In response, the German Bundestag, Germany’s national parliament, has opened an inquiry into the episode. However, Stark-Watzinger and the Free Democratic Party, of which she is a member, have reportedly sought to prevent Döring from testifying.^[55]

University leaders called police in to disperse protests at several other campuses including at the University of Bremen^[56] and Leipzig University,^[57] after protesters occupied campus buildings. On May 22, a group of students occupied Humboldt University of Berlin’s department of social sciences. They barricaded the main entrance, displayed a banner to rename the building the “Jabalia Institute” (Jabalia is the name of a refugee camp in Gaza), and spray-painted slogans on the walls including “Killing civilians is not self-defense” and “Resistance is legitimate.” While the president of the university initially negotiated with students, she later reported that Berlin’s science minister and the city’s mayor both put pressure on her to end the protest.^[58] After two days, the university called the police to evict the protesters. During the eviction, officers arrested more than 150 people, including students and university staff, charging 25 with criminal acts. According to students and journalists present, the police response was violent and brutal, sending some, including a journalist, to the hospital.^[59]

Concerns over Chinese research espionage led Germany during the reporting period to take steps to restrict research collaboration with Chinese institutions, scholars, and students. On July 18, 2023, the German government released a new China strategy that included measures to withhold funding for research projects where there is the possibility of “knowledge drain” to China and to educate academics on the security risks of cooperation with Chinese academics and institutions. While concerns about Chinese espionage were not unfounded^[60]—and German academics were already concerned about China’s vague laws on data protection and national security—the undefined concept of “knowledge drain” left room for overly broad application of the strategy in ways that threatened to undermine academic freedom.^[61] The tension between academic freedom and research security was highlighted in May 2024 by the arrests of three researchers who had signed a contract with Chemnitz University of Technology, who were accused of having stolen information on dual-use technologies for the Chinese secret service.^[62]

Concerns about Chinese espionage also extended to Chinese students. In July 2023, Friedrich Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU), one of Germany’s largest universities decided to stop admitting students funded by the China Scholarship Council (CSC) “to reduce the risk of industrial espionage.” The university pointed to the fact that students supported by the CSC must sign “loyalty pledges” to the Chinese government. In an email, FAU acknowledged, “FAU is aware that under these contracts CSC scholarship holders will be unable to fully exercise their academic freedom and freedom of expression as stipulated under German Basic Law.”^[63]

Hong Kong

In Hong Kong, restrictions on academic freedom continued, following the established pattern of the last five years. Hong Kong’s score on the AFi remained low, with the country rated as “severely restricted.” Hong Kong’s government continued to take actions that reduced the autonomy of higher education institutions. For scholars, increased ideological and political control over universities correlated with examples of event cancellations and loss of academic positions.

Figure 6: Hong Kong has seen academic freedom gradually decline over the past decade. Whereas, in 2013, the AFi rated Hong Kong as “mostly free” (0.69), in 2023, it was rated as “mostly restricted” (0.24).

On March 23, 2024, Hong Kong’s chief executive John Lee signed a new “national security” law that could constrain academic research. The new law, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, expands on the draconian National Security Law passed in 2020 by allowing for closed-door trials and for police to detain individuals for up to 16 days without charge. In addition, it allows for the government to ban organizations and companies found to be “working for foreign forces” from operating in Hong Kong.”^[64] Academics working in Hong Kong have expressed concern that, under the new law, those engaged in international research collaboration could be charged under the new crime of “foreign interference.”^[65] Since the 2020 National Security Law took effect, Hong Kong has seen the flight of academics—a trend that could continue with the addition of Article 23.^[66]

In October 2024, Hong Kong’s Immigration Department rejected Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) historian Rowena He’s application to renew her visa, prompting CUHK to terminate her contract. The rejection appeared to be based on He’s research on research on the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, academic freedom, and censorship and her ties to foreign governments and non-governmental groups. At the time of her dismissal, He, a Canadian citizen who had taught at CUHK since 2019, was on leave from the university while she waited for the renewal of her visa. During the renewal process, Hong Kong’s Immigration Department asked her to answer a list of questions related to foreign funding she had received for past research projects and her ties to foreign institutions. Around the same time, Chinese government affiliated newspapers accused He of slandering the Chinese government. He’s book Tiananmen Exiles: Voices of the Struggle for Democracy was removed from the shelves of public libraries in Hong Kong in May 2023. He waited for a response for over one year before her application was rejected. Chief Executive Lee, the Immigration Department considered “potential security risks to Hong Kong” in making the decision. Following the rejection of her visa renewal, CUHK informed He that her position was being terminated immediately.^[67]

Several Hong Kong universities canceled academic talks during fall 2023, apparently because of external pressure. On October 20, 2023, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong announced the cancellation of a lecture by James Frankel, who also goes by Fu Jianshi. Frankel, a professor in the Department of Culture and Religious Studies at CUHK was scheduled to give a talk titled, “Gaza Humanitarian Crisis—Save the Children of Gaza.” Frankel reported that he had received an email suggesting that members of the local community had planned to disrupt the event to combat “Palestinian propaganda.”^[68] On November 14, 2023, the University of Hong Kong canceled a talk by British lawyer Timothy Owens on judicial independence and criminal justice. The precise reasons for the cancellation were unclear, but Owens had previously been linked to a high-profile national security case. Reports suggest that the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the executive committee of Beijing’s legislative body with final interpretative oversight over Hong Kong’s Basic Law, had advised the Hong Kong Immigration Department to deny any applications for a work visa that Owens filed.^[69]

India

In India, the most pressing threats to the academic freedom of students and scholars included the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s efforts to exert political control and impose a Hindu nationalist agenda over universities^[70] and university policies limiting student protest. According to the AFi, the country now ranked as “completely restricted,” its lowest score since the mid-1940s.

Figure 7: Academic freedom has declined in India over the past decade. In 2013,  the AFi rated the country as “fully free” (0.62). By 2022, the country’s rating had fallen to “mostly restricted” (0.29), and in 2023, the country was rated as “completely restricted” (0.18).

In the most positive development during the reporting period, the Bombay High Court in March 2024 acquitted former Delhi University professor G.N. Saibaba based on insufficient evidence provided by the prosecution. Saibaba was released from prison two days later, after nearly a decade in jail.^[71]

The reporting period saw the right-wing BJP-led central government battle with state governments over control of higher education. In Kerala state, Governor Arif Mohammed Khan, an appointee of the central government, fought with the state government over a legislative amendment that would have him replaced as the chancellor of the state’s universities. In April 2024, the state government filed an appeal with India’s Supreme Court against India’s president, Droupadi Murmu, who refused to approve the proposed amendment. Similar battles for control of higher education took place in other states governed by left-wing governments, including Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Punjab.^[72]

Political rivalry between the central government and the government of Karnataka state appeared to play a role in national Indian immigration officials’ refusal to allow Nitasha Kaul to enter the country on February 23, 2024. Kaul is a professor of Politics, International Relations, and Critical Interdisciplinary Studies and the head of the Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD) at the University of Westminster’s School of Social Sciences who grew up in India but is a British citizen. Kaul holds an Overseas Citizen of India card, multiple entry, multipurpose, and lifelong visa for visiting India. Kaul was traveling to India on the invitation of H.C. Mahadevappa, the minister of social welfare of Karnataka state, to speak at a two-day convention on the “Constitution and National Unity.” The Karnataka state is governed by the opposition Congress Party. Immigration officials told Kaul that the central government had instructed them to deny her entry and referred to comments that she had made that were critical of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a right-wing Hindu nationalist paramilitary organization.^[73]

In one case, the pressure by the central government appeared to play a role in the resignation of a professor. On July 25, 2023, Sabyasachi Das, an assistant professor of economics at Ashoka University, presented a paper alleging political manipulation during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections at a conference on development economics hosted by National Bureau of Research, a private nonprofit research organization based in the United States. After the paper gained public attention, BJP leaders publicly attacked Das’s work. The newspaper Wire reported that the prime minister’s office had called investors and board members of Ashoka University, questioning Das’s motivations. Ashoka University sought to distance itself from the work, and formed an ad-hoc committee to investigate the context in which Das wrote the paper and whether he had violated the faculty policy on academic freedom. Das resigned, resulting in a public outcry from his colleagues in the Department of Economics and Political Science. Following his resignation, media outlets reported that members of India’s Intelligence Bureau visited Ashoka University asking questions about the paper—possibly in connection to a Foreign Contributions Regulations Act (FCRA) evaluation.^[74]

As during previous years, Indian university students found their right to free expression violated.

Police repeatedly used force or detained students for exercising their rights to freedom of expression and assembly through peaceful protests. On October 23, 2023, police detained more than 200 students from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Jamia Millia Islamia University, and the University of Delhi as they protested outside of the Israeli embassy in solidarity with the OPT. Students claimed that police “manhandled” them, causing some injuries.^[75] On January 11, 2024, police detained around 150 students who had gathered at Periyar University to peacefully protest a visit by Tamil Nadu state governor R.N. Ravi, keeping them in a nearby banquet hall in advance of the governor’s arrival and releasing them later in the afternoon.^[76] In March 2024, protests erupted across India after the government announced the immediate implementation of the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act, which excludes Muslim migrants from a pathway to citizenship guaranteed to others in the same law.^[77] On March 21, police detained around 50 students at the University of Delhi who had responded to the All India Student Association (AISA)’s call to protest implementation of the Act. The students were later released without charges against them.^[78]

Universities, including JNU and South Asian University (SAU), and state governments took action to restrict student’s right to free expression. In December 2023, JNU issued a directive that banned students from hanging posters or staging sit-in protests within 100 meters of academic buildings. Students who broke the rule faced a fine of Rs 20,000 ($240 USD) or expulsion if they engaged in undefined “anti-national” activities. Both left- and right-wing students decried the directive.^[79] On July 28, 2023, following a crackdown on a wave of student protests that began during the fall of 2022,^[80] SAU began requiring admitted students to sign a 13-point pledge to refrain from protesting, agitating, or striking on campus and to declare that they are physically and mentally healthy.^[81] Meanwhile, the Gujarat state government passed a Public Universities Bill in fall 2023, that in essence eliminates student politics by replacing student senates and syndicates, which are elected bodies, with a “board of governance” appointed by the state.^[82]

As in previous years, political struggles played out on campus—often violently—as students from opposing groups attacked scholars and each other. On January 17, 2024, two members of the Fraternity Movement, the student wing of the Welfare Party of India, violently attacked Nizamuddin KM, an assistant professor of Arabic at Maharaja’s College, over the suspension of another Fraternity Movement member. The group accused Nizamuddin of preferential treatment of the left-wing Student Federation of India (SFI) members.^[83] The following day, around 20 members of the same group, along with members of the Kerala Student Union—the student wing of the Congress Party—stabbed Nasser Abdul Rahman, a unit secretary of the SFI at an on-campus hostel at Maharaja’s College.^[84]

On March 12, 2024, students affiliated with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad shouted down an on-campus lecture at Gangadhar Meher University by Nivedita Menon—a professor in political theory at Jawaharlal Nehru University, author, and advocate for gender equality and social justice—forcing her to leave the stage and ending the event early.^[85]

India’s scholars also experienced heightened tensions related to Israel’s ongoing military actions in Gaza, which followed the October 7 attack by Hamas.^[86] For example, on November 14, 2023, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay canceled a talk by Achin Vanaik, a critically acclaimed writer and former head of the department of political science at the University of Delhi, about the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the current crisis. However, a group of students waged a campaign to cancel the event, citing remarks that Vanaik had given two weeks earlier during a talk at OP Jindal University during which he compared Zionism and Hindutva. The students alleged that Vanaik’s remarks were anti-Hindu and pro-Hamas.^[87]

Iran

Iran’s persecution of faculty and students for their participation in the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement continued in 2023-2024. Iranian government took increasingly repressive actions to enforce the wearing of the hijab for women,^[88] and Iranian women and girls faced disproportionate risks because of their gender.^[89] Academic freedom remained at extremely low levels, with the AFi rating the country as “completely restricted.”

Figure 8: Since 2013, the AFi has consistently rated Iran as “completely restricted” with respect to academic freedom. In 2023, Iran received a score of 0.08, putting it in the bottom 10 percent of all countries.^[90]

In a positive development, Iranian authorities released the wrongfully imprisoned conservationist Niloufar Bayani in April 2024.^[91]

However, other academics remained imprisoned. Among these was the Swedish-Iranian academic Ahmadreza Djalili, who was originally taken into custody in 2016 and was sentenced to death in 2017.^[92] Djalili remained in prison even after a prisoner swap between Iran and Sweden on June 15.^[93] Djalili has allegedly experienced torture and ill-treatment while in prison, and he has been repeatedly denied medical care despite his deteriorating health. His health deteriorated further after he engaged in a hunger strike from June 26 to July 4, 2024, in protest of his continued detention.^[94]

Around the start of the 2023-2024 school year, Iranian forces arrested Tina Deljoo, a prominent women’s rights advocate, university lecturer, and PhD candidate in political science at Azad University. On January 30, 2024, she began serving her sentence of one year in prison on charges of “propaganda against the regime” for her online protest activity.^[95] Also in January, Iranian forces arrested Pr. Shahin Ghafouri, a professor at Azad University of Qorveh, for comments that he made on social media criticizing the commemoration of the death of General Qassem Soleimani.^[96]

As of May 2024, it was estimated that more than 700 students had been arrested, attacked, or beaten for participating in demonstrations at universities.^[97] The charges commonly levied against students and professors included the disruption of public order and propaganda against the regime.

Some students and scholars arrested for their participation in the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement were given amnesty and released in early 2024. Within a few months, however, it was reported that many had been re-arrested.^[98]

Some students reported ill treatment while in prison. In September 2023, Iranian forces arrested Armita Paveer, a student of molecular and cellular biology at Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University, on charges of “insulting the leadership” and “propaganda against the regime.” Paveer was taken to Tabriz prison, where she reported experiencing mental torture and forced confessions. Paveer engaged in multiple hunger strikes in protest of her prison conditions and was hospitalized repeatedly. On February 9, the Azarshahr Revolutionary Court sentenced her to 22 months and 17 days in prison after trying her in absentia without allowing her a legal representative or to present a defense.^[99]

In one case, a student was killed while in custody. On January 28, 2024, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) arrested Sepehr Shirani, an 18-year-old student, for his alleged online protest activities. Three days later, on January 31, his family received news that he had died while in custody.^[100] Authorities did not provide any explanation for his death, and dissidents have called Shirani’s death suspicious.^[101]

On September 14, 2024, Iranian forces arrested Kharazmi University industrial engineering student Samaneh Asghari for her participation in the “Women, Life Freedom” protests. Asghari is also a prominent children’s rights activist. On February 10, 2024, the Tehran Revolutionary Court charged Asghari with “assembly and collusion to commit a crime against internal/external security,” “disturbance of public order,” and “propaganda against the Islamic Republic,” sentencing her to one year in prison.^[102]

The 2023-2024 academic year opened with a purge of university professors. While such dismissals had been ongoing since the beginning of protests in September 2022, their pace escalated in August 2023.^[103] While some professors received written notice of their dismissal, many universities notified professors of the decision to terminate their contracts by phone.^[104] Without written notice, these professors had no evidence of their persecution—a potential barrier when seeking external aid. A document leaked around the same time indicated that the Iranian government had plans to hire 15,000 new lecturers. Observers saw this as a move to replace professors opposed to the government with supporters; the new lecturers would make up around 17 percent of university teachers.^[105]

Al Zahra University dismissed Professor Neda Tavallaie in October 2023, just three months after she had been reappointed. Tavallaie reported that the university told her of the decision in a phone call, pointing to the “fluctuations in the confirmation of [her] qualification by the guards” as the reason. Tavallaie had previously expressed public support for one of her students, Sepideh Rashno,^[106] an activist and student, who was suspended from Al Zahra University in May 2023 after being arrested for refusing to wear a hijab on a city bus.^[107] Rashno was sentenced to nearly four years in prison.^[108]

In some cases, Iranian professors resigned from their positions in response to the Iranian government’s interference into university policies. On September 30 and October 1, 2023, all but one member of Sharif University of Technology’s faculty council, an academic union, resigned from the council in protest of the government’s intervention into the university. The mass resignation led to the dissolution of the council.^[109]

Throughout the year, universities also suspended, expelled, and otherwise limited educational opportunities for students for their participation in protests. On November 26, 2023, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences expelled Zoha Abdi, a final-year PhD student in pharmaceutical sciences in apparent retaliation for her aid of an injured protester in October 2022. Abdi had previously been arrested in October 2022, before being released as part of a nationwide amnesty in early 2023. Abdi’s expulsion meant that she was unable to defend her PhD thesis.^[110] In February 2024, the Central Committee of the Ministry of Science issued a two semester suspension to Sepehr Rathi, a student in aerospace engineering and the secretary general of the Islamic Association at the Khajeh Nasir Toosi University, for allegedly disrupting university affairs by participating in protests.^[111] At a policy level, in January 2024, Shahid Beheshti University announced a new admissions policy that disqualifies students who have previously received disciplinary convictions from either the university’s internal disciplinary council or the Ministry of Science, Research, and Technology from the university’s “exceptional talents program.”^[112] According to information collected by the International Community of Iranian Academics, between June 2023 and July 2024, Iranian universities suspended around 50 students for between one and seven semesters.^[113]

Around April 2024, universities began issuing disciplinary penalties in rising numbers in the context of intensified enforcement of the country’s new mandatory hijab law, originally approved by Iran’s parliament in September 2023 but not yet approved by Iran’s Guardian Council.^[114] In mid-April, Iranian forces opened a new campaign, Noor, to enforce hijab law. On university campuses, this involved increased surveillance on campus, including reports of facial recognition cameras at university entrances, and universities employing their own hijab enforcers.^[115] Late that month, morality police barred more than 200 women students from entering Amir Amirkabir University of Technology for not having a “proper” head covering.^[116]

In addition to experiencing repression inside Iran, Iranian academics found themselves with barriers to international opportunities, as some governments pointed to Iran’s human rights abuses to discourage collaboration with Iranian institutions. In April 2024, the Australian’s foreign minister wrote to university leaders asking them to pause partnerships with their Iranian counterparts.^[117]

Israel

The October 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel’s communities by Hamas had a dramatic effect on students, scholars, and universities. According to the AFi, while Israel remained “fully free,” its level of academic freedom dropped slightly.

Figure 9: Israel has had a high level of academic freedom over the past decade, receiving a consistent “fully free” rating from the AFi. However, the country’s score declined from 0.94 in 2022 to 0.85 in 2023.

The October 7 attack left Israeli society, including students, scholars, and universities, traumatized and reeling. In the aftermath of the attack and as Israel organized its own military action in Gaza, including by calling up reservist students, academics, and university staff, the Israeli higher education sector delayed the start of the school year. Initially, the beginning of class work was pushed by a week from October 15 to October 22.^[118] Ultimately, classes began on January 1, 2024, two and a half months late.^[119] Once classes started, scholars and students found themselves trying to address trauma and dealing with the death and abduction of their community members.^[120] Students found it difficult to escape the presence of the military and the ongoing conflict on campus, with student-soldiers carrying weapons on campus and deep divides growing between Israeli Jewish and Israeli Arab students.^[121]

According to media reports, the drive to call up reservist scholars led to the freezing of academic research, with David Harel, president of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, telling Times Higher Education, “right now everything’s come to a halt.” Israeli scholarship was further impacted as Israel’s military actions and the growing death toll and humanitarian crisis in Gaza fueled calls in many academic communities abroad to pressure for a ceasefire by withdrawing from research and study partnerships with Israeli institutions.^[122] Most of these calls for academic boycott emphasized cutting ties with Israeli institutions or individuals serving as representatives of those institutions, but not with individual scholars.^[123]

As the majority of Israelis defended the military action in Gaza,^[124] dissenters were silenced, particularly Arab-Israeli citizens, including scholars and students.^[125] In one of the most high-profile cases, Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israeli police took actions against the professor Nadira Shalhoub-Kevorkian, the university’s Lawrence D. Biele Chair in Law at the Faculty of Law-Institute of Criminology and the School of Social Work and Public Welfare. Shalhoub-Kevorkian is a Palestinian citizen of Israel. On October 29, 2023, Hebrew University leadership publicly called on Shalhoub-Kevorkian to resign from her position after she signed a petition that expressed concern about the effects of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza on children’s well-being and emotional, mental, and physical health and called “for the immediate cessation of the Western-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza.”^[126] The call prompted threats of violence against Shalhoub-Kevorkian and her family.^[127]

Five months later, on March 12, 2024, Hebrew University summarily suspended Shalhoub-Kevorkian in apparent retaliation for remarks that she made during a podcast interview expressing doubt about Hamas’s use of sexual assault on October 7 and that “Zionism is a crime, and only by revoking it will we be able to go on.”^[128] The university reversed the suspension on March 27, after around 100 current and former Hebrew University faculty members signed a letter demanding that the university follow due process and respect Shalhoub-Kevorkian’s right to academic freedom, and after Shalhoub-Kevorkian met with Hebrew University rector Tamir Sheafer and clarified her remarks.^[129]

The following month, on April 18, 2024, Israeli police arrested Shalhoub-Kevorkian on suspicion of incitement to terrorism, violence, and racism. Shalhoub-Kevorkian was released the following day and reported experiencing ill treatment, including being strip-searched, handcuffed, and held in a cold cell without adequate clothing and without access to food, water, and medication for several hours.^[130] Two months later, in June 2024, Shalhoub-Kevorkian remained under investigation for incitement to terrorism.^[131]

Arab-Israeli and Jewish-Israeli scholars lost their positions in apparent retaliation for comments that they made critical of Israeli military action in Gaza. On October 15, 2023, Kaye Academic College of Education suspended educator, peace activist, and professor Warda Sada after she published a series of social media posts that acknowledged the pain of both Israelis and Palestinians, sought to explain Hamas’s attack on Israel by pointing to Palestinian suffering, criticized the military’s conduct in Gaza, and expressed support for hostage negotiations.^[132] In a similar case, Achva Academic College dismissed Uri Horesh, a senior lecturer in Arabic linguistics and a Jewish-Israeli academic, after he shared a Facebook post that stated “End the Genocide Now, Let Gaza Live” and changed his Facebook cover photo to an image that included the Hebrew phrase “Free Ghetto Gaza” and the English phrase “Free Gaza.”^[133]

Dozens of Palestinian students studying at Israeli universities faced disciplinary action for the criticism of Israeli military action in Gaza, most for posts made on social media expressing solidarity with the people of Gaza or reciting verses of the Quran.^[134] For example, on October 10, 2023, the University of Haifa suspended several students who had allegedly posted content supportive of Hamas’s October 7 attack, such as a video of the late Ghassan Kanafani, a prominent author, journalist, and the spokesperson for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a Palestinian-Marxist organization. Over the course of the next several months, the university reversed and reinstated the students’ suspension multiple times as disciplinary proceedings continued.^[135] According to Adalah—The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel—from October 7 to May 9, 2024, 36 universities and colleges summoned 124 Palestinian students to disciplinary hearings. Among the 95 of those students represented by Adalah, 47 percent were suspended or expelled. The majority (79 percent) of students who faced disciplinary action were female.^[136]

More broadly, members of the Israeli government leveraged legislative action to silence dissent among students and scholars. In early June 2024, Likud lawmaker Ofir Katz introduced a bill—initially proposed by the National Union of Israeli Students—that called for universities to fire “a lecturer, a teacher or researcher who expresses or acts in a manner that includes denial of the existence of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, incitement to racism, violence or terrorism and/or support for an armed struggle or an act of terrorism against Israel.”^[137] The presidents of several Israeli universities warned that the vaguely worded bill was a totalitarian measure.^[138]

Myanmar

The national uprising against Myanmar’s military junta continued during the reporting period. By the beginning of 2024, the military government had lost control over large portions of the country to an increasingly well-organized resistance movement.^[139] Three years of war took a toll on Myanmar’s education system, with higher education essentially stopping.^[140] Under these conditions, the AFi scored Myanmar’s level of academic freedom as one of the lowest globally.

Figure 10: Myanmar’s level of academic freedom declined dramatically from 2020 to 2021—a consequence of the February 2020 military coup. In 2023, the AFi rated Myanmar as “completely restricted” with respect to academic freedom. Its score of 0.03 ranked it as the third most restricted country in the world.^[141]

By early 2024, Myanmar’s university student population had shrunk from pre-coup levels by 90 percent, a statistic that at least partially reflected students’ decisions to boycott the military junta’s education system in favor of joining either the nonviolent or armed resistance. Faculty members’ decisions echoed those of their students, with large numbers of professors choosing to join the civil disobedience movement (CDM).^[142] According to a survey conducted by the opposition National Unity Government’s Ministry of Education, those faculty members and teachers who had decided to join the CDM struggled to find employment. Some voluntarily taught CDM students online but did not receive a salary.^[143]

Compounding these challenges, a reactivated conscription law put additional strain on university-aged youth. While the law, which was re-enacted in February 2024, allows for a temporary deferment for students, this only applies to those enrolled in official universities run by the military junta—not to those enrolled in education programs run by the CDM. Media reports indicated that the renewed law was prompting young people to consider leaving the country in greater numbers, posing a potential barrier to their education.^[144]

Often, those students who remained enrolled at Myanmar’s universities found themselves at risk of armed conflict. Myanmar’s military junta commonly deployed forces on university campuses, prompting attacks by local People’s Defense Forces (PDF), the armed resistance. For example, November 26, 2023, it was reported that around 30 troops from Myanmary’s military junta and police were stationed at the University of Sittwe.^[145] Such attacks caught students and faculty members in the crossfire.^[146] For example, on October 1, 2023, PDF conducted a sniper attack against military junta forces stationed at Pakokku Technological University.^[147] In at least one case, local PDF directly targeted the government’s education system. On September 5, 2023, Monywa’s local PDF conducted an armed attack on the opening ceremony of a community course being offered at the University of Computer Studies, saying that “they couldn’t accept the military council’s education system.”^[148]

Students and faculty members continued to face arrest, prosecution, and killings—although lower numbers were reported than in previous years. According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), at least 25 students and educators were arrested from July 1, 2023, through June 30, 2024, and at least 16 students and educators were sentenced during that same time period (a number that includes individuals affiliated with secondary and primary educational institutions).^[149] One deadly event targeting university students occurred on July 28, 2023, when military junta forces raided the Budalin Student Union office and killed three student leaders who were staying at a house nearby. In addition to killing the three students, the junta forces also abducted one of the student leader’s father and several other people from the village.^[150]

Nicaragua

In Nicaragua, the Ortega government continued to quell dissent by aggressively targeting universities, scholars, and students, along with members of civil society, certain religious figures, and others who opposed the regime. This included severely undermining university autonomy by forcibly closing and confiscating the assets of dozens of Nicaraguan higher education institutions, both public and private, including foreign universities. The country’s continued decline of academic freedom, which began in 2018, has also continued during this reporting period, placing Nicaragua among the 10 countries with the lowest levels of academic freedom globally, according to the AFI.^[151]

Figure 11: Academic freedom declined dramatically between 2017 and 2018, falling from “somewhat free” (0.43) to “completely restricted” (0.14). Since 2018, academic freedom has continued to decline, reaching 0.05 by 2023 and making Nicaragua the country with the sixth lowest AFi Score in the world.^[152]

Following widespread, anti-government demonstrations in Nicaragua in 2018, the Ortega government has intensified its crackdown on institutions perceived as critical of its regime. This has included the closure of more than half of the universities and civil society organizations in the country.^[153] Nicaraguan authorities often implemented such closures by claiming that the institutions were either centers of terrorism or by pointing to an alleged failure to meet accreditation standards or reporting requirements.^[154] Notably, in August 2023, the government shut down the Central American University (UCA), a major independent institution, under accusations of terrorism.^[155] The UCA provided essential support for the 2018 protests and was considered one of the last-standing hubs for freedom and democratic thought in the country.^[156] The Special Rapporteurship on Economic, Social, Cultural and Environmental Rights of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights called on the Nicaraguan government to reverse its decision against the UCA, which violates the Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy.^[157] Similarly, on July 28, 2023, Nicaragua’s Ministry of Interior canceled the legal operating status and confiscated the property of the Universidad Evangelica Martin Luther King (UENIC) and the Universidad de Occidente (UDO).^[158] Nicaragua’s National Council of Universities (CNU) and National Council of Evaluation and Accreditation (CNEA) had requested the cancellation of UENIC, stating that the university had failed to comply with the quality standards necessary for accreditation.^[159] The Ministry of Interior, CNEA, and CNU also requested the cancellation of UDO, stating that the university had failed to report its financial statements for 2022; offered courses not approved by the CNU and CNEA; offered to degrees that it was not authorized to offer; failed to meet minimum quality standards for courses; and held locations in locales not reported to the CNU and CNEA.^[160]

The Nicaraguan government consolidated its control over universities by implementing policies that undermined university autonomy. In November 2023, the National Assembly of Nicaragua passed changes to Law 89, the Law of Autonomy of Higher Education Institutions, and Law 582, the General Education Law, granting the government-run National Council of Universities (CNU) oversight of university operations.^[161] The changes also grant the Nicaraguan Ministry of Finance and Public Credit the power to administer the state’s budget for universities, effectively centralizing funds distribution. The November 30 changes come after previous revisions enacted at the beginning of 2023. The earlier revisions made the CNU the “comptroller of the universities”—an apparent attempt to centralize the country’s universities under government control.^[162]

The Ortega regime continued to imprison and prosecute scholars and students critiquing the government. A week after the order to close the UCA, police arrested four students who had publicly criticized the closure—Joseling Mayela Campos Silva, Josseth Miranda, Adela Espinoza Tercero, and Gabriela Morales.^[163] Josseth Miranda was released on August 21, while the other three student activists remain in prison.^[164] In addition, the whereabouts and conditions of sociologist and retired professor Freddy Quezada remain unknown. On November 29, 2023, police arrested Professor Quezada at his residence in Managua, hours after he criticized the Ortega regime on social media.^[165] On December 5, 2023, Quezada was transferred to the Jorge Navarro Penitentiary System in Tipitapa, known as “La Modelo.”^[166] In early 2024, Quezada was tried during a one-day trial, which he was permitted to join only via Zoom. He was found guilty of “incitement to hatred.”^[167] On September 5, 2024, the United States secured the release of 135 Nicaraguan prisoners, including Quezada, on humanitarian grounds. The prisoners were released to Guatemala.^[168]

In a statement issued in September 2023, Jan-Michael Simon, chair of the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (GHREN)—a United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights mandated independent research group—laid out the state of affairs in stark terms: “We have observed the intentional and severe deprivation of economic and social rights, in particular the right to education and academic freedom. Today, the university sector of Nicaragua as a whole no longer has independent institutions. Nicaragua is being stripped of its intellectual capital and critical voices, leaving the country’s prospects and development on hold.”^[169] The most recent report from GHREN, published in February 2024, found numerous human rights violations targeting specific groups, including university students and faculty, in addition to the active suppression of university autonomy.^[170]

Nigeria

In Nigeria, small non-state armed groups continue to cause insecurity throughout several regions, including the north and northeast.^[171] These groups opportunistically targeted university students and instructors, demanding ransom for their release. Despite this insecurity, Nigeria has been consistently ranked in the top 20 percent of countries for the highest level of academic freedom, according to the AFi.

Figure 12: Academic freedom has remained stable in Nigeria over the past decade, and the country rates as “fully free.” In 2023, the AFi scored the country at 0.91.

In Nigeria’s northeast, where the Islamist group Boko Haram has engaged in a decade-long insurgency that has systematically targeted education, campus insecurity continued. On December 4, 2023, Nigerian police successfully defused an improvised explosive device (IED) found at the entrance of the University of Maiduguri.^[172] This was the ninth attack on the university involving either explosives or armed attackers that SAR has recorded since 2017.^[173]

Over the past several years, opportunistic abductions of university students by criminals and armed groups have spiked, notably in northern Nigerian states. Sources have frequently described groups of “bandits” kidnapping students and staff in pursuit of ransom. On September 22, 2023, over 35 Federal University, Gusau, students were kidnapped in Zamfara State; 13 of the students have been rescued.^[174] On October 8 and 22, 2023, respectively, unknown gunmen abducted two professors from Nasarawa State University, Haruna Ayuba Kuje, a professor in biogeography and environmental science and former deputy vice-chancellor, and Comfort Adokwe, a lecturer in the Faculty of Administration and Deputy Director of the Gender Studies program.^[175]  On May 9, 2024, unknown gunmen abducted more than 20 students from their classrooms at the Confluence University of Science and Technology; by May 12, four students remained missing.^[176]

Occupied Palestinian Territory

In the OPT, students, scholars, and universities faced conditions of escalating hardship in the context of Israeli military action in Gaza. Gaza’s system of higher education was wholly destroyed, while in the West Bank, the Israeli military raided Palestinian universities and arrested Palestinian scholars at students, and Israeli settlers engaged in extreme levels of violence against Palestinian communities.^[177] In Gaza, academic freedom remained low, with the AFi rating the territory as “severely restricted.” In the West Bank, academic freedom dropped significantly from 2022 to 2023, falling from “mostly free” to “moderately restricted.”

Figure 13: Gaza’s levels of academic freedom had remained relatively stable, albeit low, since 2013. In 2023, the AFi assessed the territory as “mostly restricted” (0.32). In the West Bank, academic freedom declined substantially over the past four years. In 2020, the AFi assessed the territory as “mostly free” (0.76). By 2023, the territory was scored as “mostly restricted” (0.45).

Israel’s aerial and ground bombardment of Gaza resulted in the destruction of thousands of buildings, including universities.^[178] By January 17, 2024, the media reported that Israeli military forces had destroyed the last standing university in Gaza, Al Israa University. Israeli forces had targeted the university in early November 2023, claiming that Hamas fighters had used it as a hideout. The Israeli military subsequently occupied the university for approximately two and a half months, using it as a military base and detention and interrogation center, before using landmines to destroy it.^[179]

Dozens of university professors and hundreds of students were killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza. As of April 2024, the deaths of 95 professors had been reported.^[180] Some of the most high-profile deaths include Sufyan Tayeh, the president of the Islamic University of Gaza and a leading researcher in physics and applied mathematics,^[181] and Refaat Alareer, a renowned poet, writer, activist, and professor of literature at the Islamic University of Gaza.^[182]

In the West Bank, according to the Palestinian minister of education and higher education, the presence of Israeli military checkpoints made it essentially impossible for the West Bank’s students and scholars to access their universities. In addition, Israeli forces stormed and raided universities, sometimes arresting students. Such raids were not new after October 7, but rather a pre-existing tactic of Israeli military forces in the West Bank. For example, on September 24, 2023, dozens of Israeli special forces forcibly entered Birzeit University, damaged campus property, and arrested eight students. Those detained included the student council president, Abdul Majid Hassan, who had previously been arrested and detained multiple times, and other senior members of the student council, which is currently dominated by the Hamas-affiliated Islamic Wafa bloc.^[183] Israeli forces again raided Birzeit University on November 8, 2023. The raid targeted the student council’s office, and Israeli forces damaged property and confiscated Palestinian flags and students’ belongings.^[184] Other universities were also affected. On November 16, 2023, Israeli forces raided Palestine Technical University, Kadoorie, damaging university infrastructure.^[185]

At least one professor was arrested in the West Bank. On October 23, 2023, Israeli forces arrested prominent astrophysicist and professor of physics at Al Quds University Imad Barghouti. On November 1, Barghouti’s family informed supporters that he had been sentenced to six months of administrative detention.^[186] On May 1, 2024, it was reported that Barghouti had been released.^[187] Barghouti had previously been arrested in 2020.^[188]

Russia

Russia’s war in Ukraine continued to put significant pressure on Russian scholars, students, and higher education institutions. As in previous reporting periods, the Russian government increasingly sought to control the content of higher education and to quell dissent within academia, turning university classroom lessons into political echo chambers. Under these conditions, academic freedom continued to decline, with the AFi ranking the country as nearly “completely restricted.”

Figure 14: In Russia, academic freedom has declined from already low levels over the past decade. In 2013, the AFi assessed the country as “moderately restricted” (0.43). By 2023, the country’s ranking had nearly dropped to “completely restricted” (0.2).

Prior to his “reelection”^[189] in 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his intentions to limit Western influences and suppress dissent on university campuses.^[190] In taking action to fulfill these promises, the government particularly targeted liberal arts programs.^[191] These programs focus on fostering individual thought through an interdisciplinary approach that encourages students to question assumptions, analyze complex issues, and formulate ideas and arguments. Courses with topics considered “undesirable” to the prosecutor’s office, such as gender studies, feminism, human rights, current politics, and historical interpretations of World War II contrary to the official narrative, were canceled and removed from the curriculum.^[192]

Russian authorities also sought to counter what they designated Western influence and to suppress dissent by labeling some organizations, including research and higher education institutions, as “undesirable.” This designation usually resulted in the suspension of operations or closures.^[193] In October 2023, Russian authorities designated a research center and a university based outside of Russia—in Europe—as undesirable. These included the Center for Eastern European and International Studies (ZOiS), a Berlin-based research institution focused on conflict, migration, diversity, and political economy in post-Soviet Eastern and Central European countries, and the Central European University (CEU), a research university with operations in Budapest, Vienna, and the United States, founded by the Hungarian-American philanthropist George Soros. Russia’s prosecutor general accused ZOiS of spreading anti-Russia propaganda by “initiat[ing] anti-Russian sentiments, discredit[ing] the authority of Russia in the international arena, destabiliz[ing] the socio-political situation within our country, and promot[ing] information that distorts the history of the Russian state.”^[194] CEU was labeled undesirable for allegedly discrediting Russian political leadership and the war (officially the “Special Military Operation”) in Ukraine. Significantly, the undesirable label means that Russian citizens are now also banned from participating in CEU programs and courses, and risk persecution, and around 100 Russian citizens studying at the university at the time of its designation are at risk of arrest and imprisonment should they be left without visas after they graduated and be forced to return to Russia.^[195]

Similarly, on March 7, 2024, Russia’s Foreign Ministry designated the Institute of International Education—a US-based nonprofit that facilitates international educational exchange, including the US government-funded Fulbright program—an undesirable organization for allegedly implementing “anti-Russian programs and projects aimed at recruiting ‘agents of influence’ under the guise of educational and cultural exchanges.” Large numbers of Russian citizens have participated in the Fulbright program, which, historically, has been seen as a highly prestigious scholarship.^[196]

In another action that undermined international academic cooperation, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced sanctions and entry bans, also known as the “stop list,”^[197] to a range of individuals, including researchers and scholars, critical of the government or vocal about giving support to Ukraine. On February 12, 2024, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced sanctions, including entry bans, on 18 British citizens, among them eight scholars and researchers. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed that the ban was a response to the United Kingdom’s alleged efforts to demonize Russia and promote anti-Russian narratives. The ministry also accused the banned scholars and their institutions of contributing to the UK’s “sabotage operations in Russia.”^[198] The following month, on March 14, the Foreign Ministry placed over 225 Americans, including several prominent academics, on the “stop list” in retaliation for US-imposed sanctions.^[199]

In response to the Russian government’s repression on higher education, some institutions abroad remained steadfast in providing support for Russian students and academics who risk expulsion, exile, or even prison.^[200] Conversely, in reaction to Russia’s invasion and subsequent war in Ukraine, some organizations and academic communities abroad ceased relations by withdrawing from research and study partnership with Russian higher education institutions.^[201]

Professors and students who spoke out against the government were either fired or expelled. At the start of the new academic year, on September 1, 2023, Russia’s Academy of Sciences (RAN) dismissed Valery Garbuzov, the director of RAN’s US and Canada Studies Institute (ISKRAN), after he published an opinion article in the news publication Nezavisimaya Gazeta in which he criticized the Russian government’s approach to foreign policy and condemned the presence of propaganda and anti-Western ideology in state media. RAN reportedly fired Garbuzov at the request of ISKRAN leaders.^[202] Similarly, on October 13, 2023, St. Petersburg State University fired Svetlana Drugoveiko-Dolzhanskaya, a senior lecturer in the Russian language department, for allegedly violating “moral and ethical standards” while conducting a linguistic analysis to determine whether an artist charged with discrediting the Russian military had knowingly spread false information.^[203] The crackdown on dissenting academics also contributed to prominent Russian scholars leaving their universities for more secure positions abroad.^[204]

Sudan

Despite a civil war that broke out in April 2023 between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and that has devastated the higher education sector, academic freedom remained stable, albeit “severely restricted,” according to the AFi.

Figure 16: The AFi has rated Sudan as “severely restricted” for the past decade. In 2023, the country received a score of 0.32.

One year into the war, research and teaching had almost completely halted and more than 100 Sudanese universities had been severely damaged or entirely destroyed, most through intentional targeting or looting.^[215] Much of this destruction appeared to have occurred during the first four months of fighting, with 104 higher education institutions reported to have been burned or vandalized between April and August 2023.^[216] A study conducted across 58 Sudanese medical schools in three states—Khartoum, Darfur, and Kordofan—found that between April 15 and July 15, 2023, nearly half of all medical schools experienced attacks, including looting, which occurred in 73.5 percent of all attacked facilities. In addition, armed forces or groups used 67.6 percent of attacked medical facilities as military bases.^[217] In early January 2024, RSF members looted the University of Gezira’s academic and administrative facilities and the university’s bank and farm, and targeted professors’ homes and local institutions affiliated with the university.^[218]

Within a few months of the start of fighting, Sudan’s Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research set up an emergency committee to consider strategies for continuing education even as the conflict continued.^[219] By October 2023, the Ministry had issued a controversial directive that all higher education institutions—both public and private—reopen.^[220] Sudanese students and academics faced a variety of challenges, including forcible displacement and lack of salaries.^[221]

Türkiye

For the eighth year, academics continued to experience the fallout from the crackdown on dissenting academics that began in January 2016 when a group of scholars known as “Academics for Peace” signed a petition condemning Türkiye’s military actions in the Kurdish regions of the country. As in previous years, police and universities also sought to prevent students from engaging in protests, particularly those promoting women’s and LGBTQIA+ rights. Academic freedom remained extremely low: “completely restricted,” according to the AFi.

Figure 15: In Türkiye, academic freedom dropped substantially between 2015 and 2016, a consequence of the crackdown on dissenting scholars. Since that time, the AFi has rated the country as “completely restricted.” In 2023, the country’s score of 0.09 ranked it in the bottom 10 percent of all countries with respect to academic freedom.^[205]

Academics who criticized government policies found their jobs at risk. In August 2023, the Higher Education Council, which sets policy for the university sector, told private universities not to renew their contracts with academics who expressed opinions in opposition to the government in the media, or who write for or participate in interviews with oppositional media outlets. The instruction came at a time of year when private universities typically provide academics with new contracts.^[206]

At Boğaziçi University (BU), faculty members continued to hold daily silent protests against the appointment of Melih Bulu as rector of the university by the Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, a move that undermined university autonomy. During the late summer of 2023, BU launched disciplinary investigations against 10 faculty members for their participation in the protests. The rectorate accused the professors of engaging in “lawlessness” and of discouraging prospective students from enrolling at the university. The rector’s office also threatened judicial, criminal, and administrative proceedings if the faculty members continued.^[207]

In June 2024, Türkiye’s Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional several provisions of a decree passed in 2018 allowing Erdoğan to appoint university rectors.^[208] The government was given one year to draft new legislation on the appointment of university rectors, but at the time of writing, it was still unclear how the ruling would affect higher education.^[209]

University students continued to face police violence while engaging in protests. On October 5, 2023, police detained eight students peacefully protesting against increased food prices at Dokuz Eylül University.^[210] On February 21, 2024, police used riot shields to prevent students from entering Istanbul University’s campus as they demonstrated against a decision to prohibit students from transferring from one faculty at the university to another. The police intervention sparked clashes, leaving one student injured.^[211] On March 7, 2024, police detained several protesters to prevent a group of students from participating in a Women’s Day march. The media reported that the police response allegedly occurred because of a banner reading “LGBTIQ+” and pointed to a trend of police using force to detain students protesting for LGBTIQ+ rights.^[212]

Universities engaged in disciplinary action against student protesters. In late December 2023, BU revoked the university ID cards of 16 students preventing them from accessing campus housing. The students had been protesting a decision to restructure the university’s faculties of Science and Literature and of Managerial Sciences. The university also suspended the students for a period of one month. The university did not give the students the opportunity for a disciplinary hearing.^[213] During the summer of 2023, Middle East Technical University and Uşak University both launched investigations against students for waving LGBTQIA+ pride flags during graduation ceremonies.^[214]

Ukraine

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the resulting war continued to have deeply damaging consequences for higher education. As during the previous years, the violence resulted in the destruction and occupation of higher education infrastructure and the forced displacement of scholars and students alike. Academic freedom in Ukraine continued to decline slightly, with the AFi scoring it as “somewhat free.”

Figure 17: Academic freedom has declined in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2021. In 2021, the AFi rated the country as “mostly free” (0.63). In 2022, that rating fell “somewhat free.” The country scored 0.54 in 2022 and 0.50 in 2023.

According to Ukrainian Ministry of Education and World Bank data, by March 2024, two years into the war, one in five higher education institutions had been damaged or destroyed.^[222] By July 2024, at least 270 of Ukraine’s nearly 800 higher education institutions, including both colleges and universities, had been damaged, with 9 completely destroyed, as a result of Russia’s shelling of civilian infrastructure, according to Ukrainian government data.^[223] The most severe damage and destruction to higher education infrastructure occurred in the eastern part of Ukraine, where Russia continued to bombard and occupy civilian infrastructure, including Kharkiv, Kherson, and Donetsk.^[224] Despite the concentration of attacks in the east, universities across other regions of Ukraine were also struck in explosive attacks. For instance, on January 1, 2024, Russian drones struck the National Agrarian University in Lviv, damaging the roof and windows.^[225]

European and other international allies were quick to support Ukrainian students and academics, offering options for study and research abroad. While international support for Ukrainian academia has been welcome and invaluable, efforts focused on opportunities outside of Ukraine raised concerns about “brain drain.” In late 2023, Ukraine’s deputy minister of education and science asked universities outside of Ukraine to refocus their support and funding on study and research programs within Ukraine, to decrease incentives for Ukrainian students and academics to move abroad.^[226]

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, academic freedom has declined over the past decade, due to factors including the surveillance of Muslim students, censorship of conversations on the OPT, and the elevation of an audit culture requiring academic institutions and departments to demonstrate particular forms of impact.^[227] The decline continued in 2023-2024, according to the AFi, with the UK sliding from “fully free” to “mostly free” for the first time since the index began.

Figure 18; Academic freedom has gradually declined over the past decade in the United Kingdom. In 2022, the AFi rated the country as “fully free” (0.84). In 2023, the UK’s score fell to “mostly free” (0.79).

Issues of free speech on campus took center stage in UK debates on higher education. In June 2023, Arif Ahmed, a University of Cambridge philosopher, was appointed the country’s first director for freedom of speech and academic freedom at the Office for Students (OfS), the UK’s independent regulator of higher education.^[228] The new role was created by the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act passed in May 2023.^[229] Six months into his appointment, in the aftermath of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel and two months into Israel’s military action in Gaza, Arif stated that university staff and students were free to make provocative statements, including on Israel and Palestine, so long as those statements did not break laws on harassment or incitement.^[230]

Numerous incidents alleging antisemitic speech or conduct were reported during the 2023-2024 academic year. The Community Security Trust, a charity that monitors antisemitism across the UK, received 182 reports of antisemitism affecting Jewish students or academics, the highest number recorded and three times as many as the previous year.^[231] Other observers expressed concern that accusations of antisemitism could be used to silence criticism of Israeli government policies and actions. In September 2023, even before the October 7 attack, the European Legal Support Center and British Society for Middle Eastern Studies raised concerns about the use of the International Holocaust Remembrance Association’s working definition on antisemitism within UK universities. They argued that the definition, which is accompanied by examples that conflate criticism of Israel and Zionism with antisemitic and racist sentiment, had led to unfounded allegations against students, staff, and campus events, leading to investigations or cancellation.^[232] As evidence, they reported that in 38 out of 40 cases tracked, the investigations found no evidence of antisemitism.^[233]

Scholars found themselves under pressure because of their social media posts related to the Hamas attack and Israeli military action in Gaza. In one case, Kate Sang and Kamna Patel, both members of the Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Advisory Group (EDI AG) of United Kingdom Research and Innovation (UKRI), the government body that funds academic research, made social media posts shortly after the October 7 attack. Sang tweeted that a Guardian headline (‘Suella Braverman urges police to crack down on Hamas support in UK”) was disturbing. Patel retweeted a post condemning violence “on both sides” and referring to Israel’s actions as “genocide” and “apartheid.” On October 28, UK Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Michelle Donelan published an open letter to the UKRI chief executive Dame Henrietta Miriam Ottoline Leyser condemning the posts and requesting she close the EDI AG group immediately. Ottoline Leyser acceded to Donelan’s request and announced an investigation into the concerns raised.^[234] The investigation concluded in early March 2024, finding that there was “no evidence in the public domain of support for a proscribed terrorist organisation or the sharing of extremist material and no grounds to remove any individual members of the [(EDI AG)].”^[235] Shortly thereafter Donelan publicly withdrew her accusations against Sang and agreed to pay her 15,000 pounds ($19,182 USD) in damages.^[236] On June 3, 2024, Patel resigned as EDI AG chair in protest of the way that the entire situation had been handled and of what she described as “the playbook of lobbing unfounded allegations and stoking an investigation into anybody critical of the Israeli state’s policies… irrespective of any evidence underpinning the charge or the outcome of any investigation.”^[237]

UK universities canceled several events focused on Israel and the OPT. During the second half of October 2023, Liverpool Hope University (LHU) officials indefinitely postponed a lecture by Avi Shlaim, a “new historian” of Israel, who has written critically about the history of Zionism and the establishment of Israel. Professor Shlaim had been scheduled to speak during the university’s “distinguished lecture series” on his newly published book Three Worlds: Memoirs of an Arab-Jew. The book is part history and part memoir, describing Shlaim’s family’s forced migration from Iraq to Israel and analyzing evidence that the Mossad, Israel’s spy agency, played a role in terror attacks on Iraq’s Jewish community in an effort to coerce Jews into migrating to Israel. The postponement reportedly came following pressure from LHU’s Jewish community to cancel the event; according to an LHU spokesperson the talk was postponed to protect “the well-being and safety of our students and staff.”^[238]

Similarly, in November 2023, a group of faculty members from the University of Birmingham’s Law School received approval to host a “listening session” on “law and how it matters in relation to the current situation in Palestine.” However, after the event organizers advertised the listening session with materials that included watermelon emojis—a symbol of Palestinian solidarity often used as a stand-in for the Palestinian flag—the Law School dean informed them that the event would be postponed because of concerns that it would not be “safe and objective.”^[239]

In May and June, inspired by the wave of student-led Gaza solidarity protests that began in the United States and spread to other regions of the world, UK university students began establishing their own encampments.^[240] In addition to expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people, the students echoed their counterparts in other parts of the world by calling for their universities to divest from companies that supply military weapons to Israel; some students also called for their universities to cut ties with universities in Israel.^[241] For the most part, UK encampments were not subject to the same levels of violence and arrests as occurred at some US universities. Multiple UK universities sought to have students dispersed through legal avenues. In the UK, the High Court concluded that students protesting at the universities of Birmingham and Nottingham, Queen Mary University of London, the London School of Economics, and University College London were trespassing on their campuses and allowed the universities to evict the protesters from their encampments.^[242]

More broadly, an expanding surveillance culture reduced some professors’ sense of academic freedom. A survey of over 2,100 UK academics found that lecture recording technology and grade-monitoring practices affected the kinds of grades they assigned to students and the kinds of assignments they gave. Such technologies also affected their willingness to hold lectures or in-class discussions on politically sensitive topics.^[243]

United States

In the United States, elected officials stoked anti-intellectual sentiments, increasing the distrust of universities and scholars among portions of the American public.^[244] States passed legislation that sought to silence the teaching of disfavored topics and diminish university autonomy. In this context, universities canceled events. Scholars experienced threats to their safety and livelihoods. Students faced disciplinary action, including suspension and expulsion, for participating in protests on campus. According to the AFi, academic freedom continued to decline in the US, dropping to its lowest point since 1917.

Figure 19: Academic freedom has declined in the US over the past decade, dropping particularly sharply since 2020. In 2020, the AFi rated the country as “fully free” (0.89). By 2023, the country was rated as “mostly free” (0.69).

The heightened tensions that students and scholars experienced on campus largely stemmed from protests relating to Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel and Israel’s military actions in Gaza—a topic that dominated the US higher education space for the majority of the 2023-2024 academic year. Against this backdrop, university presidents sometimes found themselves at the center of a debate over “political neutrality.”^[245] This debate, while not entirely new to the higher education sector,^[246] was newly brought to the attention of elected officials and the wider public, who often weighed in without nuance, blurring the distinctions between academic freedom, free speech, and protest in order to impose their own ideological standards on universities.^[247] These interventions threatened to undermine university autonomy and undercut the role of the university in sharing knowledge with the public.

For example, Congressional lawmakers put pressure on both public and private university leaders during a series of hearings held by the House Education and Workforce Committee.^[248] During the hearings, ostensibly held to investigate the institutions’ responses to allegations of rising antisemitism on campus, lawmakers questioned the leaders about a variety of topics, including ideological diversity, foreign funding, and disciplinary actions.^[249]The first hearing, held on December 5, 2023, featured the presidents of Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.^[250] Their testimonies led to a public backlash by critics who argued that the presidents’ responses on their universities efforts to address antisemitism were insufficient.^[251] Following their appearances and increasing pressure from elected officials, media, donors, alumni, and from within their own institutions, both UPenn president Liz McGill^[252] and Harvard president Claudine Gay resigned their positions.^[253]

Throughout the reporting period, members of the public levied violent threats against scholars, often fueled by vitriolic media campaigns involving misinformation. In September 2023, the nursing faculty at the University of Arizona received threatening calls and emails following public backlash for a seminar presentation that included slides that encouraged gender-affirming care for children.^[254] Also in Arizona, October 12, 2023, members of a film crew from Turning Point USA—a right-wing nonprofit with a stated mission “to promote freedom”—reportedly filmed, harassed, and shoved David Boyles, a writing instructor in Arizona State University’s English Department, as he left his classroom. The incident took place after Arizona Free News published a story accusing Boyles of encouraging people to “plant pornographic LGBTQ+ banned books in local libraries.”^[255] On September 28, 2023, California State University, Fresno, received two bomb threats after a series of social media posts that criticized business and finance professor Ida Jones’s policy on pronouns.^[256]

In addition to threats to their physical safety, scholars also found their livelihoods at risk because of political and public pressure. In July 2023, Texas A&M University (TAMU) altered the terms of a job that it had offered to Kathleen O. McElroy, a prominent journalist and tenured faculty member at the University of Texas, Austin, downgrading the offer after conservative politicians, media, and alumni expressed their disapproval of McElroy’s track record of publications covering race and diversity. McElroy declined the revised offer. After an investigation prompted by outcry over the reversal, both the interim dean of TAMU’s College of Arts and Sciences and the university’s president resigned, and TAMU agreed to pay McElroy a $1 million settlement.^[257] On January 30, 2024, Catholic University dismissed Melissa Goldberg, a professor of psychology, after a student publicly shared recordings of a lecture by a guest speaker who spoke about providing abortion and transgender care. The university dismissed Goldberg stating that there was “clear evidence that the content of the class did not align with our mission and identity,” despite Catholic University’s Faculty Handbook’s stated commitment to ensure academic freedom.^[258]

The October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and Israeli military action in Gaza was the backdrop to many suspensions of faculty members and students, cancellation of events, suspension of student groups, and establishment of new policies aimed at constraining protest and contention on campus. Criticism of Israeli policies and conduct was widespread at campus protests. Reports of antisemitism grew (on and off campuses), and some Jewish students reported feeling unsafe on their campuses.^[259] For instance, on November 3, 2023, a student assaulted a group of other students during an event expressing solidarity with Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. The event was held at the Hillel (a Jewish student organization) at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The aggressor shouted slurs including derogatory stereotypes about Jews, spat on an Israeli flag held by one member of the group, and punched a security guard and another student who attempted to intervene.^[260]

In some cases, however, the charge of antisemitism appears to have been levied against faculty members and students in ways that threatened academic freedom and free speech on campus.^[261] At root are disagreements over the extent to which criticism of Israel, Israeli government policies, or Zionism are antisemitic, making it difficult to assess allegations of antisemitism.^[262]

Faculty members who held in-class conversations about Israel’s bombardment of Gaza or posted about it to social media found their jobs threatened. In November 2023, elected officials and media outlets called two University of Arizona’s College of Education professors—Rebecca Lopez and Rebecca Zapien—“biased” and “antisemitic” for leading an in-class conversation about the impact of Israel’s military actions on Palestinian children in Gaza. On November 16, the university placed the two professors on administrative leave.  Lopez and Zapien were later reinstated but not allowed to finish teaching their course.^[263] In mid-December, Indiana University (IU) suspended tenured political science and Middle Eastern studies Professor Abdulkader Sinno for not accurately indicating that a room request that he filed was not for a department-sponsored event but for a student-sponsored event hosting Miko Peled, an Israeli-American veteran of the Israeli military and a peace activist. Sinno’s suspension came following pressure on IU by State Representative and US Senate candidate Jim Banks to take more aggressive action to combat antisemitism. Banks’s letter specifically mentioned the Palestine Solidarity Committee, on whose behalf Sinno had filed the request.^[264]

Universities repeatedly canceled events aimed at analyzing the history of Israel and the OPT or the current state of the region, or focused on Palestinian solidarity. Often these events had been pre-approved, and their subsequent cancellation appeared to be fueled—at least in part—by public pressure. The universities justified their cancellations alleging failure to follow university policy or security concerns. On October 22, 2023, the University of Vermont (UVM) canceled an event featuring well-known Palestinian poet and journalist Mohammed El-Kurd scheduled months prior as part of the Will Miller Social Justice Lecture Series. However, in weeks leading up to the event, some students and alumni expressed concerns that El-Kurd had previously used antisemitic language—a charge that event organizers rejected after reviewing his poetry, public speeches, and other statements. Eventually, the weekend prior to the event, UVM’s Division for Safety and Compliance determined that they could not “adequately provide safety and security for [the] event as it [was] currently planned.” Email records later reviewed by an independent Vermont news outlet showed that there had been no security threats.^[265] A week later, on November 1, 2023, Barnard College canceled an event featuring Mohammed El-Kurd, stating that students had not properly followed university policy in scheduling the event.^[266]

At least eight universities suspended—or attempted to suspend—student groups for their expression and activism related to the OPT. University administrations typically explained the suspensions by pointing to unauthorized protest activities, but public pressure often appeared to play a role. Multiple university chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) were among the groups suspended. In mid-October 2023, the national organizing committee of SJP released a toolkit in relation to the group’s call for a “National Day of Resistance” on October 12. The toolkit included language that appeared to celebrate Hamas’s October 7 attack.^[267] In response, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the Louis D. Brandeis Center wrote to 200 colleges and universities urging them to investigate local SJP chapters to determine their sources of funding, whether they had violated university codes of conduct or state or federal laws, or were providing material support to Hamas.^[268] Over the next six weeks, universities such as Brandeis University,^[269] Columbia University,^[270] George Washington University,^[271] and Rutgers University^[272] banned their campus chapters of SJP. Local SJP chapters do not necessarily endorse the actions or messaging of the national committee.^[273]

As student groups and faculty members continued to protest over the OPT throughout the school year, universities began to rewrite their policies in ways that silenced free speech and protest, impinging upon academic freedom.^[274] Often the process of re-writing the policies lacked transparency or input from important stakeholders, including faculty and students. In November 2023, Barnard College’s administration quietly released revised policies that expand the definition of “political activity” prohibited on campus and require departments to submit the contents of their websites to the Office of the Provost for review and approval.^[275] The policy revision appeared to be a reaction to a statement published by Barnard’s Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies expressing solidarity with students experiencing a variety of emotional responses to the October 7 attack and Israeli military action in Gaza. Barnard’s administration deleted the statement the day after it was published.^[276]

On April 17, 2024, Columbia University and Barnard College students established a peaceful encampment on Columbia’s campus expressing solidarity with Palestinians and calling for the university to divest from companies that do business with Israel. The protest began at the same time as a House Committee on Education and the Workforce hearing featuring testimony from Columbia University president Minouche Shafik. During the hearing, committee members questioned Shafik about the university’s response to antisemitism, including whether disciplinary action would be taken against specific professors accused of antisemitic rhetoric or actions. Shafik’s answers appeared to include unilateral decisions to relieve faculty members from their positions and sparked outrage, intensifying the on-campus protest.^[277]The following day, Shafik suspended all students involved in the encampment and formally requested that the police intervene and disperse the students. The police arrested 108 students.^[278]

The arrests at Columbia University sparked a wave of student encampments on campuses across the US and abroad. Some universities chose to allow the encampments to remain or to negotiate with protesters; these often remained peaceful.^[279] Other campuses elected to call in the police, often resulting in violent incidents.^[280] Some protests did have negative impacts on campuses, ranging from minor debris requiring clean up to defacing or damaging of university grounds and facilities, the latter in the most egregious instances resulting in substantial financial costs.^[281]

In some cases, police used excessive force in making arrests. On May 2, 2024, Los Angeles Police Department officers used flashbangs and rubber bullets while dispersing a pro-Palestinian student encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles. More than 200 protesters were arrested on charges of failure to disperse.^[282] The forcible arrests took place two days after a group of pro-Israel counterprotesters violently assaulted the encampment. Police were on scene observing, but did not intervene to stop the assault for over three hours. No counter protesters were arrested.^[283]

Some universities set the stage for police intervention by quietly changing their policies. At Indiana University, Bloomington, on May 24, after learning that students planned to establish an encampment, the provost formed an ad-hoc committee and changed the university’s assembly ground policy to prohibit the “temporary or permanent installation of outdoor structures” without approval from the board of trustees and to prohibit the use of “signage” and “tents.” During protests in the days that followed, police arrested 56 protesters. Arrested students and faculty members were subsequently banned from campus for a period of one year, except for the protest leader Bryce Greene, who was banned for five years. The local prosecutor’s office later declined to file charges against those arrested, except for one student who was charged with felony battery for biting a state trooper on the wrist and attempting to flee.^[284]

As in the case of Indiana University, prosecutors often dropped the charges—typically trespassing or disturbing the peace—against most arrested students. However, many students faced significant disciplinary penalties from their universities. These included being barred from campus or having their diplomas withheld.^[285] These penalties followed a pattern seen throughout the 2023-2024 academic year, during which US universities penalized student protesters with increasingly harsh measures, often under pressure from elected officials and donors.^[286] International students, in particular, faced particular high stakes in choosing to protest, including having their visas revoked if suspended.^[287]

In total, police arrested over 3,100 students, dozens of faculty members, and other community members at 61 universities and colleges across the country.^[288]

Throughout the United States, state lawmakers continued to introduce legislation aimed at censoring disfavored topics—particularly related to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) or to gender and sexuality.^[289] According to the Chronicle of Higher Education’s DEI Legislation Tracker, from 2023 through the end of June 2024, lawmakers in 28 states introduced 85 bills restricting DEI offices and staff, mandatory DEI training, diversity statements, or identity-based preferences for hiring and admissions. By June 28, 2024, 14 of these bills had been enacted, and 14 additional bills had final legislative approval.^[290] According to PEN America, lawmakers shifted their strategy from 2023 to 2024, pivoting from legislation that censored classroom speech—such as Florida’s Stop WOKE Act,^[291] aspects of which federal judges have blocked^[292]—to laws focused on university autonomy and governance.^[293] Through such bills, lawmakers sought to influence university curricula, tenure, accreditation processes, and mission statements.^[294]

The bills that were introduced and passed were widely criticized for vague and overbroad language that would be difficult to implement narrowly and therefore create grave risks to academic freedom.^[295] The ambiguous language in the bills opened the way for lawsuits against higher education institutions, along with uneven and unequal application of the laws.^[296] It also imposed a significant chilling effect on higher education administrations, staff, and faculty members, implicitly encouraging pre-emptive action or self-censorship in an effort to prevent lawsuits or disciplinary action.^[297]

In Wisconsin, during fall 2023, Republican legislators took the unusual step of refusing to administer previously budgeted pay increases for university staff unless the university system agreed to cut DEI positions.^[298] A December 2023 deal between Wisconsin Assembly speaker Robin Vos and University of Wisconsin president Jay Rothman finally resolved the standoff. Under the deal, the University of Wisconsin will freeze a number of DEI positions and refocus a third of those positions on “academic and student success” rather than DEI initiatives.^[299]

In addition, states began to implement legislation passed during the previous year with significant consequences for students, staff, and faculty studying, working, and teaching in the affected states. In Texas, SB 17 went into effect on January 1, 2024, prompting the University of Texas (UT), Dallas and UT, Austin to close their DEI offices. In doing so, UT Dallas laid off 20 employees,^[300] while UT Austin laid off around 50 employees.^[301] In June 2024, it was reported that public colleges in Texas were either freezing or amending 131 scholarships to comply with the SB 17 law. The affected scholarships had race-based eligibility requirements intended to diversify particular fields of study.^[302] Similarly, Utah’s guidance on HB 261, which went into effect July 1, 2024, prompted the state’s universities and colleges to begin closing cultural centers.^[303] Meanwhile, in an effort to implement Florida’s SB 1674, passed in May 2023, in late August 2023, Florida’s Board of Education voted to approve a new set of rules under which employees and students could be fired or suspended for using a restroom two or more times that does not match the gender they were assigned at birth, including in student housing.^[304]

In Virginia, Governor Glenn Youngkin’s education secretary’s office requested to review the syllabi of diversity-themed courses intended to meet George Mason’s “Just Societies” mandate and Virginia Commonwealth University’s “Racial Literacy” requirement. Both Virginia universities complied with the request,^[305] and both universities subsequently announced that they would not implement the course mandates in fall 2024 as originally planned.^[306] These actions illustrated the ways in which the pressures described above have apparently weakened norms of university autonomy, in particular, against political interference, threatening further declines for academic freedom in future years.

^[1] See table of incidents at the end of this report.

^[2] See Katrin Kinzelbach, Ilyas Saliba, Janika Spannagel, and Robert Quinn, Free Universities: Putting the Academic Freedom Index into Action (March 11, 2021), https://www.gppi.net/2021/03/11/free-universities.

^[3] The AFi assesses countries on a scale of 0-1, assigning them to cohorts as follows: Fully free (0.8-.1.0), mostly free (0.6-0.79), somewhat free (0.4-0.59), mostly restricted (0.2-0.39), and completely restricted (0.0-0.19).

^[4]  Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, and Lars Lott. (2024). Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg and V-Dem Institute, p. 11.. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405.

^[5] Ayaz Gul, “Taliban’s Female University Education Ban Marks One Year,” Voice of America, December 21, 2023, https://www.voanews.com/a/taliban-s-female-university-education-ban-marks-one-year/7406898.html.

^[6] Ayaz Gul, “Female students missing from Afghan university entrance exams for 3rd straight year,” Voice of America, June 6, 2024, https://www.voanews.com/a/female-students-missing-from-afghan-university-entrance-exams-for-3rd-straight-year/7645296.html.

^[7] SAR AFMP, University of Dubai, August 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-23-university-of-dubai/.

^[8] Karen Fisher, “Latitudes: The Taliban cut off access to education. A new partnership wants to change that,” Chronicle of Higher Education, April 17, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2024-04-17.

^[9] SAR AFMP, Roshan Afghanistan Online University, January 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-09-roshan-afghanistan-online-university/.

^[10] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, December 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-14-multiple-institutions/.

^[11] “Madrasahs Go Mainstream: Taliban To Grant University Degrees To Religious Students In New Blow To Secular Education,” Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty, January 25, 2024, https://www.rferl.org/a/afghanistan-madrasahs-taliban-secular-education-degrees-diplomas/32791896.html. Mukhtar Wafai, “Discrediting the education system of Afghanistan; Clergymen get a university degree without studying,” Independent,  March 9, 2024, https://www.independentpersian.com/node/392626/%D8%B3%DB%8C%D8%A7%D8%B3%DB%8C-%D9%88-%D8%A7%D8%AC%D8%AA%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%B9%DB%8C/%D8%A7%D8%B9%D8%AA%D8%A8%D8%A7%D8%B1%E2%80%8C%D8%B2%D8%AF%D8%A7%DB%8C%DB%8C-%D8%A7%D8%B2-%D9%86%D8%B8%D8%A7%D9%85-%D8%A2%D9%85%D9%88%D8%B2%D8%B4%DB%8C-%D8%A7%D9%81%D8%BA%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%B3%D8%AA%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%9B-%D8%B1%D9%88%D8%AD%D8%A7%D9%86%DB%8C%D9%88%D9%86-%D8%A8%D8%AF%D9%88%D9%86-%D8%AA%D8%AD%D8%B5%DB%8C%D9%84-%D9%85%D8%AF%D8%B1%DA%A9-%D8%AF%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%B4%DA%AF%D8%A7%D9%87%DB%8C.

^[12] “Afghan universities are losing their scholars and students,” Times Higher Education, December 4,2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/afghan-universities-are-losing-their-scholars-and-students.

^[13] SAR Scholars in Prison Project, Rahile Dawut, China, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/actions/rahile-dawut-china/#Case%20Information.

^[14] SAR AFMP, Central University Nationalities, January 15, 2014, www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2014-01-15-central-university-nationalities/.

^[15] SAR AFMP, October 4, 2018, Unaffiliated, www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2018-10-04-unaffiliated/.

^[16] SAR AFMP, January 29, 2018, Xinjiang Pedagogical University, www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2018-01-29-xinjiang-pedagogical-university/.

^[17] SAR AFMP, Kobe Gakuin University, March 18, 2024. https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-03-18-kobe-gakuin-university/.

^[18] Julian Ryall, “Chinese academic’s disappearance sparks concerns among compatriots in Japan: ‘people are worried’,” South China Morning Post, March 19, 2024, https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/people/article/3255977/chinese-academics-disappearance-sparks-concerns-among-compatriots-japan-people-are-worried.

^[19] “Foreign professor fired from Chinese university after interview with VOA,” Voice of America, July 2, 2024, https://www.voanews.com/a/foreign-professor-fired-from-chinese-university-after-interview-with-voa-/7682090.html.

^[20] Gu Ting, “China’s ruling party takes direct control of country’s universities,” Radio Free Asia, January 18, 2024, https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/china-universities-01182024160231.html. Patrick Jack, “Party strengthens control of Chinese university administration,” Times Higher Education, January 29, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/party-strengthens-control-chinese-university-administration.

^[21] SAR AFMP, Chinese Academy of Sciences, August 2, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-02-chinese-academy-of-sciences/.

^[22] Yana Gorokhovskaia and Grady Vaughan, Addressing Transnational Repression on Campuses in the United States, Freedom House, January 2024, https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/TNR_UniversityReport_2024F.pdf. Amnesty International, “On My Campus I am Afraid”: China’s Targeting of Overseas Students Stifles Rights, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ASA1780062024ENGLISH.pdf.

^[23] Jessie Lau, “Threats, fear and surveillance: how Beijing targets students in the UK who criticise regime,” The Guardian, March 25, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/mar/25/china-students-uk-beijing-transnational-repression-surveillance. Tang Yuanyuan, “Exclusive: Chinese students in the US speak out for democracy, their families in China are harassed,” Radio Free Asia, September 19, 2023, https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/renquanfazhi/tj-09192023113801.html.

^[24] Karin Fischer, “Latitudes: Among Chinese students at U.S. colleges, political pressures and discrimination grow more acute,” Chronicle of Higher Education, September 13, 2023, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2023-09-13.

^[25] Yana Gorokhovskaia and Grady Vaughan, Addressing Transnational Repression on Campuses in the United States, Freedom House, January 2024, https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/TNR_UniversityReport_2024F.pdf. Amnesty International, “On My Campus I am Afraid”: China’s Targeting of Overseas Students Stifles Rights, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ASA1780062024ENGLISH.pdf.

^[26] Amy Hawkins, “China influencing leading British universities, documentary claims,” The Guardian, November 28, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/nov/28/china-influencing-leading-british-universities-documentary-claims. Lyndon Lee, “British Documentary Alleges China Influences Universities, Spies on Hong Kongers in UK,” Voice of America, November 30, 2023, https://www.voanews.com/a/british-documentary-alleges-china-influences-universities-spies-on-hong-kongers-in-uk/7379777.html.

^[27] Yojana Sharma, “Overseas students, exchanges deterred by spy laws – Academic,” University World News, March 12, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024031215292831.

^[28] SAR AFMP, University of Antioquia, March 15, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-15-university-of-antioquia/.

^[29] SAR AFMP, Santander Industrial University, November 29, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-29-universidad-industrial-de-santander/.

^[30] Daniel Mauricio Rodríguez Sevilla, “This will be the new academic calendar of the National University, after four months of strike: this Monday, July 22, students return to class,” Info Bae, July 22, 2024, https://www.infobae.com/colombia/2024/07/22/asi-sera-el-nuevo-calendario-academico-de-la-universidad-nacional-luego-de-cuatro-meses-de-paro/.

^[31] Francy Agudelo, “National University confirmed the date for the resumption of classes: 56,000 students will return to campus, July 19, 2024, https://www.infobae.com/colombia/2024/07/19/universidad-nacional-confirmo-la-fecha-para-el-reinicio-de-clases-56000-estudian-volveran-a-las-instalaciones-de-la-institucion/.

^[32] Sarah Marsh, “Antisemitism rose more than 80% in Germany last year, watchdog says,” Reuters, June 25, 2024, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/antisemitism-rose-more-than-80-germany-last-year-watchdog-says-2024-06-25/. Farago, Jason, “Berlin Was a Beacon of Artistic Freedom. Gaza Changed Everything,” New York Times, April 6, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/06/arts/design/berlin-israel-gaza-art-scene.html.  Erika Solomon, “Germany’s Stifling of Pro-Palestinian Voices Pits Historical Guilt Against Free Speech,” New York Times, November 10, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/10/world/europe/germany-pro-palestinian-protests.html. Afisha Kassam, “Rise in antisemitism ‘brings Germans back to most horrific times’,” The Guardian, October 24, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/24/rise-in-antisemitism-brings-germans-back-to-most-horrific-times.

^[33] Deborah Cole, “Judge says phrase ‘denied right of Israel to exist’ but woman’s lawyer says ruling is a defeat for free speech,” The Guardian, August 6, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/06/german-court-due-to-rule-on-from-the-river-to-the-sea-case-in-test-of-free-speech.

^[34] Erika Solomon, “Germany’s Stifling of Pro-Palestinian Voices Pits Historical Guilt Against Free Speech,” New York Times, November 10, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/10/world/europe/germany-pro-palestinian-protests.html. Afisha Kassam, “Rise in antisemitism ‘brings Germans back to most horrific times’,” The Guardian, October 24, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/24/rise-in-antisemitism-brings-germans-back-to-most-horrific-times.

^[35]  Thomas Hinz, Anna Marczuk, Frank Multrus, 2024, “Student Opinions on the Escalation of Violence in Israel and Gaza and Antisemitism at German Universities,” Working Paper No. 17, Cluster of Excellence “The Politics of Inequality”, University of Konstanz, https://kops.uni-konstanz.de/server/api/core/bitstreams/e711613a-3dbd-459e-afe0-d81ad592083a/content.

^[36] Toby Axelrod, “Grandson of Munich massacre victim assaulted in Berlin in alleged hate crime,” Jerusalem Post, February 6, 2024, https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/antisemitism/article-785344.

^[37] Berlin The Governing Mayor, Senate Chancellery, “Amendment to the Berlin University Act passed,” March 26, 2023, https://www.berlin.de/rbmskzl/aktuelles/pressemitteilungen/2024/pressemitteilung.1431516.php.

^[38] Hannes Schrader and Swantje Unterberg, “Anyone who takes action risks losing their university degree,” March 26, 2023, https://www.spiegel.de/panorama/bildung/berlin-verschaerft-hochschulgesetz-wer-zuschlaegt-riskiert-seinen-uni-abschluss-a-f56bf036-97dc-4bc4-be87-65013fdb9879. “Berlin University Act is being tightened,” rbb24, June 12, 2024, https://www.rbb24.de/politik/beitrag/2024/06/berlin-hochschulgesetz-wird-verschaerft-exmatrikulation-hausverbot.html.  “ver.di rejects introduction of regulatory law at Berlin universities,” April 3, 2024, https://gesundheit-soziales-bildung-bb.verdi.de/++co++0cf7da74-f18e-11ee-a7fe-c9a4585893d9.

^[39] SAR AFMP, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, February 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-07-max-planck-institute-for-social-anthropology/.

^[40] SAR AFMP, University of Cologne, April 5, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-05-university-of-cologne-the-new-school/.

^[41] SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/.

^[42] Thomas Escritt, “Police shut down pro-Palestinian gathering in Germany over hate speech fears,” Reuters, April 12, 2024, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/police-shut-down-pro-palestinian-gathering-germany-over-hate-speech-fears-2024-04-12/.

^[43] SAR AFMP, University of Glasgow, April 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-12-university-of-glasgow/.

^[44] Ashifa Kassam, “Clashes and arrests as pro-Palestinian protests spread across European campuses,” The Guardian, May 8, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/08/pro-palestine-student-protests-campuses-europe-arrests-police.  Ruairi Casey, “Punched, choked, kicked: German police crack down on student protests,” Al Jazeera, May 25, 2024, https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/5/25/punched-choked-kicked-german-police-crack-down-on-student-protests.

^[45] Michael Gardiner, “Pro-Gaza academic blacklist: Calls for minister to resign,” University World News, July 2, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240702173025759.

^[46] SAR AFMP, Free University of Berlin, May 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-07-free-university-of-berlin/. “Berlin university lecturers sign open letter of solidarity with protesting students,” The Berliner, May 10, 2024, https://www.the-berliner.com/english-news-berlin/berlin-university-lecturers-sign-open-letter-solidarity-protesting-students/.

^[47] “Police clear pro-Palestinian protesters from Leipzig lecture hall,” DPA, May 8, 2024, https://www.yahoo.com/news/another-german-university-calls-police-151807592.html. Ashley Thompson, “US Campus Protests Spread to Europe,” Voice of America, May 7, 2024, https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/us-campus-protests-spread-to-europe/7601305.html.

^[48] Michael Gardiner, “Pro-Gaza academic blacklist: Calls for minister to resign,” University World News, July 2, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240702173025759.

^[49] Statement from teachers at Berlin universities, https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfVy2D5Xy_DMiaMx2TsE7YediR6qifxoLDP1zIjKzEl9t1LWw/viewform.

^[50] “Berlin university lecturers sign open letter of solidarity with protesting students,” The Berliner, May 10, 2024, https://www.the-berliner.com/english-news-berlin/berlin-university-lecturers-sign-open-letter-solidarity-protesting-students/. David Matthews, “German science official steps down in row about pro-Palestine protest,” Science Business, June 17, 2024, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/universities/german-science-official-steps-down-row-about-pro-palestine-protest.

^[51] Dave Braneck, “German education minister scandal highlights tense, restrictive climate around Gaza,” Courthouse News, July 9, 2024, https://www.courthousenews.com/german-education-minister-scandal-highlights-tense-restrictive-climate-around-gaza/.

^[52] John Goetz and Manuel Biallas, “In response to criticism: Ministry of Education wanted to cut funding,” NDR, June 11, 2024, https://www.ndr.de/fernsehen/sendungen/panorama/Als-Reaktion-auf-Kritik-Bildungsministerium-wollte-Foerdermittel-streichen-,watzinger102.html. Dave Braneck, “German education minister scandal highlights tense, restrictive climate around Gaza,” Courthouse News, July 9, 2024, https://www.courthousenews.com/german-education-minister-scandal-highlights-tense-restrictive-climate-around-gaza/

^[53] Dave Braneck, “German education minister scandal highlights tense, restrictive climate around Gaza,” Courthouse News, July 9, 2024, https://www.courthousenews.com/german-education-minister-scandal-highlights-tense-restrictive-climate-around-gaza/. David Matthews, “German science official steps down in row about pro-Palestine protest,” Science Business, June 17, 2024, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/universities/german-science-official-steps-down-row-about-pro-palestine-protest.

^[54] Open statement on the Federal Minister of Education’s actions in response to the open letter from Berlin university professors, https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccTcNVPTUSpezw2v7wWgNVpoFPfYsYMa9QpLkmCaq4YWy1Nw/viewform.

^[55] Markus Weisskopf, “BMBF funding scandal: Why things could still get tight for the minister,” Table Briefings, August 19, 2024, https://table.media/research/analyse/bmbf-foerdermittelaffaere-warum-es-fuer-die-ministerin-doch-noch-eng-werden-koennte/. “Döring wants invitation to special session,” Forschung & Lehre, September 2, 2024, https://www.forschung-und-lehre.de/politik/doering-will-einladung-zur-sondersitzung-6602.

^[56] “Another German university calls police to clear pro-Palestinian demo,” DPA, May 8, 2024, https://www.yahoo.com/news/another-german-university-calls-police-151807592.html. “University Executive Board Breaks Up Protest Camp, but Remains in Dialog with Students,” University of Breman, May 8. 2024, https://www.uni-bremen.de/en/university/university-communication-and-marketing/all-news/details/universitaetsleitung-loest-protestcamp-auf-bleibt-aber-im-dialog-mit-den-studierenden.

^[57]  “Police clear pro-Palestinian protesters from Leipzig lecture hall,” DPA, May 8, 2024, https://www.yahoo.com/news/another-german-university-calls-police-151807592.html. “Statement from Leipzig University following the occupation on 7 May 2024,” University of Leipzeig, May 7, 2024, https://www.uni-leipzig.de/en/newsdetail/artikel/statement-from-leipzig-university-following-the-occupation-on-7-may-2024-2024-05-07.

^[58] Michael Plöse and Benjamin Rusteberg, “Occupied University Autonomy,” Verfassungsblog, June 3, 2024, https://verfassungsblog.de/besetzte-hochschulautonomie/. BRISMES, “Academic Freedom | Letter to the Presidents of the Berlin University Alliance,” May 29, 2024, https://www.brismes.ac.uk/news/academic-freedom-letter-to-the-presidents-of-the-berlin-university-alliance.

^[59] SAR AFMP, Humboldt University, May 23, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-23-humboldt-university/. Ruairi Casey, “Punched, choked, kicked: German police crack down on student protests,” Al Jazeera, May 25, 2024, https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/5/25/punched-choked-kicked-german-police-crack-down-on-student-protests. Committee to Protect Journalists, “German police launch criminal probe of video journalist after beating him during pro-Palestinian protest,” June 7, 2024, https://cpj.org/2024/06/german-police-launch-criminal-probe-of-video-journalist-after-beating-him-during-pro-palestinian-protest/.

^[60] See, e.g.,  Amnesty International, “On My Campus I am Afraid”: China’s Targeting of Overseas Students Stifles Rights, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ASA1780062024ENGLISH.pdf.

^[61] David Matthews, “Germany moves to create new restrictions on research cooperation with China,” Science Business, July 18, 2023, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/dual-use/germany-moves-create-new-restrictions-research-cooperation-china.

^[62] Markus Weisskopf, “Chinese scientific espionage in Germany: what next?,” Science Business, May 2, 2024, https://sciencebusiness.net/universities/chinese-scientific-espionage-germany-what-next.

^[63] Yojana Sharma, “German university ends ties with China scholarship scheme,” University World News, July 20, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230720113914406.

^[64] Kelly Ng, “Article 23: What is Hong Kong’s tough new security law?,” BBC, March 25, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-68508694.

^[65] Yojana Sharma, “Another security law proposed as academic exodus continues,” University World News, February 7, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240207111612329.

^[66] Yojana Sharma, “Another security law proposed as academic exodus continues,” University World News, February 7, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240207111612329.

^[67] SAR AFMP, Chinese University of Hong Kong, October 27, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-27/.

^[68] SAR AFMP, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong, October 30, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-30-hang-seng-university-of-hong-kong/.

^[69] SAR AFMP, University of Hong Kong, November 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-14-university-of-hong-kong/.

^[70] Sameer Yasir, “‘It Is Suffocating’: A Top Liberal University Is Under Attack in India,” New York Times, February 10, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/10/world/asia/india-bjp-jnu.html.

^[71] SAR Scholars in Prison Project, Gokarakonda Naga Saibaba, India, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/actions/gokarakonda-naga-saibaba-india/. “Human rights defender G.N. Saibaba acquitted of all charges and released from jail,” Frontline Defenders, March 22, 2024, https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/case/human-rights-defender-gn-saibaba-acquitted-all-charges-and-released-jail.

^[72] Helen Packer, “‘Crisis’ as Indian states battle BJP for control of universities,” Times Higher Education, April 1, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/crisis-indian-states-battle-bjp-control-universities. KS Sudhi, “Kerala challenges withholding of Presidential assent to State bills in Supreme Court,” The Hindu, March 23, 2024, https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/kerala-moves-supreme-court-against-president-withholding-assent-to-state-bills/article67983464.ece.

^[73] SAR AFMP, University of Westminster, February 23, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-23-university-of-westminster/.

^[74] SAR AFMP, Ashoka University, August 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-14-ashoka-university/.

^[75] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-multiple-institutions/.

^[76] SAR AFMP, Periyar University, January 11, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-11-periyar-university/.

^[77] Shuriah Niazi, “Campus protests over citizenship law revive bitter memories,” University World News, March 14, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240314145211447.

^[78] SAR AFMP, University of Delhi, March 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-12-university-of-delhi/.

^[79] Shuriah Niazi, “Uproar over JNU restrictions on student campus activities,” University World News, December 14, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231214130326960. Madhur Sharma, “A Decade Of Protests And Crackdowns On Indian Campuses,” Outlook, December 19, 2023, https://www.outlookindia.com/national/a-decade-of-protests-and-crackdowns-on-indian-campuses-news-337303.

^[80] SAR AFMP, South Asian University, June 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-06-16-south-asian-university/.

^[81] SAR AFMP, South Asian University, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-south-asian-university/.

^[82] Bharat Yagnik, “Common varsities bill to be end of student politics,” Times of India, August 14, 2023, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/common-varsities-bill-to-be-end-of-student-politics/articleshow/102707526.cms. Damayantee Dhar, “‘Draconian’: Why academics in Gujarat are decrying the Public Universities Bill,” The Federal, September 20, 2023, https://thefederal.com/category/states/west/gujarat/draconian-regressive-why-academics-in-gujarat-are-decrying-the-public-universities-bill-96575.

^[83] SAR AFMP, Maharajas College, January 17, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-maharajas-college/.

^[84] SAR AFMP, Maharajas College, January 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-18-maharajas-college/.

^[85] SAR AFMP, Gangadhar Meher University, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-12-gangadhar-meher-university/.

^[86] Tiya Thomas-Alexander, “Academic freedom under pressure as India tackles Gaza debate,” Times Higher Education, December 1, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/academic-freedom-under-pressure-india-tackles-gaza-debate.

^[87] SAR AFMP, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, November 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-14-indian-institute-of-technology-bombay/.

^[88] Shafigeh Shirazi and Yojana Sharma, “Female students living in fear under new hijab crackdown,” University World News, April 30, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024043011402234. “Tehran University Deploys More Hijab Enforcers,” Iran International, February 19, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202402197787.

^[89] UN OHCHR, “Iran: Institutional discrimination against women and girls enabled human rights violations and crimes against humanity in the context of recent protests, UN Fact-Finding Mission says,” UN OHCHR Press Release, March 8, 2024, https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/03/iran-institutional-discrimination-against-women-and-girls-enabled-human.

^[90]  Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, Lars Lott. 2024. Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg andV-Dem Institute, p. 11. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405.

^[91] SAR, “Iran: Niloufar Bayani released from prison,” April 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/2024/04/iran-niloufar-bayani-released-from-prison/. Michele Catanzaro, “Iran frees scientists who studied big cats in surprise move,” Nature, April 9, 2024, https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01059-8.

^[92] SAR Scholars in Prison Project, Ahmadreza Djalali, Iran, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/actions/ahmadreza-djalali-iran/#Case%20Information.

^[93] Amnesty International, “Further Information: Swedish-Iranian at Grave Risk of Execution in Iran: Ahmadreza Djalali,” July 8, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde13/8279/2024/en/.

^[94] SAR Scholars in Prison Project, Ahmadreza Djalali, Iran, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/actions/ahmadreza-djalali-iran/#Case%20Information. Amnesty International, “Further Information: Swedish-Iranian at Grave Risk of Execution in Iran: Ahmadreza Djalali,” July 8, 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde13/8279/2024/en/.

^[95] SAR AFMP, Azad University, January 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-30-azad-university/.

^[96] SAR AFMP, Azad University of Qorveh, January 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-09-azad-university-of-qorveh/.

^[97] “Iranian Universities Step up Suppression on Students,” Iran International, May 12, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202405115746.

^[98] Human Rights Watch, “Iranian Authorities Summoning and Re-arresting Activists and Protesters,” June 26, 2023, https://www.hrw.org/blog-feed/iranian-society-under-crackdown.

^[99] SAR AFMP, Azerbaijan Shahid Madani University, February 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-02-09-azarbaijan-shahid-madani-university/.

^[100] SAR AFMP, Unknown Institution, January 31, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-01-31-unknown-institution/.

^[101] Maryam Sinaiee, “Top Sunni Dissident Cleric Calls Death Of Baluchi Student Suspicious,” Iran International, February 5, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202402050567.

^[102] SAR AFMP, Kharazmi University, February 10, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-10-kharazmi-university/.

^[103] Shafigeh Shirazi, “Campus persecutions ramp up as protest anniversary looms,” University World News, September 6, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230906121905590.

^[104] Hannah Kaviani and Fereshteh Ghazi, “’Era Of Repression’: Iran Purges Ranks Of University Professors Ahead Of Protest Anniversary,” RFERL, August 30, 2024, https://www.rferl.org/a/iran-amini-anniversary-professors-purge/32571418.html. “August 2023 Report: Dismissal of Professors across 150 Iranian Universities,” NCRI, September 6, 2023, https://women.ncr-iran.org/2023/09/06/dismissal-of-professors-in-iran/.

^[105] Pola Lem, “Scholars fear ‘hiring drive’ foreshadows purge of Iranian sector,” Times Higher Education, September 4, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/scholars-fear-hiring-drive-foreshadows-purge-iranian-sector.

^[106] SAR AFMP, Al Zahra University, May 13, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-05-13-al-zahra-university/.

^[107] SAR AFMP, Al Zahra University, October 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-16-al-zahra-university/.

^[108] “Iranian Writer Rashno to Serve Nearly Four-Year Prison Sentence,” Iran Wire, February 15, 2024, https://iranwire.com/en/women/125385-iranian-writer-rashno-to-serve-nearly-four-year-prison-sentence/.

^[109] Shafigeh Shirazi, “Professors protest against regime’s campus interference,” University World News, October 5, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231005180222323.

^[110] SAR AFMP, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, November 26, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-26-isfahan-university-of-medical-sciences/.

^[111] SAR AFMP, Khajeh Nasir, Toosi University of Technology, February 26, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-26-khajeh-nasir-toosi-university-of-technology/.

^[112] SAR AFMP, Shahid Beheshti University, January 15, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-15-shahid-beheshti-university/.

^[113] Information shared via email from the International Community of Iranian Academics.

^[114] Shafigeh Shirazi and Yojana Sharma, “Female students living in fear under new hijab crackdown,” University World News, April 30, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024043011402234.

^[115] Ibid. “Tehran University Deploys More Hijab Enforcers,” Iran International, February 19, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202402197787.

^[116] Ibid. “Iranian Universities Step up Suppression on Students,” Iran International, May 12, 2024, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202405115746.

^[117] Jonathan Yerushalmy, “Where freedom meets repression: Australian academics tread a fine line over ties to Iran,” The Guardian, February 25, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/25/where-freedom-meets-repression-australian-academics-tread-a-fine-line-over-ties-to-iran.

^[118] Ben Upton and Paul Basken, “Israeli universities delay start of academic year after attacks,” Times Higher Education, October 9, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/israeli-universities-delay-start-academic-year-after-attacks.

^[119] Shira Kadari-Ovadia, “Academic School Year Begins at Most Israeli Universities Following Extended Delay Due to Gaza War,” Haaretz, December 31, 2023, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-12-31/ty-article/.premium/following-delays-academic-school-year-begins-at-most-israeli-universities/0000018c-bfd3-d6c4-ab8d-fff7a61a0000.

^[120] Pola Lem, “Israel’s Gaza border college on ‘healing mission’ after attacks,” Times Higher Education, December 1, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/israels-gaza-border-college-healing-mission-after-attacks. Jeffrey Gettleman, “On the Front Lines, an Israeli University Grieves and Readies for War,” New York Times, October 14, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/14/world/asia/ben-gurion-university-israel-attack.html.

^[121] Jackie Northam, “The war in Gaza is leading to deep divisions at Israeli universities,” NPR, January 30, 2024, https://www.npr.org/2024/01/30/1226618464/israel-universities-gaza-war-arab-students. Adam Sella, “War Brings Tensions, and Assault Rifles, Into an Israeli College,” New York Times, January 7, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-haifa-university-students.html#.

^[122] Karin Fischer, “Latitudes: Amid boycott calls, Pitzer College pulls back from a study-abroad program in Israel,” Chronicle of Higher Education, April 3, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/latitudes/2024-04-03. Michele Chabin, “Fallout from Israel-Hamas war causing ‘significant harm’ to researchers in Israel, survey finds,” Science, February 28, 2024, https://www.science.org/content/article/fallout-israel-hamas-war-causing-significant-harm-researchers-israel-survey-finds.

^[123] For instance, the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign advocates an academic boycott that targets institutions, but not individual scholars: Flora Cassen and Ilan Pappé, “Should academic institutions boycott Israel? Two scholars debate,” The Guardian, June 1, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jun/01/academic-institutions-boycott-israel-debate. See also: American Studies Association, “What Does the Boycott Mean?,” https://www.theasa.net/what-does-boycott-mean. American Anthropological Association, “AAA Membership Endorses Academic Boycott Resolution,” July 24, 2023, https://americananthro.org/news/aaa-membership-endorses-academic-boycott-resolution/.

^[124] Arie Perliger, “Most Israelis dislike Netanyahu, but support the war in Gaza – an Israeli scholar explains what’s driving public opinion,” The Conversation, May 23, 2024, https://theconversation.com/most-israelis-dislike-netanyahu-but-support-the-war-in-gaza-an-israeli-scholar-explains-whats-driving-public-opinion-230046.

^[125] Hilo Glazer and Itay Mashiach, “’Systematic Witch Hunt:’ What Persecution of Arab-Israelis Looks Like Amid Gaza War,” Haaretz, November 2, 2023, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-02/ty-article-magazine/.highlight/systematic-witch-hunt-what-persecution-of-israeli-arabs-looks-like-amid-gaza-war/0000018b-90db-db7e-af9b-fbdb254e0000.

^[126] “Childhood researchers and students call for immediate ceasefire in Gaza,” October 26, 2023, https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf6Y8T7YLQrQ32Nl_7JXrRKjJKw_JYxQKpAV4KGubNgEca3Ww/viewform.

^[127] SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, October 29, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-29-hebrew-university-of-jerusalem/.

^[128] Shira Kadari-Ovadia, “100 Hebrew University Faculty Members Protest Dismissal of Scholar Alleging Israeli Gaza Genocide, Doubting Hamas Atrocities,” Haaretz, March 13, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-03-13/ty-article/.premium/100-hebrew-university-faculty-protest-suspension-of-scholar-alleging-israeli-gaza-genocide/0000018e-3993-d3fc-adff-b9b383330000.

^[129] SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, March 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-12-hebrew-university-of-jerusalem/.

^[130] SAR AFMP, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, April 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-18-hebrew-university/.

^[131] Damien Cave and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad, “A Palestinian Professor Spoke Out Against the Gaza War. Israel Detained Her.,” New York Times, June 12, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/12/world/middleeast/palestinian-professor-israel-gaza-war.html

^[132] SAR AFMP, Kaye Academic College of Education, October 15, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-15-kaye-academic-college-of-education/.

^[133] SAR AFMP, Achva Academic College, November 12, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-12-achva-academic-college/.

^[134] Pola Lem, “Palestinian students suspended by Israeli universities,” Times Higher Education, October 31, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/palestinian-students-suspended-israeli-universities.

^[135] SAR AFMP, University of Haifa, October 10, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-10-university-of-haifa/.

^[136] Adalah, “Repression of Palestinian Students in Israeli Universities and Colleges,” May 9, 2024, https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/11116#:~:text=At%20least%2036%20Israeli%20universities,Adalah%20has%20represented%2095%20students.

^[137] Middle East Studies Association, “Letter opposing a bill proposed by National Union of Israeli Students,” June 27, 2024, https://mesana.org/advocacy/committee-on-academic-freedom/2024/06/27/letter-opposing-a-bill-proposed-by-national-union-of-israeli-students.

^[138] Rachel Fink, “Tel Aviv University’s President Warns of ‘McCarthyist’ Danger of Proposed Israeli Law,” Haaretz, June 9, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-06-09/ty-article/.premium/tel-aviv-universitys-president-warns-of-mccarthyist-danger-of-proposed-israeli-law/0000018f-fd6e-de5e-a5ef-fdeeb9380000. Nir Hasson and Lior Dattel, “’Abomination’: University Presidents Slam Student Union Bill Calling to Fire Faculty for ‘Inciting Against Israel’,” Haaretz, June 17, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-06-17/ty-article/.premium/abomination-hebrew-university-president-slams-bill-pushed-by-national-student-union/00000190-2705-d14b-a999-27ed677c0000.

^[139] Ye Myo Hein, “Nine Things to Know About Myanmar’s Conflict Three Years On,” United States Institute of Peace, April 30, 2024, https://www.usip.org/publications/2024/04/nine-things-know-about-myanmars-conflict-three-years.

^[140] “University student population has plunged 90% since coup,” Radio Free Asia, January 8, 2024, https://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/universities-01082024154241.html.

^[141] Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, Lars Lott. 2024. Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg an dV-Dem Institute, p. 11. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405.

^[142] Ibid.

^[143] Padone, “Teachers, students suffer opposing the military regime,” University World News, July 10, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230710160615705.

^[144] Padone, “Compulsory army conscription law shatters education hopes,” University World News, February 21, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240221102634648.

^[145] SAR AFMP, University of Sittwe, November 26, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-26-university-of-sittwe/.

^[146] Padone, “Military deployment on campuses put staff, students at risk,” University World News, March 12, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240312120550473.

^[147] SAR AFMP, Pakokku Technological University, October 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-1-pakokku-technological-university/.

^[148] SAR AFMP, University of Computer Studies, Monywa, September 5, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-05-university-of-computer-studies-monywa/.

^[149] See AAPP’s data on arrests at https://airtable.com/appHDJLeiPsMGFJ7s/shr9w3z7dyIoqdUv4/tbl8hVtSci8VifbO9. Note: The figure cited is the result of filtering the data by age (over the age of 18) and category (including student, All Burma Federation of Student Unions, Assistant Lecturer, Lecturer, Professor, Teacher, Rector).

^[150] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-multiple-institutions/. Padone, “Military raid on union office kills three student leaders,” University World News, August 1, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230801132954821.

^[151] AFI, pg. 11, https://academic-freedom-index.net/research/Academic_Freedom_Index_Update_2024.pdf

^[152]  Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, Lars Lott. 2024. Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg andV-Dem Institute, p. 11.. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405.

^[153] Tiya Thomas-Alexander, “Half of Nicaragua’s universities shut down by government,” Times Higher Education, October 9, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/half-nicaraguas-universities-shut-down-government.

^[154] Ismael López and Mary Beth Sheridan, “Nicaragua strips universities’ legal status in new attack on dissent,” Washington Post, February 3, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/03/nicaragua-ortega-closes-universities/.

^[155] SAR AFMP, Central American University, August 18, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-18-central-american-university-managua/

^[156] “Daniel Ortega acusó de terrorismo a una universidad jesuita de Nicaragua y ordenó la confiscación de todos sus bienes,” Infobae, August 16, 2023, https://www.infobae.com/america/america-latina/2023/08/16/daniel-ortega-acuso-de-terrorismo-a-una-universidad-jesuita-de-nicaragua-y-ordeno-la-confiscacion-de-todos-sus-bienes/

^[157] Aula Abierta – Las Américas. “La @DESCA_CIDH insta a dejar sin efecto,” Post to Twitter, August 18, 2023.

^[158] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-multiple-institutions-2/.

^[159] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-multiple-institutions-2/..

^[160] SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, July 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-28-multiple-institutions-2/..

^[161] SAR AFMP, Multiple institutions, November 30, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-30-multiple-insitutions/.

^[162] “Daniel Ortega Buries University Autonomy in Nicaragua,” Havana Times, December 3, 2023, https://havanatimes.org/features/daniel-ortega-buries-university-autonomy-in-nicaragua/.

^[163]  “El régimen de Nicaragua detuvo a cuatro dirigentes estudiantiles tras el cierre de la Universidad Centroamericana,” Infobae, August 22, 2023, https://www.infobae.com/america/america-latina/2023/08/23/el-regimen-de-nicaragua-detuvo-a-cuatro-dirigentes-estudiantiles-tras-el-cierre-de-la-universidad-centroamericana/. Monitoring Report, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-19-multiple-institutions/.

^[164] “Universitarios venezolanos suscriben comunicado en rechazo a las acciones contra universidades y estudiantes en Nicaragua,” Observatorio de Derechos Humanos Mérida-Venezuela, August 27, 2023, https://www.uladdhh.org.ve/index.php/2023/08/27/comunicado-universidades-confiscadas-nicaragua-uca/

^[165] SAR AFMP, Freddy Quezada, November 29, 2023,  https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-29-unaffiliated-insitution/.

^[166] PEN International, “Nicaragua: PEN calls for release of philosopher and author Freddy Quezada,” December 13, 2023, https://www.pen-international.org/news/pen-calls-for-release-of-philosopher-and-author-freddy-quezada.

^[167] Por Wilfredo Miranda Aburto, “Philosopher on trial via Zoom: Professor Freddy Quezada found guilty of “incitement to hatred”,” Divergents, February 23, 2024, https://www.divergentes.com/philosopher-on-trial-via-zoom-professor-freddy-quezada-found-guilty-of-incitement-to-hatred/.

^[168] Redacción Confidencial, “Retired Professor Freddy Quezada: “I Didn’t Think My Opinions Represented Danger”,” Confidential, September 10, 2024, https://confidencial.digital/english/retired-professor-freddy-quezada-i-didnt-think-my-opinions-represented-danger/. Anthony J. Blinken, “Release of Political Prisoners from Nicaragua to Guatemala,” US Department of State, Press Release, September 5, 2024, https://www.state.gov/release-of-political-prisoners-from-nicaragua-to-guatemala.

^[169] Jan-Michael Simon, Statement by Jan-Michael Simon, Chair of the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (GHREN), 54th session of the Human Rights Council, September 12, 2023, https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/hrbodies/hrcouncil/grhe-nicaragua/OA-GHREN-54HRC-12SSEP23_English.docx.

^[170]United Nations Human Rights Commission, “Report of the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (Advance unedited version),” A/HRC/55/27, https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/A_HRC_55_27_AdvanceUneditedVersion1_0.pdf, p. 8-9.

^[171] “Nigeria, June 2024”, Insecurity Insight, https://www.crisisgroup.org/crisiswatch/june-trends-and-july-alerts-2024#nigeria.

^[172] SAR AFMP, University of Maiduguri, December 4, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-04-university-of-maiduguri/.

^[173] See the following link, which includes all attacks at the University of Maiduguri: https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/academic-freedom-monitoring-project-index/?_snk_keyword=maiduguri&_snk_dt%5Bshowall%5D=y.

^[174] https://freedomhouse.org/country/nigeria/freedom-world/2024, D3

^[175] SAR AFMP, Nasarawa State University, October 22, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-22-nasarawa-state-university-keffi/.

^[176] SAR AFMP, Confluence University of Science and Technology, May 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-09-confluence-university-of-science-and-technology/.

^[177] United Nations, “More than 500 Palestinians killed in occupied West Bank: UN rights chief,” June 6, 2024, https://palestine.un.org/en/270889-more-500-palestinians-killed-occupied-west-bank-un-rights-chief#:~:text=%E2%80%9CAs%20if%20the%20tragic%20events,%2C%E2%80%9D%20the%20High%20Commissioner%20said.

^[178] Kiara Alfonseca, Kerem Inal, and Chris Looft, Destruction in Gaza: Side-by-side aerial look at the Israel-Hamas war’s devastating damage,” ABC News, May 9, 2024, https://abcnews.go.com/International/destruction-gaza-side-side-israel-hamas-wars-damage/story?id=109958458.

^[179] SAR AFMP, Al Israa University, January 17, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-17-al-israa-university/. Laura Pollack, “Israel destroys last university in Gaza as strikes continue,” The National, https://www.thenational.scot/news/24059315.israel-destroys-last-university-gaza-strikes-continue/.

^[180] UN Office for the Commissioner of Human Rights, “UN experts deeply concerned over ‘scholasticide’ in Gaza,” Press Release, April 18, 2024, https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/04/un-experts-deeply-concerned-over-scholasticide-gaza.

^[181] “Israeli air strike in Gaza kills prominent scientist Sufyan Tayeh, Palestinian ministry says,” Reuters, December 3, 2023, https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-air-strike-gaza-kills-prominent-scientist-sufyan-tayeh-palestinian-2023-12-02/.

^[182] Sana Noor Haq, “Prominent Gaza professor and writer killed in airstrike, weeks after telling CNN he and his family had ‘nowhere else to go’,” CNN, December 12, 2023, https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/11/middleeast/refaat-alareer-gaza-professor-killed-in-airstrike-intl/index.html.

^[183] SAR AFMP, Birzeit University, September 24, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-24-birzeit-university/.

^[184] SAR AFMP, Birzeit University, November 8, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-08-birzeit-university/.

^[185] SAR AFMP, Palestine Technical University Kadoorie, November 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-palestine-technical-university-kadoorie/.

^[186] Scientists4Palestine, “Professor Barghouti sentenced to administrative detention,” November 1, 2024, https://www.scientists4palestine.com/professor-barghouti-sentenced-to-administrative-detention/.

^[187] Committee on Academic Freedom, “Prof. Imad Barghouti has been released,”  Middle East Studies Association, May 1, 2024, https://mesana.org/advocacy/committee-on-academic-freedom/2024/05/01/prof.-imad-barghouti-has-been-released.

^[188] SAR AFMP, Al Quds University, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-al-quds-university/.

^[189] The 2024 election of Vladimir Putin—which places him in power 6 additional years, on top of his already 24-year rule—has been widely regarded as a sham due to the many allegations of electoral fraud, quashing of political opposition, and the lack of a genuine democratic process, with independent observers reporting significant voting irregularities and physical voter intimidation. Additionally, the Russian government’s control over the media and the legal system also prevented fair competition and transparency, further undermining the legitimacy of the election results: Emma Burrows, Dasha Litvinova, and Jim Heintz, “Putin extends rule in preordained Russian election after harshest crackdown since Soviet era,” Associated Press, March 18, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/russia-election-putin-2024-updates-ebdaae1bf12b44343b88ba471f9f0cb0. Alexandra Sharp, “Putin Declares Victory in Sham Presidential Election,” Foreign Policy, March 18, 2024, https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/18/putin-wins-reelection-russia-president-victory-speech/. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, “Russia Has Re-Elected Putin. What Next?” Event Announcement, March 26, 2024, https://carnegieendowment.org/events/2024/03/russia-has-re-elected-putin-what-next?lang=en.

^[190] On June 18, 2024, the ECtHR ruled that Russia’s “undesirable organization” law breaches European Convention on Human Rights: Nova Kruijning, “ECtHR rules Russia ‘undesirable organization’ law breaches European Convention on Human Rights,” Jurist News,  June 18, 2024, https://www.jurist.org/news/2024/06/ecthr-rules-russia-undesirable-organization-law-breaches-european-convention-on-human-rights/. Mary Ilyushina, “To please Putin, universities purge liberals and embrace patriots,” Washington Post, May 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/07/russia-universities-education-putin-overhaul/.

^[191] Pola Lem, “The slow, painful death of liberal arts in Russia,” Inside Higher Education, September 4, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/slow-painful-death-liberal-arts-russia.

^[192] Ibid.

^[193] Passed in May 2015, the “undesirable organization” law (Article 20.33 of Russia’s Code of Administrative Offences) provides Russia’s Prosecutor General and Foreign Ministry with the power to register foreign or international institutions as “undesirable organizations” if they present a “threat to the defensive capabilities or security of the state, to the public order, or to the health of the population.” Entities registered as “undesirable organizations” are banned from operating in Russia. Non-governmental organizations in Russia that work with or are supported by organizations classified as “undesirable” can be charged with violating the law. Since the law was passed, a growing number of foreign organizations that have been publicly critical of human rights conditions in Russia have been registered under this title. Those affiliated with an “undesirable organization” could face fines, restrictions on activities, travel bans, or jail sentences of up to four years.

^[194] SAR AFMP, Berlin Center for Eastern European and International Studies, October 13, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-13-berlin-center-for-eastern-european-and-international-studies/.

^[195] SAR AFMP, Central European University, October 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-16-central-european-university/. Yulia Akhmedova, “Academic retreat: Central European University’s ‘undesirable organisation’ label has created a headache for its roughly 100 Russian students and staff,” Novaya Gazeta, November 28, 2023, https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/11/28/academic-retreat-en.

^[196] SAR AFMP, Institute of International Education, March 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-07-institute-of-international-education/.

^[197] “Moscow bans more EU officials and politicians from Russia in response to sanctions,” Reuters, February 23, 2024, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/moscow-bans-more-eu-officials-politicians-russia-response-sanctions-2024-02-23/.

^[198]  SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, February 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-12-multiple-institutions/.

^[199] “Russia Bans Entry to 227 Americans for ‘Anti-Russian’ Actions,” Moscow Times, March 14, 2024, https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/03/14/russia-bans-entry-to-227-americans-for-anti-russian-actions-a84459.

^[200] The Associated Press, “U.S. colleges are cutting their partnerships and financial ties with Russia,” NPR, March 10, 2022, https://www.npr.org/2022/03/10/1085792668/colleges-russia-ukraine/.

^[201] Brendan O’Malley, “Ukraine seeks international support to stem brain drain,” University World News, October 28, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231028073035837.

^[202] SAR AFMP, Russian Academy of Sciences, September 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-01-russian-academy-of-sciences/.

^[203] SAR AFMP, St. Petersburg State University, October 13, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-13-st-petersburg-state-university/.

^[204] Mary Ilyushina, “To please Putin, universities purge liberals and embrace patriots,” Washington Post, May 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/07/russia-universities-education-putin-overhaul/.

^[205]  Katrin Kinzelbach, Staffan I. Lindberg, Lars Lott. 2024. Academic Freedom Index 2024 Update. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg andV-Dem Institute, p. 11. DOI: 10.25593/open-fau-405.

^[206] “Universities in Turkey instructed not to renew contracts with dissident academics,” Medya News, August 16, 2023, https://medyanews.net/universities-in-turkey-instructed-not-to-renew-contracts-with-issident-academics/. “Private universities asked not to renew contracts with academics writing for critical outlets,” Turkish Minute, August 16, 2023, https://www.turkishminute.com/2023/08/16/private-universities-asked-not-to-renew-contracts-with-academics-writing-for-critical-outlets/.

^[207] SAR AFMP, Boğaziçi University, September 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-01/.

^[208] Emily Dixon, “Turkish academics doubt court ruling will limit president’s power,” Times Higher Education, June 26, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/turkish-academics-doubt-court-ruling-will-limit-presidents-power.

^[209] Hamdi Firat Buyuk, “Turkish Court Strikes Down Decree Allowing President to Appoint Rectors,” Balkan Insight, June 4, 2024, https://balkaninsight.com/2024/06/04/turkish-court-strikes-down-decree-allowing-president-to-appoint-rectors/.

^[210] SAR AFMP, Dokuz Eylül University, October 5, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-5-dokuz-eylul-university/.

^[211] SAR AFMP, Istanbul University, February 21, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-02-21-istanbul-university/.

^[212] SAR AFMP, Istanbul University, March 7, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-07-istanbul-university/. “Turkish police intervene in women’s march of university students over LGBTI+ banner,” Duvar English, March 8, 2024, https://www.duvarenglish.com/turkish-police-intervene-in-womens-march-of-university-students-over-lgbti-banner-news-63964.

^[213] SAR AFMP, Boğaziçi University, December 25, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-25-bogazici-university/.

^[214] SAR AFMP, Uşak University, July 18, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-18-usak-university/. SAR AFMP, Middle East Technical University, September 2, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-02-middle-east-technical-university/.

^[215] Polly Nash, “The war in Sudan and higher education: one year on,” The PIE, June 3, 2024, https://thepienews.com/the-war-in-sudan-and-higher-education-one-year-on. Wagdy Sawahel, “Destruction of HE will demand post-war reform of sector,” University World News, March 28, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2024032603345775.

^[216] Wagdy Sawahel, “104 HE institutions burned and vandalised, says ministry,” University World News, August 31, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230830182024830.

^[217] Wagdy Sawahel, “Study reports on destruction at medical schools in Sudan,” University World News, April 10, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240409153124870.

^[218] SAR AFMP, University of Gezira, January 3, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-03-university-of-gezira/.

^[219] Wagdy Sawahel, “Ministry sets up emergency committee to support HE sector,” University World News, July 12, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230712093052848.

^[220] Wagdy Sawahel, “Reopening of universities prompts opposition and support,” University World News, October 17, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231016140937661.

^[221] Ahmed Wafik, “Sudan’s War Disrupts Universities, Leaving More Students in Limbo,” Al Fanar Media, June 3, 2023, https://www.al-fanarmedia.org/2023/06/sudans-war-disrupts-universities-leaving-more-students-in-limbo/. Jean d’Amour Mbonyinshuti, “Medical students from war-torn Sudan arrive in Rwanda,” University World News, August 3, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=2023080310410443. Wagdy Sawahel, “Hardship for academics who have gone without pay for months,” University World News, August 15, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20230814212759752. Wagdy Sawahel, “War forces Sudanese science academy to appeal for help,” University World News, October 4, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231003141532902. Lola Hierro, “From faculties to refugee camps: The war in Sudan has displaced thousands of university students,” El Pais, December 9, 2023, https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-12-09/from-faculties-to-refugee-camps-the-war-in-sudan-has-displaced-thousands-of-university-students.html.

^[222] Dylan Carter, “One in five HE institutions damaged or destroyed in war,” University World News, March 1, 2024, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240301072602780.

^[223] “Save Schools Ukraine,” Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science, https://saveschools.in.ua/en/.

^[224] Ibid.

^[225] SAR AFMP, National Agrarian University, Lviv, January 1, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-01-national-agrarian-university-lviv/

^[226] Brendan O’Malley, “Ukraine seeks international support to stem brain drain,” University World News, October 28, 2023, https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231028073035837.

^[227] Lori Allen, “Academic Freedom in the United Kingdom,” American Association of University of Professors, Fall 2019, https://www.aaup.org/article/academic-freedom-united-kingdom.

^[228] Tom Williams, “Arif Ahmed appointed OfS’ first free speech director,” Times Higher Education, June 1, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/arif-ahmed-appointed-ofs-first-free-speech-director.

^[229] Peter Walker, “England’s ‘free speech tsar’ named in announcement to one newspaper,” The Guardian, June 1, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/jun/01/government-free-speech-tsar-named-arif-ahmed.

^[230] Richard Adams, “Students can make provocative remarks if they do not break law, watchdog says,” The Guardian, December 14, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/dec/14/students-can-make-provocative-remarks-if-they-do-not-break-law-watchdog-says.

^[231] Chris Havergal, “Antisemitic incidents in higher education triple amid Gaza crisis,” Times Higher Education, February 15, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/antisemitic-incidents-higher-education-triple-amid-gaza-crisis.

^[232] Haroon Siddique, “Antisemitism definition used by UK universities leading to ‘unreasonable’ accusations,” The Guardian, September 13, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/sep/13/antisemitism-definition-used-by-uk-universities-leading-to-unreasonable-accusations.

^[233] European Legal Support Center and  British Society for Middle Eastern Studies, Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom in UK Higher Education: The Adverse Impact of the IHRA Definition of Anti-Semitism, September 2023, https://res.cloudinary.com/elsc/images/v1694507437/Freedom-of-Speech-and-Academic-Freedom-in-UK-Higher-Education-BRISMES-ELSC/Freedom-of-Speech-and-Academic-Freedom-in-UK-Higher-Education-BRISMES-ELSC.pdf.

^[234] SAR AFMP, United Kingdom Research and Innovation, October 31, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-31-united-kingdom-research-and-innovation/.

^[235] Patrick Jack, “UKRI clears academics accused by minister of backing ‘extremism’,” Times Higher Education, March 5, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ukri-clears-academics-accused-minister-backing-extremism.

^[236] Zoe Grunewald, “Minister uses taxpayers money to pay for libel damages to scientist over Hamas claim,” The Independent, March 6, 2024, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/michelle-donelan-libel-damages-academic-b2507949.html.

^[237] Patrick Jack, “UKRI panel chair resigns over handling of Donelan accusations,” Times Higher Education, June 3, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ukri-panel-chair-resigns-over-handling-donelan-accusations.

^[238] SAR AFMP, Liverpool Hope University, October 20, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-20-liverpool-hope-university/.

^[239] SAR AFMP, University of Birmingham, December 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-14-university-of-birmingham/.

^[240] Ashitha Nagesh and Christina McSorley, “More UK students occupy campuses, in Gaza protest,” BBC, May 2, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-68944591. Patrick Jack, “Pro-Palestinian encampments spread across UK universities,” Times Higher Education, May 7, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/pro-palestinian-encampments-spread-across-uk-universities.

^[241] Sally Weale, “UK students begin new wave of protests against Gaza war after US arrests,” The Guardian, May 1, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/may/01/uk-students-begin-new-wave-of-protests-against-gaza-war-after-us-arrests. Edna Mohamed, “UK students at elite universities join mushrooming pro-Palestine protests,” Al Jazeera, May 9, 2024, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/5/7/pro-palestine-protests-how-some-universities-reached-deals-with-students.

^[242] Shyamantha Asokan and Tom Pilgrim, “Universities win court order on Gaza protest camps,” BBC, July 10, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0jqgqe3wjno. Richard Adams and Geneva Abdul, “Gaza protest camps at UK universities wind down amid legal action,” The Guardian, July 7, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/education/article/2024/jul/07/gaza-protest-camps-uk-universities-legal-action.  Imogen Garfinkel, “Pro-Palestine protesters evicted from Queen Mary University of London following High Court possession order,” Roman Road London, July 12, 2024, https://romanroadlondon.com/queen-mary-university-of-london-evict-palestine-encampment-after-securing-possession-order/. Callum Parke, “LSE given court order blocking encampments in its building after student protest,” The Independent, June 28, 2024, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/lse-london-central-london-county-court-apartheid-assets-b2570711.html. Tony Grew and PA Media, “UCL wins court order on Gaza protest camps,” BBC, August 6, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0jpp0w88w5o.

^[243] Chavan Kissoon and Terence Karran, “Universities’ over-monitoring culture is a threat to academic freedom,” Times Higher Education, May 7, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/universities-over-monitoring-culture-threat-academic-freedom. Jack Grove, “Digital surveillance of scholars ‘eroding academic freedom’,” Times Higher Education, May 7, 2024, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/digital-surveillance-scholars-eroding-academic-freedom.

^[244] Paul Tough, “Americans Are Losing Faith in the Value of College. Whose Fault Is That?” New York Times Magazine, September 5, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/05/magazine/college-worth-price.html. Phil Primack, “How American Higher Education Became the Envy of the World—Yet Remains Distrusted at Home,” Tufts Now, September 15, 2023, https://now.tufts.edu/2023/09/15/how-american-higher-education-became-envy-world-yet-remains-distrusted-home. Bradford Vivian, “The Roots of Anti-University Rhetoric,” Inside Higher Education, June 13, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2024/06/13/tracing-roots-anti-university-rhetoric-opinion^. Jessica Blake, “AAUP Report Finds ‘Well-Funded’ Right-Wing Attacks on Higher Ed,” Inside Higher Ed, May 30, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/05/30/aaup-report-indexes-right-wing-attacks-higher-ed.  

^[245] Ryan Quinn, “War in Gaza Fuels Faculty Free Speech Battles.” Inside Higher Education, December 18, 2023, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/academic-freedom/2023/12/18/israels-war-gaza-fuels-faculty-free-speech-battles. Karin Fischer, “The Third Rail of Higher Education,” Chronicle of Higher Education, October 18, 2023, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/academic-freedom/2023/12/18/israels-war-gaza-fuels-faculty-free-speech-battles, https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-third-rail-of-higher-ed. Paul Basken, “Chicago Principles tested as free speech rows split faculties,” Times Higher Education, August 28, 2023, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/chicago-principles-tested-free-speech-rows-split-faculties.

^[246] Peter W. Wood, “The Illusion of Institutional Neutrality,” National Association of Scholars, April 22, 2024, https://www.nas.org/reports/the-illusion-of-institutional-neutrality/full-report#_ftn3.

^[247] John K. Wilson, “What the Champions of Neutrality Get Wrong,” Chronicle of Higher Education, March 18, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/what-the-champions-of-neutrality-get-wrong.

^[248] Katherine Knott, “House Investigations of Harvard, Others Mark a ‘Watershed Moment’,” Inside Higher Education, January 11, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/politics-elections/2024/01/11/house-probes-harvard-others-mark-watershed-moment. Erin Gretzinger, “Yet Another Congressional Hearing Came for Higher Ed. College Presidents Tried to Fight Back.,” Chronicle of Higher Education, May 23, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/yet-another-congressional-hearing-came-for-higher-ed-college-presidents-tried-to-fight-back. Elissa Nadworny and Janet W. Lee, “At antisemitism hearing, Columbia official tells lawmakers, ‘We have a moral crisis’,” NPR, April 17, 2024, https://www.npr.org/2024/04/17/1245168995/columbia-university-testimony-antisemitism. Katherine Knott, “Third Antisemitism Hearing Could Further Disrupt Higher Ed,” Insider Higher Education, May 22, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/2024/05/22/key-developments-higher-ed-columbia-u-house-hearing.

^[249] Rachel Treisman, “Lawmakers grill the presidents of Harvard, MIT and Penn over antisemitism on campus,” NPR, https://www.npr.org/2023/12/05/1217459477/harvard-penn-mit-antisemitism-congress-hearing.

^[250] Katherine Knott, “Presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT Face Grilling on Capitol Hill,” Inside Higher Education, December 5, 2023, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/2023/12/05/college-presidents-face-grilling-over-israel-palestine-protests.

^[251] Annie Ma and Collin Binkley, “Ivy League presidents reckon with swift backlash to remarks on campus antisemitism,” Associated Press, December 7, 2023, https://apnews.com/article/harvard-mit-penn-campus-antisemitism-backlash-2c89312cdd0d2652a9b57ce71f1533fd.

^[252] Stephanie Saul, Alan Blinder, Maureen Farrell, and Anemona Hartocollis, “Inside the Chaotic Struggle for Power at Penn,” New York Times, December 11, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/11/us/upenn-president-liz-magill-antisemitism.html. Susan Snyder, “Penn faculty fear the donor who started the effort to oust Liz Magill is attempting to set the agenda for trustees,” Philadelphia Inquirer, December 12, 2023, https://www.inquirer.com/education/marc-rowan-university-pennsylvania-agenda-20231212.html.

^[253] Emma Pettit, “Debate Follows Harvard President’s Resignation Amid Plagiarism Claims and Criticism Over House Hearing,” Chronicle of Higher Education, January 2, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/harvard-president-resigns-amid-plagiarism-claims-and-criticism-over-congressional-hearing.  Ian Ward, “We Sat Down With the Conservative Mastermind Behind Claudine Gay’s Ouster,” Politico, January 3, 2024, https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/01/03/christopher-rufo-claudine-gay-harvard-resignation-00133618.

^[254] SAR AFMP, University of Arizona, September 7, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-07-university-of-arizona/.

^[255] SAR AFMP, Arizona State University, October 12, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-12-arizona-state-university/.

^[256] SAR AFMP, California State University, Fresno, September 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-09-28-california-state-university-fresno/.

^[257] SAR AFMP, Texas A&M University, July 11, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-07-11-texas-am-university/.

^[258] SAR AFMP, Catholic University, January 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-30-catholic-university-of-america/.

^[259] Anemona Hartocollis, “Jewish Students Describe Facing Antisemitism on Campus to Members of Congress,” New York Times, March 1, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/01/us/antisemitism-campus-jewish-students.html.

^[260] SAR AFMP, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, November 3, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-03-university-of-massachusetts-amherst/. Tony Fay and Duncan MacLean, “UMass student assaulted at Israel solidarity event; suspect arraigned,” WWLP, November 6, 2023, https://www.wwlp.com/news/crime/umass-student-assaulted-at-israel-solidarity-event-suspect-arrested/.

^[261] Kenneth Stern, “I drafted the definition of antisemitism. Rightwing Jews are weaponizing it,” The Guardian, December 13, 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/13/antisemitism-executive-order-trump-chilling-effect. Jonathan Hafetz and Sahar Aziz, “How a Leading Definition of Antisemitism Has Been Weaponized Against Israel’s Critics,” The Nation, December 27, 2023, https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ihra-definition-antisemitism/.

^[262] Chris McGreal, “How pervasive is antisemitism on US campuses? A look at the language of the protests,” The Guardian, May 3, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/03/college-gaza-protests-antisemitism.

^[263] SAR AFMP, University of Arizona, November 16, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-16-university-of-arizona/.

^[264] SAR AFMP, Indiana University, December 15, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-15-indiana-university/.

^[265] SAR AFMP, University of Vermont, October 23, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-23-university-of-vermont/.

^[266] SAR AFMP, Barnard College, November 1, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-01-barnard-college/.

^[267] Students for Justice in Palestine, Day of Resistance Toolkit, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/10/DAY-OF-RESISTANCE-TOOLKIT.pdf.

^[268] “ADL and Brandeis Center Letter to Presidents of Colleges and Universities,” October 26, 2023, https://www.adl.org/resources/letter/adl-and-brandeis-center-letter-presidents-colleges-and-universities.

^[269] SAR AFMP, Brandeis University, November 6, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-06-brandeis-university/.

^[270] SAR AFMP, Columbia University, November 10, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-10-columbia-university/.

^[271] SAR AFMP, George Washington University, November 14, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-14-george-washington-university/.

^[272] SAR AFMP, Rutgers University, December 12, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-12-12-rutgers-university/.

^[273] Daniel Arkin, “How a pro-Palestinian campus group became a national lightning rod,” NBC, November 24, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/students-justice-palestine-became-national-lightning-rod-rcna125420.

^[274] Josh Moody, “Colleges Eye Rule Changes in the Wake of Spring Protests,” Inside Higher Education, May 31, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/governance/executive-leadership/2024/05/31/protests-are-mostly-over-whats-next-colleges.

^[275] SAR AFMP, Barnard College, November 13, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-11-13-barnard-college/.

^[276] SAR AFMP, Barnard College, October 22, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-10-22-barnard-college/.

^[277] Noah Bernstein, Sarah Huddleston, Shea Vance, and Esha Karam, “‘Columbia in Crisis’: Shafik testifies before Congress about antisemitism at Columbia,” Columbia Spectator, April 21, 2024, https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/21/columbia-in-crisis-shafik-testifies-before-congress-about-antisemitism-at-columbia/.

^[278] SAR AFMP, Columbia University, April 18, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-18-columbia-university/.

^[279] Gabrielle Canon, “The US universities that allow protest encampments – and even negotiate,” The Guardian, May 4, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/04/universities-allow-student-campus-protest-encampments.

^[280] Lois Beckett, “Nearly all Gaza campus protests in the US have been peaceful, study finds,” The Guardian, May 10, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/10/peaceful-pro-palestinian-campus-protests.

^[281] Susan H. Greenberg, “Protests Cost University of California $29M,” Inside Higher Education, July 22, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/07/22/protests-cost-university-california-29-million.

^[282] SAR AFMP, University of California, Los Angeles, May 2, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-05-02-university-of-california-los-angeles/.

^[283] SAR AFMP, University of California, Los Angeles, April 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-30-university-of-california-los-angeles/.

^[284] SAR AFMP, Indiana University, Bloomington, April 25, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-25-indiana-university-bloomington/.

^[285]  Isabelle Taft, Alex Lemonides, Lazaro Gamio, and Anna Betts, “Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped,” New York Times, July 21, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/21/us/campus-protests-arrests.html. Jocelyn Gecker, “College protesters want ‘amnesty.’ At stake: Tuition, legal charges, grades and graduation,” Associated Press, April 28, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/student-protest-gaza-war-arrest-amnesty-ae235703d6a9b99114078fca13a530a0.

^[286] Kathryn Palmer, “Punishments Rise as Student Protests Escalate,” Inside Higher Education, April 15, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/students/free-speech/2024/04/15/punishments-rise-student-protests-escalate. Prem Thakker, “Amid Gaza Protest, Universities are Cracking Down on a Celebrated Protest Tactic: Sit-Ins,” The Intercept, January 21, 2024, https://theintercept.com/2024/01/21/university-student-sit-ins-palestine/.

^[287] Maham Javaid, “For international students, protesting on campuses has higher stakes,” Washington Post, May 3, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/05/03/international-students-campus-protest-visas/.

^[288] Isabelle Taft, Alex Lemonides, Lazaro Gamio, and Anna Betts, “Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped,” New York Times, July 21, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/21/us/campus-protests-arrests.html. April Rubin, Kavya Beheraj, Tory Lysik, and Will Chase, “Mapped: Where pro-Palestinian student protesters have been arrested,” Axios, May 10, 2024, https://www.axios.com/2024/04/27/palestinian-college-protest-arrest-encampment. Scott Glover, Audrey Ash, and Bob Ortega, “Dozens of professors among those arrested in campus protests,” CNN, May 11, 2024, https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/11/us/professors-campus-arrests-invs/index.html.

^[289] Nicholas Confessore, “‘America Is Under Attack’: Inside the Anti-D.E.I. Crusade,” New York Times, January 20, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/01/20/us/dei-woke-claremont-institute.html.

^[290] Chronicle of Higher Education, DEI Legislation Tracker, Updated June 28, 2024, https://www.chronicle.com/article/here-are-the-states-where-lawmakers-are-seeking-to-ban-colleges-dei-efforts.

^[291] The FIRE, The Stop WOKE Act: Provisions Related to Higher Education, https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/stop-woke-act-provisions-related-higher-education.

^[292] Greg Allen, “Gov. Ron DeSantis’ war on ‘woke’ appears to be losing steam in Florida,” NPR, March 15, 2024, https://www.npr.org/2024/03/15/1238272873/desantis-woke-dont-say-gay-florida-stop-woke.

^[293] PEN America, “How So-Called DEI Bans Serve as Pretexts for Censorious Takeovers of University Governance,” May 25, 2023, https://pen.org/more-than-meets-the-dei/.

^[294] Ibid. Jeffrey Adam Sachs and Jeremy C. Young, “The Censors’ Next Target,” Inside Higher Education, January 10, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2024/01/10/legislative-censors-change-broaden-their-approach-opinion.

^[295] The anti-DEI legislation passed during the reporting period included: Alabama’s SB 129, which prohibits public universities from using state funds to operate DEI offices; Indiana’s SB 202, which requires colleges and universities to require “neutrality statements” in lieu of diversity statements and instituting a post-tenure review process that requires professors to promote “intellectual diversity” in the classroom—changes which, in essence, eliminate tenure; and Utah’s HB 261 Equal Opportunity Initiatives, which prohibits higher education institutions from using diversity statements in hiring or admissions processes, mandating diversity training, or establishing DEI offices, and requires that institutions reallocate DEI funds to “student success and support” initiatives. SAR AFMP, Multiple Institutions, March 20, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-03-20-multiple-institutions/. Campbell Robertson and Anna Betts, “Indiana Law Requires Professors to Promote ‘Intellectual Diversity’ or Face Penalties,” New York Times, March 23, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/23/us/indiana-professors-tenure-diversity.html. SAR AFMP, Utah System of Higher Education, January 30, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-01-30-utah-system-of-higher-education/.

^[296] PEN America, “New Report: Legislatures Introduce 110 Educational Gag Orders in 2023,” November 9, 2023, https://pen.org/press-release/new-report-gag-orders-in-2023/.

^[297] For example: Johanna Alonso, “DEI Ban Prompts Utah Colleges to Close Cultural Centers, Too,” Inside Higher Education, July 1, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/2024/07/01/onset-anti-dei-law-utah-colleges-close-cultural-centers. Mark Toner, “Countering the ‘Chilling Effect’,” NAFSA, May 2, 2024, https://www.nafsa.org/ie-magazine/2024/5/2/countering-chilling-effect.

^[298] Erin Gretzinger, “Wisconsin Governor Sues Republican Legislators for Holding University Pay Raises ‘Hostage’,” The Chronicle, October 21, 2023, https://www.chronicle.com/article/wisconsin-governor-sues-republican-legislators-for-holding-university-pay-raises-hostage?sra=true.

^[299] Baylor Spears, “UW System Regents reverse course to approve deal with GOP lawmakers on funding, DEI,” Wisconsin Examiner, December 14, 2023, https://wisconsinexaminer.com/2023/12/14/uw-system-regents-reverse-course-to-approve-deal-with-gop-lawmakers-on-funding-dei/. Baylor Spears, “GOP lawmakers approve UW pay raises, reassert intentions to eliminate DEI,” Wisconsin, Examiner, December 20, 2023, https://wisconsinexaminer.com/2023/12/20/gop-lawmakers-approve-uw-pay-raises-reassert-intentions-to-eliminate-dei/.

^[300] SAR AFMP, University of Texas, Dallas, April 9, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-09-university-of-texas-dallas/.

^[301] SAR AFMP, University of Texas, Austin, April 2, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2024-04-02-university-of-texas-austin/.

^[302] Liam Knox, “131 Scholarships Affected by Texas DEI Ban,” Inside Higher Education, June 18, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/06/18/texas-minority-scholarships-frozen-amended-due-dei-ban.

^[303] Johanna Alonso, “DEI Ban Prompts Utah Colleges to Close Cultural Centers, Too,” Inside Higher Education, July 1, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/2024/07/01/onset-anti-dei-law-utah-colleges-close-cultural-centers.

^[304] SAR AFMP, Florida State University System, August 28, 2023, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/report/2023-08-28-florida-state-university-system/.

^[305] Ryan Quinn, “Virginia Officials Scrutinize Two Universities’ DEI Course Syllabi,” Inside Higher Education, March 18, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/2024/03/18/va-officials-scrutinize-2-universities-dei-course-syllabi.

^[306] Ryan Quinn, “2 Virginia Universities Won’t Require DEI Classes After Governor’s Review, Board Pushback,” Inside Higher Education, May 13, 2024, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/2024/05/13/vcu-gmu-wont-require-dei-classes-after-youngkins-review.

Academic freedom is essential to higher education communities and societies worldwide, and threats to academic freedom, as noted throughout this report, are a global phenomenon. They demand a global response.

Toward that end, in 2023 Scholars at Risk, with support from the Mellon Foundation and in close cooperation with SAR network members and partners, set out to identify or help launch coalitions of academic freedom defenders in every world region. In 2024, SAR helped to launch or further advance the first three independent regional academic freedom coalitions in the Americas, Africa, and Southeast Asia. As described below, each coalition will work to foster greater protection, promotion, and respect for academic freedom through advocacy, monitoring, and membership building activities in a manner that is regionally specific, while sharing information and expertise across regions.

Over time, SAR hopes to support the work of such coalitions in every region, and invites inquiries from groups interested in partnering in this effort.

Coalition for Academic Freedom in the Americas (CAFA)

Launched in 2021 and hosted at the Universidad de Monterrey in Mexico, the Coalition for Academic Freedom in the Americas has focused on developing human rights standards that serve to protect education spaces, identify best practices, and strengthen democracies in the Americas. The Coalition currently has almost 50 active members across Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago, Canada and the United States, as well as over 200 “Friends of CAFA,” who receive regular updates. CAFA has been working to increase the visibility and relevance of academic freedom in public discourse and debate, within education circles, in strategic policy making spaces and across sectors engaged in democratic renewal, thus contributing to a heightened understanding of academic freedom as a fundamental human right and a pillar of democracy. CAFA actively engaged in the development and approval of the Interamerican Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy and has been systematically engaging with UN and Interamerican Special Rapporteurs, facilitating dialogue between these and other relevant actors from the hemisphere, as well as with regional and global UN actors and processes, such as the Regional Conference on Higher Education.

To achieve its overarching mission, the coalition is channeling efforts to strengthen the research infrastructure on academic freedom by carrying out strategic research as well as through a signature fellowship program in partnership with the Latin American Social Science Council, which will promote collective and individual comparative research across the Americas over the coming years. The coalition is also doubling down its efforts to ensure gender justice in and through education, tackling the problem of gender-based violence in education institutions, and promoting solidarity initiatives toward scholars and students at risk. CAFA looks forward to holding its third annual conference on academic freedom in the region (in Washington, D.C., November 20-21, 2024) and to scaling up its advocacy and monitoring work, as well as its inter-regional collaboration with sister coalitions in Asia and Africa.

Contact: Camilla Croso – Regional Director – camilla.croso@cafa-claa.org

Africa Coalition for Academic Freedom (ACAF)

Housed at the Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD) in Accra, the Africa Coalition for Academic Freedom (ACAF) is dedicated to promoting, protecting and ensuring respect for academic freedom in African higher education institutions through collaboration with like-minded individuals and institutions. In line with these objectives, ACAF seeks to, inter alia, lead efforts towards developing a set of academic freedom principles, advocacy strategies and interventions that reflect the African experience and contemporary issues influencing academic freedom and higher education on the continent.

As a recently launched coalition, ACAF will initially work toward growing its network of members and supporting partners. More specifically, this will include building individual membership and institutional partnership across the continent, including with student and staff unions. In parallel, ACAF will increase cooperation with civil society organizations and establish observer and consultative status with relevant inter-governmental institutions to advance academic freedom policy making in multilateral fora as well. Building on this network of partners, ACAF will prioritize developing the capacity to monitor and report on violations of academic freedom as well as incidents that may have a chilling effect on its exercise across Africa.

As ACAF consolidates this work across the continent, it will also aim to ensure that those under threat are able to find sanctuary in African universities, to guarantee easier integration in their places of shelter, and to facilitate easier return to their home countries when conditions permit.

Contacts:

Professor Kwadwo Appiagyei-Atua – Regional Director – +233 24 044 8627 – ACAFacademicfreedom@gmail.com

Sarah Koranteng – Administrative Consultant – +233 54 559 2375 – korantengsarah33@gmail.com 

Southeast Asia Academic Freedom Coalition

Launched in mid-2024, the Southeast Asia Academic Freedom Coalition is hosted at the Institute of Human Rights and Peace Studies at Mahidol University and builds upon existing strong national and regional networks of scholars engaging in defending human rights and democracy.

Given the context of democratic regression in Southeast Asia, academic freedom is under attack from authoritarian and hybrid regimes, conservatives, as well as other radical groups. Today, scholars and students engaging in struggles for democracy are subjected to harassment, surveillance, and legal prosecutions. Worsening the situation, the privatization and commercialization of education has also meant that higher education is no longer a genuinely free space for ideas and intellectual discussion.

This all points to the need for a dynamic and thriving coalition to promote the protection and respect for academic freedom across the entire region. Understanding academic freedom as part of the broader freedom of expression, the Southeast Asia coalition will work with members of the academic community and as well as other social movements to popularize principles of academic freedom, which currently are not yet sufficiently known among the general public, and to advocate for policy change. Furthermore, and bolstered by a region-wide research program, the coalition will also develop a monitoring mechanism to support local stakeholders in reporting the incidents and coordinate necessary interventions.

Contact: Bencharat Sae Chua – Regional Director – benonn@gmail.com

The data reflected in Free to Think 2024 present a distressing phenomenon of attacks on higher education communities around the world. This includes violent attacks on the university space; wrongful imprisonments and prosecutions; the use of force against students; terminations and expulsions; travel restrictions; and a growing set of executive actions, laws, and policies that undermine academic freedom and institutional autonomy. These attacks impede intellectual discourse and knowledge production, and they deprive society of the benefits provided by quality higher education.

In addition to protecting the scholars and students who face immediate risks, there are several critical steps that we must take to prevent attacks on higher education from occurring in the first place. The first is raising recognition that these incidents are all part of a single phenomenon—a global set of pressures with a common motivation: silencing higher education and thereby undermining democracy—and building consensus that action must be taken to prevent these attacks. Even more essential, however, is going beyond normative change to implement concrete protections for scholars and students and their ability to engage in free intellectual discourse, thought, and expression. In implementing these protections, it is worth underscoring the critical importance of upholding and respecting university autonomy. Academic freedom cannot be guaranteed without respect for university autonomy, and as Free to Think 2024 makes clear, where university autonomy is most under threat is also where scholars and students face the gravest risks.

This section presents a call to the international community, national governments, the higher education sector, civil society, and the public at large to take such action. While action may look different for different parties, everyone has the capacity to help. SAR invites readers to consider opportunities in the following areas: supporting at-risk scholars and students; building awareness and generating consensus; and preventing attacks on higher education.

Supporting At-risk Scholars and Students

All stakeholders who are able should prioritize supporting those scholars and students who are most immediately at risk of losing their lives, livelihoods, or access to higher education.

States and state agencies should establish mechanisms, including funding mechanisms where possible, to support at-risk or displaced scholars and students. Several national efforts offer direct funding to scholars and students to continue their academic work in safety. These include the Philipp Schwartz Initiative and the Hilde Domin Programme in Germany; the PAUSE program in France; the Students-at-Risk program in Norway; the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida)-funded program for researchers from Afghanistan in Sweden; an effort by Polish organizations to support students, scientists, and teachers from Belarus; funding from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) for the program Placement, Preservation and Perseverance (PPP): Afghan At-Risk Scholars, Activists and Students in Canada; funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) for fellowships for at-risk researchers in Switzerland and a second joint project for researchers in Ukraine in conjunction with the Ukrainian research funding organization NRFU;^[1] and a human rights defenders stream of the Government-Assisted Refugees Program in Canada.^[2]

States may also join together through multistate bodies or supranational groups to provide opportunities to support higher education institutions, NGOs, and other organizations seeking to help at-risk scholars and students. For example, Inspireurope+ project is an EU-funded multi-partner initiative coordinated by SAR Europe to strengthen support in Europe for researchers at risk.^[3] MSCA4Ukraine, which started in July 2022, is part of the European Union’s response to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation. Topped up with an additional €10 million in 2024, this €35 million EU-funded program, led by SAR Europe and implemented in partnership with the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Germany) and the European University Association (Belgium), will be providing fellowships of up to two years to over 170 researchers from Ukraine. It also offers training and networking opportunities for researchers from Ukraine; collaboration with and between Ukrainian and European research stakeholders; limited referrals for qualifying researchers whose applications were successful but could not be financed due to funding limitations; and reintegration support if and when safe conditions are met. In September 2024, the European Commission launched the Supporting At-risk Researchers with Fellowships in Europe (SAFE) project. The project aims to support up to 60 researchers at risk from around the world with a fellowship at a research institution in the European Union. The fellowship has a duration of up to 24 months. The European Research Executive Agency (REA) has provided 12 million EUR for this endeavor.^[4]

Higher education institutions should support scholars impacted by attacks by offering positions of academic refuge to these individuals through SAR, the Council for At-Risk Academics (Cara), the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF), PAUSE, the Philipp Schwartz Initiative, Open Society University Network’s Threatened Scholar Integration Initiative, or similar programs. This past year, SAR helped arrange over 149 temporary positions for scholars, researchers, and practitioners from Afghanistan, Ukraine, Turkey, Iran, Ethiopia, Sudan, Yemen, Russia, and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, among others. In addition, through MSCA4Ukraine, SAR Europe has awarded 125 fellowships to displaced researchers from Ukraine with host institutions in 21 countries. Most of these fellowships began in late 2023 and will last for two years.

Higher education institutions should join the SAR Network to demonstrate solidarity for threatened colleagues worldwide, and to contribute to efforts to respond to attacks on scholars and institutions. In June 2024, SAR, in partnership with the European Humanities University (EHU), organized the SAR Global Congress in Vilnius, Lithuania. Over 250+ participants from more than 60 countries, including SAR network members, project partners, SAR-assisted scholars, donors, local officials, and media, met in-person to share lessons from prior crises, explore new academic freedom research, learn best practices for advocacy and protection efforts, and develop future strategies. SAR’s next Global Congress will be held in 2026.

Higher education institutions and national and regional higher education networks, such as national SAR sections, should highlight and condemn attacks on the sector and speak out about the need to protect at-risk scholars. In doing so, higher education leaders prevent the normalization of attacks, signaling that an attack on one scholar is an attack on all. For example, the Coalition for Academic Freedom in the Americas (CAFA) released a statement calling on “education authorities and public officials to take available measures to ensure a safe space for the free and open exchange of ideas on campus” in the context of campus protests surrounding Israel’s military action in Gaza.^[5]

Faculty and researchers can support at-risk or displaced scholars on campus by serving on a SAR committee at their institution, through which they provide collegial support to hosted scholars and seek opportunities to engage them in on-campus activities. Faculty may also lead student advocacy seminars, through which students conduct research and advocacy in support of a wrongfully imprisoned scholar or student, or academic freedom legal clinics, through which students engage with governmental mechanisms by reporting on and seeking interventions regarding attacks on the higher education community, holding governments accountable for their actions, and urging increased protections for academic freedom.^[6]

Student groups and academic departments can invite formerly threatened scholars to speak to the campus community, including virtually, through the Vivian G. Prins/Scholars at Risk Speaker Series, a speakers’ bureau that provides higher education institutions the opportunity to learn from current and formerly SAR-assisted scholars.

Associations, societies, and research organizations should seek opportunities to engage displaced or at-risk scholars in their activities. In June 2023, the US National Academy of Sciences and the Polish Academy of Sciences announced awards to 18 Ukrainian research scientists to conduct research in stable conditions.^[7] In March 2024, the American Psychological Association (APA) offered free International Affiliate Memberships to six SAR-supported scholars in the field of psychology. In 2023, the American Physical Society (APS) received funding for an emergency aid fund, through which they helped connect SAR scholars with relevant research institutes specializing in physics and provided funding for temporary salaries. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) invited and accepted select SAR scholars for their Support Program to foster Academic Relationships and eXchange (SPARX), which “connects faculty members from developing countries and countries at risk with distinguished RAS mentors to elevate their research and publishing efforts in RAS conferences and journals” and offered around $10,000 USD in research funding.

Those in industry or other nonacademic research careers can offer expertise and employment opportunities to displaced scholars through recruitment offices, hiring programs, trainings, and workshops such as those organized by Inspireurope.

Building Awareness and a Shared Sense of Responsibility

All stakeholders should take actions that increase public understanding of the different ways authority figures act to suppress intellectual thought and discourse, including by tracking and publicizing attacks, as well as by engaging in more extensive research on the topic. Moreover, addressing attacks on higher education requires both normative and social change: scholars’ and students’ rights to academic freedom must be understood as fundamental—as indispensable to a functioning free society as the rights of journalists, an independent judiciary, or a healthy civil society. Academic freedom must be viewed as a shared responsibility. While there has been substantial progress in this direction, as this report shows, the right is still too little understood or respected. States, higher education communities, and civil society can support consensus around the right to academic freedom by explicitly stating their commitments and bolstering understanding.

States should express concern about attacks on higher education communities, publicly acknowledge the crucial importance of academic freedom to social and scientific progress, democratic advancement, and international cooperation, and recognize a right to academic freedom grounded in existing international human rights standards.  At an interactive dialogue held at the Human Rights Council on June 24, 2024, UNESCO noted that the definition of academic freedom presented in the report on academic freedom by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education resonated with its own. Several states, including Angola, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Malawi, Senegal, and Vanuatu, expressed support for the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom, which were released in March 2024 by an international Working Group on Academic Freedom, co-led by SAR.^[8] The document includes nine principles articulating the right to academic freedom and is intended to strengthen monitoring and protection mechanisms for academic freedom. In addition, the European Union stated its commitment to “respect, protect and fulfill the right to academic freedom,” and Bulgaria, Ireland, Portugal, and Romania each indicated their alignment with the EU’s statement. Separately, Sierra Leone acknowledged the Special Rapporteur’s call  to consider academic freedom as an “autonomous human right based on international law.” States can also express their concern through posing questions of other states under consideration in the UN’s Universal Periodic Review process^[9] or by raising academic freedom concerns before the Joint ILO/UNESCO Committee of Experts on the Application of the Recommendations concerning Teaching Personnel (CEART).^[10]

States should publicly commit to protecting higher education from attack by endorsing the Safe Schools Declaration, through which states express political support for and commit to implementing the Guidelines for Protecting Schools and Universities from Military Use During Armed Conflict.^[11] States that have already endorsed the Declaration—120 as of this report—should encourage the rest of the international community to take this step.

States should work through multistate bodies or supranational groups to develop monitoring mechanisms to allow them to track and promote respect for academic freedom. Efforts to develop such mechanisms are currently underway (in different stages of development) at the Higher Education Area and Bologna Follow-up Process.^[12] Between 2018 and 2024, members of the European Higher Education Area (49 countries and the European Commission) adopted and defined a common list of six fundamental values of higher education: academic freedom, university autonomy, academic integrity, student and staff participation in governance, public responsibility for higher education, and public responsibility of higher education. In addition, ministers responsible for higher education from the EHEA countries made official commitments to protect (through legislation) and promote (though policies and other initiatives) these values as jointly defined in their systems. Moreover, at their request, a monitoring mechanism for the fundamental values of higher education in the EHEA has been developed by an independent group of researchers through extensive consultations with all categories of stakeholders (including SAR).^[13]

States should invest in regular calls for research on academic freedom where such activities could  contribute to 1) new approaches to combating threats to academic freedom; (2) increased understanding of academic freedom and the short- and long-term consequences for society when academic freedom is repressed; (3) increased data on threats to academic freedom and increased knowledge and effectiveness of existing protections; (4) development of policies, procedures, guidelines, toolkits and methodologies to implement academic freedom; (5) reinforced legislative tools for protecting and promoting academic freedom; and (6) tailored curricula to implement trainings for targeted staff, civil servants—including members of Ministries of Education and Foreign Affairs—national human rights institutions, and diplomatic missions, among others.

Associations, societies, and research organizations should conduct and encourage research into the root causes of attacks on higher education and efforts to protect academic freedom. The Magna Carta Observatory, an international organization that seeks to bolster academic freedom, university autonomy, and intellectual and scientific integrity, in partnership with PEN America, will hold a conference on “Universities, Governments, and Democracy: International Challenges, Lessons” in late October 2024. The conference, hosted at Johns Hopkins University (USA), will focus on threats to university autonomy in the Americas.^[14] The Coalition for Academic Freedom in the Americas (CAFA) is hosting its third annual Regional Conference on Academic Freedom in the Americas in November 2024 and has invited scholars to submit papers examining challenges to academic freedom protection throughout the Americas, with a particular focus on shrinking academic spaces,  the intersection of gender-based violence and academic freedom, and impediments to policy  implementation.^[15] Other groups promoting research on attacks on higher education and academic freedom include the Global Observatory on Academic Freedom (GOAF),^[16] Strengthening Human Rights and Peace Research and Education in ASEAN/Southeast Asia (SHAPE-SEA), housed at Thailand’s Mahidol University,^[17] International Solidarity for Academic Freedom in India (InSAF),^[18] and the Norwegian Students’ and Academics’ International Assistance Fund.^[19] Supported by the Mellon Foundation, the Mellon/SAR Academic Freedom Workshop and Fellowship program provides a research stipend and supportive professional community for an annual cohort of researchers to develop and share related work on academic freedom and/or related higher education values.^[20]

Academic associations and societies should support education to advance academic freedom within their memberships at the institutional, national, regional, and international levels. Academic freedom defenders in particular should develop education, advocacy, and solidarity mechanisms to promote joint protection and promotion strategies. For example, the Coalition for Academic Freedom in the Americas (CAFA) is a hemisphere-wide effort co-organized by SAR, the University of Ottawa’s Human Rights Research and Education Centre, and the University of Monterrey, Mexico. CAFA seeks to highlight the importance of academic freedom and to engage in advocacy to develop and concretize relevant human rights standards to protect higher education spaces in the western hemisphere.^[21] Building on the lessons learned from CAFA’s successes establishing a robust membership and supporting the adoption of the Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy, SAR has partnered with academic freedom advocates in Africa and Southeast Asia to launch similar independent regional coalitions for academic freedom. Hosted by the Ghana Center for Democratic Development in Accra, the Africa Coalition for Academic Freedom (ACAF) launched in mid-2024 and is engaging with academics, students, and practitioners across the Continent to advance academic freedom through solidarity, research, and monitoring activities. The Southeast Asia Academic Freedom Coalition was also launched in 2024 and is hosted by the Institute of Human Rights and Peace Studies at Mahidol University in Bangkok, Thailand. Like CAFA and ACAF, the aim of the Southeast Asia coalition is to build community and solidarity to bolster academic freedom at a regional level. In Europe, SAR Europe convenes the European Coordinating Committee for Academic Freedom Advocacy, whose aim is to coordinate advocacy aimed at strengthening respect and encouraging action to protect academic freedom within and outside Europe.^[22]

The media plays a central role in raising awareness about the phenomenon of attacks on the higher education sector through investigative reporting, interviews, and public discussions. In addition to documenting attacks, members of the press can explain the causes and impacts of such attacks beyond their direct victims, including impacts on cross-border education and research, and on the economic, political, and security conditions in the countries and territories in which attacks occur.

Everyone can play a key awareness-raising role over social media by sharing Free to Think 2024, using the hashtags #AcademicFreedom and #Free2Think2024 in their posts, following @ScholarsAtRisk on Twitter and Facebook, and reposting SAR’s social media posts.

Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom

Above all, implementing the right to academic freedom on the ground is the only way to truly ensure that scholars and students remain safe to voice their opinions, freely discuss ideas, and engage in research that furthers knowledge and understanding. This requires developing concrete and practical legal standards and toolkits that provide practical guidance for protecting higher education. It requires ensuring that local actors have the knowledge, understanding, and capacity to take action. And it requires ensuring that those responsible for attacking higher education are held to account for their actions.

States should adopt policies designed to protect and promote academic freedom. States should, for example, consider hosting high-profile side events on academic freedom at international meetings , such as the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC). On June 26, 2024, for example, at the 56th session of the Human Rights Council, Portugal, France, Luxembourg, Ireland, Finland, the Republic of Korea, and the European Union sponsored an interactive dialogue on academic freedom.^[23] The event was organized by the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education, Ms. Farida Shaheed, in cooperation with UNESCO and Scholars at Risk, on the occasion of the presentation of her thematic report to the Human Rights Council on “The right to academic freedom” (A/HRC/56/58), which heavily references the “Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom” (A/HRC/56/CRP.2), noting that “[e]ndorsement and implementation of the principles would support academic freedom worldwide.”

States should assess their own country’s respect for academic freedom by consulting the Academic Freedom Index (AFi), a research tool co-developed by the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, the V-Dem Institute, the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPI), and SAR that measures levels of respect for academic freedom in 179 countries and territories.^[24] States should consult Free Universities: Putting the Academic Freedom Index into Action, a joint report by GPPI and SAR that introduces the AFi, for guidance on interpreting and using the data to safeguard and strengthen respect for academic freedom and institutional autonomy, and in doing so, improving higher education quality.^[25]

Intergovernmental, regional, and supranational bodies should develop policies, structures, and guidelines to protect and promote academic freedom regionally and globally. In her 2024 report to the Human Rights Council, the Special Rapporteur on the right to education, in examining the right to academic freedom from a right-to-education perspective, referenced the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom and called for their endorsement and implementation to allow a better state of academic freedom worldwide.^[26] In the Americas, the IACHR adopted a similar  instrument, the Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy,^[27] which regional academic freedom advocates are now focused on implementing at the international, national, local, and institutional levels.^[28]

Likewise, multiple European bodies have sought to develop guidance on protecting academic freedom. Promoting and protecting European democratic values is a central dimension of the European Strategy for Universities adopted by the European Commission in January 2022.^[29] The Commission is now working on developing “Guiding principles on protecting fundamental academic values.”^[30] The education department of the Council of Europe is seeking to bolster its work on the “Democratic Mission of Higher Education” through a new project entitled “Academic Freedom in Action,” which will be launched at a conference in mid-November 2024.^[31] The project will run from 2024-2027 and will address academic freedom, the democratization of science, and digital and artificial intelligence challenges to higher education.^[32]

States must respect university autonomy by ensuring the security and integrity of the university while refraining from militarization, surveillance, financial penalties, interference with hiring and admissions, interference in the methods or content of teaching or research, and other coercive measures that undermine the truth-seeking function. Laws, policies, and practices concerning the appointment, tenure, and removal of institutional leaders, oversight boards, and governing councils must respect the principle of self-governance, which is an essential component of autonomy.

Higher education institutions should promote understanding and respect for core higher education values of academic freedom, institutional autonomy, accountability, equitable access, and social responsibility.^[33] Higher education leaders have a critical role to play as the frontline defenders of academic freedom and the university, especially against actors outside the university, and especially in times of tension or controversy. They should vigorously defend the processes of academic inquiry and discourse, and they should create regular, visible, and meaningful opportunities for their communities to discuss complex, sensitive, and challenging questions, including those raised by rising levels of societal polarization and current events. Faculty and students should draw on their academic training, experience, and expertise to engage in these conversations. SAR’s Promoting Higher Education Values guidebook offers frameworks to ensure that higher education institutions protect and promote academic freedom while ensuring the safety of students and personnel.^[34]

Civil society and members of the public should actively support academic freedom. For example, the UK Academies Human Rights Committee responds to alerts issued by the International Human Rights Network of Academies and Scholarly Societies about cases of repression targeting scientists, engineers, or health professionals.^[35]

^[1] Swiss National Science Foundation, “War in Ukraine: Measures for researchers,” https://snf.ch/en/fniDfiLk26l0144l/page/measures-for-researchers-from-ukraine.

^[2] Learn more about these programs on the following websites: Philipp Schwartz Initiative (http://www.humboldt-foundation.de/en/apply/sponsorship-programmes/philipp-schwartz-initiative); Hilde Domin Programme (https://www.daad.de/en/study-and-research-in-germany/ scholarships/hilde-domin-programm); PAUSE program (http://www.programmepause.fr); Students-at-Risk (www.studentsatrisk.no); Swedish International Development Agency’s temporary academic sanctuary program (http://www.gu.se/en/news/researchers-from-afghanistan-receive-academic-sanctuaries-in-sweden); Polish Universities Help Students from Belarus (https://study.gov.pl/news/polish-universities-help-students-belarus); Canada’s Government-Assisted Refugees Program (http://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2021/07/ providing-protection-to-human-rights-defenders-at-risk.html).

^[3] See SAR Europe, “Inspireurope+,” https://sareurope.eu/inspireurope/.

^[4] PAUSE, “Launch of the Supporting At-risk researchers with Fellowships in Europe (SAFE) project,” August 28, 2024, https://www.programmepause.fr/en/lancement-du-projet-supporting-at-risk-researcher-with-fellowships-in-europe-safe/.

^[5] CAFA, “Academic freedom and peaceful protest on university grounds,” CAFA Statement No. 1/2024, May 21, 2024, https://cafa-claa.org/academic-freedom-and-peaceful-protest-on-university-grounds/.

^[6] Clinics contribute to monitoring and reporting in partnership with SAR’s Academic Freedom Monitoring Project and conduct legal analysis at the local, regional, or global level, or advocacy in response to particular attacks. Clinics have developed submissions for the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, the UN Universal Periodic Review process, the European Court of Human Rights, and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, among others.

^[7] National Academy of Sciences, “Eighteen Ukrainian Research Projects Selected for Long-Term Funding by the Polish Academy of Sciences and U.S. National Academy of Sciences,” June 29, 2023, https://www.nationalacademies.org/news/2023/06/eighteen-ukrainian-research-projects-selected-for-long-term-funding-by-the-polish-academy-of-sciences-and-u-s-national-academy-of-sciences.

^[8] UN Office for the High Commissioner of Human Rights, “Statements,” June 24, 2024, https://hrcmeetings.ohchr.org/HRCSessions/RegularSessions/56/Pages/Statements.aspx?SessionId=77&MeetingDate=24/06/2024%2000:00:00.

^[9] The UN’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process involves a review of the human rights records of all UN Member States and invites states to comment on or inquire into other states’ efforts to protect higher education communities. SAR routinely participates in the UPR process, urging states to ask questions of states under review about recent attacks on higher education or academic freedom-related concerns, and seeking formal state recommendations to their peers in support of academic freedom. SAR’s submissions include Academic Freedom Monitoring Project data. This past year, SAR partnered with its affiliated legal clinics to make submissions regarding China (with support from the Academic Freedom Legal Clinic of the Human Rights Centre of Ghent University): https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/2023/07/china-sar-files-submission-to-the-un-universal-periodic-review/; Israel (with support from the University of Turino’s Strategic Litigation International Legal Human Rights Clinic): https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/2022/10/israel-sar-files-submission-to-the-un-universal-periodic-review/; and Russia (with support from McGill University’s Academic Freedom Advocacy Clinic): https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/2023/04/russia-sar-files-submission-to-the-un-universal-periodic-review/.

^[10] The ILO and UNESCO developed the joint committee to promote and monitor the implementation of the ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers (1966) and the UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel (1997). It includes experts on education, teaching and labor, and examines how countries are applying the two recommendations along with allegations that teachers’ organizations make regarding abrogations of the principles: https://www.ilo.org/industries-and-sectors/education-sector/joint-ilounesco-committee-experts-application-recommendations-concerning.

^[11] See GCGPEA, “Safe Schools Declaration and Guidelines on Military Use,” protectingeducation.org/gcpea-publications/safe-schools-declaration-and-guidelines-on-military-use/.

^[12] This includes a Working Group on Fundamental Values, which is currently tasked with developing a comprehensive framework to further the monitoring and implementation of the fundamental values of the EHEA in the higher education systems of its members: https://www.ehea.info/page-Working-Group-FV.

^[13] The Bologna Follow Up Group, the main governance body of the EHEA between the ministerial conferences, is currently considering the complete proposal for monitoring with a view to approving it to commence its implementation. The proposed mechanism focuses primarily on monitoring the implementation of the commitments to protect and promote the fundamental values in all higher education systems of Europe. It includes de jure and the facto indicators, sections of narrative reporting about positive experiences, infringements and threats, as well as an evaluation of the outlook with regard to the future protection and promotion of the fundamental values in the respective systems.

^[14] See the Eventbrite at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/universities-governments-and-democracy-international-challenges-lessons-tickets-950175860577.

^[15] See Conference information: https://cafa-claa.org/event/third-conference-on-academic-freedom-in-the-americas/

^[16] See GOAF’s website here: https://elkana.ceu.edu/global-observatory-academic-freedom.

^[17] See SHAPE-SEA’s website here: https://www.shapesea.com/.

^[18] See InSAF’s website here: https://www.academicfreedomindia.com/.

^[19] See SAIH’s website here: https://www.saih.no/en.

^[20] SAR, “Mellon / SAR Academic Freedom Workshop & Fellowships,” https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/the-network-archived/mellon-sar/.

^[21] Visit https://cafa-claa.org/. Over the past two years, CAFA has submitted to the IACHR three summary reports organized webinars to identifying key threats and trends in the Americas, organized webinars that discussed key opportunities and concerns in the region, and, as described above will host its third conference in Washington D.C., USA, in November 2024.

^[22] Visit sareurope.eu/what-we-do/promote-academic-freedom/european-advocacy-committee/.

^[23] SAR, “The Right to Academic Freedom — Side event to the 56th session of the Human Rights Council,” July 8, 2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/2024/07/the-right-to-academic-freedom-side-event-to-the-56th-session-of-the-human-rights-council/.

^[24] The AFi aims to inform stakeholders, provide monitoring yardsticks, alter incentive structures, challenge university rankings, facilitate research, and ultimately promote academic freedom. The annual AFi report has already been widely cited by media, academics, policymakers, and inter-state agencies.

^[25] See Katrin Kinzelbach, Ilyas Saliba, Janika Spannagel, and Robert Quinn, Free Universities: Putting the Academic Freedom Index Into Action (March 2021), www.gppi.net/media/KinzelbachEtAl_2021_Free_Universities_AFi-2020.pdf; and Global Public Policy Institute, “The Academic Freedom Index Explained,” August 10, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOTPYMUU-xQ.

^[26] Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “he right to academic freedom – Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Farida Shaheed (Advance edited version),” A/HRC/56/58, April 25, 2024, https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/ahrc5658-right-academic-freedom-report-special-rapporteur-right.

^[27] Organization of American States, “IACHR Issues Declaration of Inter-American Principles on Academic Freedom and University Autonomy,” December 9, 2021, www.oas.org/en/iachr/jsForm/?File=/en/iachr/media_center/preleases/2021/331.asp.

^[28] See Organization of American States, “IACHR Announces Selection of Academic Centers and Universities for the Second Academic Network,” July 12, 2022, www.oas.org/en/IACHR/jsForm/?File=/en/iachr/media_center/PReleases/2022/155.asp.

^[29] European Commission, “European Strategy for Universities,” January 18, 2022, https://education.ec.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2022-01/communication-european-strategy-for-universities-graphic-version.pdf.

^[30] See information on the initiative here: https://sareurope.eu/inspireurope/.

^[31] See the Save the Date for the conference: https://www.coe.int/en/web/education/-/save-the-date-academic-freedom-in-action-conference.

^[32] “Academic Freedom in Action: Call for international consultancy services, Council of Europe Newsroom, December 14, 2023, https://www.coe.int/en/web/education/-/academic-freedom-in-action-call-for-international-consultancy-services.

^[33] Scholars at Risk, Promoting Higher Education Values: A Guide for Discussion, May 2020, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/SAR_PHV_DiscussionGuide_v20_ONLINE.pdf.

^[34] SAR, Promoting Higher Education Values: A Guide for Discussion, April 2020, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/promoting-higher-education-values-a-guide-for-discussion/.

^[35] See Academy of Sciences, The UK Academies Human Rights Committee, https://acmedsci.ac.uk/policy/policy-projects/uk-academies-human-rights-committee.

Attacks on higher education are a global phenomenon, occurring in democratic and autocratic states and all regions. They warrant a global response.

The attacks described in this report are diverse in their forms, including deadly attacks on scholars’ and students’ lives, direct attacks on their livelihoods or access to education, and coercive attacks targeting policy and legislation, chilling the space for academic discourse, debate, and investigation, and establishing the context for a graver set of violations. Together, they represent a severe threat to the circulation of ideas and development of new knowledge.

Worryingly, it is not just authoritarian leaders who are responsible for repressing the right of scholars and students to research, teach, learn, and speak freely. Increasingly, democratically elected officials are using their offices to introduce, pass, and implement illiberal legislation and policies that seriously undermine university autonomy and academic freedom. In doing so, they undermine the role of universities not only as centers of learning but as democratic incubators. Independent research, free discourse, and critical thinking are essential to democracy and innovation. Scholars and students must be able to teach, research, and learn unobstructed by external interference or intervention if they are to be able to play their vital roles as experts in their fields and active members of civic society.

The effect of these attacks is compounding: autocracies and weakening democracies undermine academic freedom, and lack of academic freedom further undermines democracy.

It is vitally important that we act now to safeguard the important role of higher education as an engine for economic, social, political, and cultural development. We have many of the tools to do so already at our disposal: the Principles for Implementing the Right to Academic Freedom build on long standing and new legal standards, principles, and guidance to protect academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and other core higher education values. But guidance does not translate automatically into action. We must do more. We must have the will to make change. All have a role to play in this: governments, higher education communities, and civil society. Together, we must implement tools to protect the right of academic freedom. We must apply and strengthen the standards that exist. We must demand accountability for the violations. We must put in place mechanisms to prevent future attacks.

SAR calls on everyone to join us in protecting those at risk, promoting academic freedom, and defending everyone’s freedom to think, question, and share ideas.

The Scholars at Risk (SAR) Academic Freedom Monitoring Project aims to identify, assess, and track incidents involving one or more of six types of conduct that may constitute violations of academic freedom and/or the human rights of members of higher education communities. 

The Monitoring Project is led by SAR staff working in partnership with higher education professionals, researchers, students participating in SAR’s Academic Freedom Legal Clinics, and advocates around the world serving as volunteer researchers. Anonymity of researchers is maintained where warranted by personal security or other concerns.

Monitoring Project staff and volunteer researchers identify and research incidents based on a system developed by SAR. Volunteer researchers may focus on researching a particular country or region for which they have expertise. All reports are reviewed by SAR secretariat staff before they are published to the Monitoring Project website. Volunteers also work with SAR to advise and develop advocacy responses to patterns of attacks found at the country level as well as severe, acute pressures on higher education communities.

The Monitoring Project reports incidents involving six types of conduct:

Killings/Violence/Disappearances

Relevant incidents include killings and disappearances either in retaliation for particular academic content or conduct, or the targeting of members of higher education communities, including higher education leaders, faculty, staff, and students. Disappearance includes arrest, detention, abduction, or other deprivation of liberty by government or quasi-government officials, or by groups or individuals acting on behalf of, or with support, consent, or acquiescence of the government, followed by a refusal to disclose the fate or whereabouts of the persons concerned or a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of their liberty, which places such persons outside the protection of the law. Violence includes violent physical assaults causing serious harm to individual members of higher education communities, including beatings, shootings, or other injuries with weapons, and torture, as well as threats of violence.

Wrongful Imprisonment

Relevant incidents include the arrest, interrogation, detention, and/or prosecution of scholars, students, or other members of higher education communities on false or otherwise wrongful grounds or charges, directly relating to, or in retaliation for, the expression of academic opinions or other professional or student activity, as well as in retaliation against other exercise of fundamental human rights, including freedom of expression and freedom of association. The latter may include incidents of scholars, students, or other members of higher education communities engaging in protected free expression, such as writing a letter to a newspaper or participating in a protest rally, even if such letter or rally is unrelated to the individual’s higher education sector status. (These incidents may not qualify as violations of academic freedom directly, but may still constitute violations of the human rights of members of higher education communities which in turn may indirectly impair academic freedom.)

Wrongful Prosecution

Relevant incidents include administrative, civil, or criminal proceedings against higher education leaders, academic and nonacademic staff, or higher education students involving false or otherwise wrongful grounds or charges directly relating to, or in retaliation for, the expression of academic opinions or other professional or student activity, or in retaliation for other exercise of fundamental human rights including freedom of expression and freedom of association. (Note that charges may be grounded in local law but nevertheless violate recognized international human rights standards because they punish protected activity.) Relevant incidents may also include, among others, proceedings for so-called “reputational harms” (e.g. ‘insulting the State’ or ‘offending national leaders’) which may subject individuals to substantial monetary penalties or imprisonment, restrictions on travel during pendency of any action or after conviction, bankruptcy, loss of political rights (including right to hold or run for elective office) and loss of position at state enterprises, including universities. Also included should be documented incidents where state or other entities use the threat of defamation or similar legal action to intimidate and silence academic personnel or students, even if such an action is never formally commenced (e.g., a state minister makes a public speech threatening prosecution of a scholar or expulsion of students for publishing an article). Such proceedings may be brought on behalf of individuals and institutions including governments and other state entities (such as the military), officials, private citizens, state religions, and nations themselves. When reporting on incidents of this type, researchers are encouraged to identify and if possible attach copies of the legal provisions providing the basis for any charges or threatened charges and evidence, such as any photographs of incidents or copies of any allegedly offending statements or publications.

Travel Restrictions

Relevant incidents include improper travel restrictions on higher education leaders, academic and nonacademic staff, and higher education students in connection with academic content or conduct. These include, but are not limited to, legal, administrative, or physical restrictions on travel within a state; restrictions on travel between states; arbitrary restrictions on a scholar or student’s ability to obtain a visa or other entry or exit documents; denial of future permissions for travel; and retaliation for attempting to travel or after return from travel. Travel restrictions may be imposed by government authorities of the scholar or student’s home state, government authorities of the state to be visited, and/or higher education institutions, leadership or professional associations.

Loss of Position

Relevant incidents involving higher education leaders or academic staff include discharge, demotion, loss of promotion or other professional penalty for a scholar’s academic work and exercise of other fundamental human rights, including statements made in the classroom, writings, research, professional association/union activity, engagement with (and criticism of) higher education leadership or education policy, etc. Relevant incidents involving students include dismissal or expulsion from studies based on academic work or student activities, including statements made in the classroom, writings, research, student association/union activity, engagement with (and criticism of) higher education leadership or education policy, etc. The offending penalties may be imposed by state authorities, higher education institutions, or other higher education-related authorities.

Other Incidents

Researchers are encouraged to report incidents which do not fit squarely within one or more of the five defined types of conduct yet are of such importance, scale, scope, and/or duration that they have already, or have the potential to impair significantly higher education functions, academic freedom, or the exercise of human rights by members of higher education communities. Such incidents may include occupation or closing of higher education campuses; destruction of higher education facilities, materials, or infrastructures; systematic or prolonged harassment or threats against members of higher education communities; systematic limits on access to higher education; and/or systematic discrimination based on gender, race or other grounds in access to, employment within, or other elements relating to higher education. The “other” type acknowledges that it is not easy to anticipate all relevant types of attacks that the Monitoring Project might expose and leaves room for researchers to include significant incidents that do not fit squarely elsewhere. Over time, regular reports of similar kinds of conduct in the “other” type may justify adding an additional delimited type.

Volunteer researchers submit reports to SAR on a rolling basis. Volunteers are encouraged to focus on the defined types of attacks, but are also instructed to exercise an “inclusion preference,” reporting corroborated incidents that may be difficult to fit within the aforementioned types, but that raise significant concerns about the security and freedom of higher education communities. This allows the broadest collection of initial data, data that over time will help support analysis of scope and frequency. In all cases, SAR staff provide a secondary level of review and work within the limits of available resources, and with project volunteers, to corroborate reported incidents and to evaluate when an incident rises to the level of reportable “attack” for project purposes. Sources typically include local, national, and international media outlets and human rights reports, and , where possible, primary sources such as interviews with victims, witnesses, or bystanders, and court, government, or university documents. Incidents corroborated by sufficient reliable sources are deemed “verified” and published as warranting public attention, including via email digests, website, social media, and summary reports.

Incident reports, links, and references are provided to assist users in evaluating alleged reports and do not necessarily represent the views of SAR, volunteer researchers, or respective members and partners of the SAR Network. SAR will not knowingly report or disseminate information that is false or uncorroborated. SAR welcomes submissions of additional corroborating, clarifying, or contradictory information that may be used to further research or otherwise improve data reported.

The below table includes 391 attacks arising from 313 verified incidents in 51 countries and territories, as reported by Scholars at Risk’s Academic Freedom Monitoring Project from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024. Note that the total number of attacks exceeds the total number of incidents reported because one incident may involve more than one type of conduct.

Scholars at Risk (SAR) gratefully acknowledges the members of higher education communities worldwide who have inspired us through their courage and dedication. We acknowledge especially the researchers contributing to the Academic Freedom Monitoring Project by reporting and analyzing incidents, and helping to develop advocacy responses, and to everyone who provided information, drafted text, and offered important feedback on the countries highlighted in this summary and in the full online edition of Free to Think 2024. We thank the Office of the Provost and New York University for hosting SAR, Maynooth University, Ireland, for hosting SAR Europe, and the many other member institutions, associations, partners, and individuals that contribute to our work beyond the monitoring project. These include the Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for Democracy, the Open Society Foundations, the Henry Luce Foundation, the Fritt Ord Foundation, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., the Gerda Henkel Foundation, the Vivian G. Prins Foundation, the Charina Endowment Fund, the Winston Foundation, our anonymous donors, the members of SAR’s Board and Ambassadors Council, and the many friends of SAR who help us each day to protect more scholars.

This report is the result of research conducted by the monitoring project and our publication partners, and thus may not reflect the views of individual network members, institutions, or participating individuals. SAR invites comments on this report or inquiries about our work at scholarsatrisk@nyu.edu.

The report graphics and layout were designed by Susannah Hainley.

The report was copy edited by Heather Dubnick.

For use or information, contact Scholars at Risk at scholarsatrisk@nyu.edu.

Cover/Hero Image: On February 10, 2024, Palestinians walk past the remains of Al-Azhar University, one of the 12 universities in Gaza that has been destroyed as a result of ongoing Israeli military action. Photo: Picture Alliance via Getty Images.

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