Description
Book SynopsisAcademic freedom is under siege, as our universities become the sites of increasingly fraught battles over freedom of speech. While much of the public debate has focussed on ‘no platforming’ by students, this overlooks the far graver threat posed by concerted efforts to silence the critical voices of both academics and students, through the use of bureaucracy, legal threats and online harassment. Such tactics have conspicuously been used, with particularly virulent effect, in an attempt to silence academic criticism of Israel. This collection uses the controversies surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a means of exploring the limits placed on academic freedom in a variety of different national contexts. It looks at how the increased neoliberalisation of higher education has shaped the current climate, and considers how academics and their universities should respond to these new threats. Bringing together new and established scholars from Palestine and the wider Middle East as well as the US and Europe,
Enforcing Silence shows us how we can and must defend our universities as places for critical thinking and free expression.
Trade ReviewEnforcing Silence is a much-needed intervention in debates that have long raged about academic freedom in relation to the Palestine question and academic boycott. It provides a thoughtful critique of the usefulness of a liberal notion of academic freedom from a variety of disciplinary and geographic locations ... a thoughtfully curated and insightful collection of essays that will give scholars, students, and activists important lines of analysis to counter enforced silence. * Journal of Palestine Studies *
This collection of essays deserves the attention of political theorists and civil liberties lawyers as well as Middle East area experts. Its arguments may also be of interest to a wider public in the wake of America’s long, hot summer of protests by Black Lives Matter. * The Middle East Journal *
As global support for Palestinian justice grows steadily, the silencing of criticism of Israel takes new aggressive forms. To understand why this is the case, and how the politics of Israel-Palestine has become indelibly connected to academic freedom, read this valuable and wide-ranging collection. * Bashir Abu-Manneh, University of Kent *
Criticism of Israel has become the litmus test of “academic freedom”. Anyone believing that this is, at bottom, a straightforward and unquestionable notion will change their mind after reading this very stimulating and useful book. * Gilbert Achcar, School of Oriental and African Studies *
Table of ContentsPreface Introduction, Palestine and Academic Freedom Part I: Universities and Academic Governance 1. Whose University? Academic Freedom, Neoliberalism and the Rise of ‘Israel Studies’ 2. Disciplinarity and the Boycott 3. “The Academic Field must be Defended”: Excluding Criticism of Israel from Campuses. 4. Lebanese and American Law at the American University of Beirut: A Case of Legal Liminality in Neoliberal Times 5. Precarious Work in Higher Education, Academic Freedom and the Academic Boycott of Israel in Ireland Part II: Colonial Erasure in Higher Education 6. Colonial Apologism and the Politics of Academic Freedom 7. The Academic Boycott and Beyond: Towards an Epistemological Strategy of Liberation and Decolonization 8. Colonial Academic Control in Palestine and Israel: Blueprint for Repression? Part III: Interrogating Academic Freedom 9. Lawfare against Academics and the Potential of Legal Mobilization as Counterpower 10. Rethinking Academic Palestine Advocacy and Activism: Academic Freedom, Human Rights, and the Universality of the Emancipatory Struggle 11. Against Academic Freedom: “Terrorism,” Settler Colonialism, and Palestinian Liberation 12 Privilege, Platforms, and Power: Uses and Abuses of Academic Freedom
