Philosophical arguments regarding academic freedom can sometimes appear removed from the real conflicts playing out in contemporary universities. This paper focusses on a set of issues at the front line of these conflicts, namely, questions regarding sex, gender and gender identity. We document the ways in which the work of academics has been…

The tension emanated from deeply polarized socio-cultural values has found its way into the Canadian university campuses. In their endeavour to strike a balance between promoting diversity, inclusion and respecting free speech, the Canadian higher educational institutions have encountered formidable challenges. Central to the contention revolving…

Freedom of expression has historically been an issue in the United States on college and university campuses. With the recent rise of movements such as Black Lives Matter and Times Up, it is critically important that policies that govern student behavior reflect the constitutionally guaranteed right of students to engage in free speech. This study…

In "Carson v. Makin," the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that, if a state offers tuition assistance for students to attend private schools, then requiring that those private schools be nonsectarian violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. Robert Kim discusses how this case aligns with other decisions related to the free…

Responses to the pernicious influences of mainstream pornography on its viewers fall into two main sorts: regulation and education. Pornography has long been a core topic in analytic feminist philosophy, but it has largely focused on issues around regulation, in particular with trying to undermine arguments against regulation on the grounds that…

Administrative language surrounding racist hate speech on campus is rooted in abstract interpretations of the liberal values of freedom and equality. Consequently, these color-blind discourses remove racist hate speech from its historical context of racial violence and discrimination and view it as merely another point of view that is deserving of…

Science plays an important, if not central role, in the profession's mission of enhancing human well-being. The benefits that flow from science do not emerge in a vacuum, but rather are contingent upon the existence of a specific value-based milieu. Included among these values are an academic discourse that: 1) supports the free expression of…

Democracy is increasingly being challenged, by disengagement and by anti-pluralist movements (Levitsky and Ziblatt in How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future, Viking, New York, 2018; Wikforss in "Därför demokrati. Om kunskapen och folkstyret" [Because of this, democracy. On knowledge and people's rule] Fri Tanke, 2021;…

Academic freedom is an oft-invoked buzzword in debates about campus speech and the American university. But how have courts treated legal disputes where faculty members have invoked academic freedom as a potential constitutional interest? And how do faculty themselves conceptualize academic freedom? The similarities and differences between these…

In recent years an uneasy peace has descended in U.S. academe between those who feel research universities have done too little to advance the representation of minority groups and women and those who feel that the administrative policies developed to improve representation can and sometimes do come into conflict with core intellectual commitments…

Self-censorship is widely practiced in university communities, under-discussed though it is. One suggestion for dealing with self-censorship is that universities and professors post rules of conduct designed to facilitate free and open discussion of sensitive topics. Rules are good for solving coordination problems, but self-censorship stems from…

Freedom of speech in universities is currently an issue of widespread concern and debate. Recent empirical findings in the UK shed some light on whether speech is unduly restricted in the university, but it suffers from two limitations. First, the results appear contradictory. Some studies show that the issue of free speech is overblown by media…

Legal rights for public employees are not clear in the area of social media speech. Following the "Garcetti v Ceballos" (2006) U.S. Supreme Court case, the pursuant to duty test was established. The social media speech of public employees, including educators, could be considered pursuant to their duties as an employee. This means that…

Institutions of higher education have recently been embroiled in a series of controversies concerning two related, though hotly contested ideas: the creation of safe space and the preservation of free speech. On one hand, there is a demand for institutional safe spaces--literal refuges or broad university norms that create a sense of inclusion for…

As a fundamental communication tool, media has undergone transformative changes throughout history. This has a lot to do with education. Each era has been characterized by its own unique media paradigms, from the invention of the printing press in the 15th century to the emergence of radio and television in the 20th century. These paradigms not…