The Geopolitics of Academic Freedom
Universities, Democracy & the Authoritarian Challenge
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 9685308 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Michael Ignatieff (0009-0009-7302-3549, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 153 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 194-206 |
| Publication date | 2024-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Daedalus (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0011-5266 • E-ISSN: 1548-6192 |
| Publisher | MIT Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1162/daed_a_02074 |
| OpenAlex | W4399203691 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 15 |
| References cited | 6 |
This essay examines why academic freedom has become a defining issue in the geostrategic competition between liberal democracies and their authoritarian challengers. The growing strategic rivalry between the United States and China is threatening to disrupt, even destroy, academic interchange between liberal and authoritarian societies. At the same time, populist right-wing leaders in Western democracies are attacking university autonomy, as part of a strategy of authoritarian consolidation. Hungary's prime minister Viktor Orbán has pursued an authoritarian takeover of his country's higher-education system while seeking new partnerships with Chinese institutions. Through this essay, I seek to explain why academic freedom faces unprecedented challenges, both within liberal democracies and from authoritarian competitors
Academic freedom · Authoritarianism · Autonomy · China · Consolidation (business · Democracy · Democratic consolidation · Democratization · Economics · Higher education · Liberal democracy · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Rivalry · Sociology · Academic Freedom and Politics · Higher Education Governance and Development · Law
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The politics behind political science
Ethics, power, and responsibility in qualitative psychology
Global Shifts in Scientific Production
International Organizations’ Influence on Higher Education Policy in Authoritarian States
Quo Vadis? Academic Autonomy and Freedom
Builder, broker, beacon and base
The University and Magna Charta Universitatum
The sequencing of academic freedom violations during democratic erosion
Illiberal democracy and the erosion of academic freedom in the ‘new’ Türkiye
| Unique citing works | 15 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 15 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 14 |