Universities write contracts that guarantee academic freedom, either because they're top schools and that's one of the many things you need to do to be a top school, or because they'd like to be, or because the school was founded by people who believed in it and it was never removed, or because the union forced them. Same goes for tenure. Neither is as much a "special and unique legal right" as it is "a line in the contract."
Modern governments have found that certain activities that are against an employer's interest are in the social interest. Therefore, we get (oft-ignored, especially in the US) protections for would-be union organizers, and protections for whistleblowers. The US government (at least, according to Fish's case law readings) generally does not seem to have found that academic freedom needs special protections. I suspect that this is in part because the concept is in the contracts.
When the USDA and OSU forced one of its faculty and his student to stop publishing a USDA-funded study that made the USDA look bad, there was a huge uproar. OSU got its wish: it couldn't do anything to the faculty member, but the student hadn't signed anything guaranteeing him academic freedom. But it also got lots of egg on its face, and the result got out anyway (without the details). This is what academic freedom is about.
In the Rancourt affair, the question is whether Rancourt has violated his contract; if not, then it's a wrongful dismissal. I asked my dad for his opinion, which would be more learned than mine (he's been president of the faculty union, and of the provincial union of faculty unions), but he was busy taking my mom out to a birthday dinner. My opinion is that Rancourt's activities are probably not grounds for dismissal; I wouldn't at all be surprised to see the UofO losing in a lawsuit. Fish's readings in US case law are, of course, totally irrelevant to this case. Not only that, he is referring to cases mostly about subpoenas by companies of university researchers, which is not at all what's going on in the Rancourt case.
Fish seems to think that you can't brook any insubordination or else the entire faculty will start behaving like raving lunatics. He gives no evidence to back this up except for the case of Rancourt.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 07:09 am (UTC)Modern governments have found that certain activities that are against an employer's interest are in the social interest. Therefore, we get (oft-ignored, especially in the US) protections for would-be union organizers, and protections for whistleblowers. The US government (at least, according to Fish's case law readings) generally does not seem to have found that academic freedom needs special protections. I suspect that this is in part because the concept is in the contracts.
When the USDA and OSU forced one of its faculty and his student to stop publishing a USDA-funded study that made the USDA look bad, there was a huge uproar. OSU got its wish: it couldn't do anything to the faculty member, but the student hadn't signed anything guaranteeing him academic freedom. But it also got lots of egg on its face, and the result got out anyway (without the details). This is what academic freedom is about.
In the Rancourt affair, the question is whether Rancourt has violated his contract; if not, then it's a wrongful dismissal. I asked my dad for his opinion, which would be more learned than mine (he's been president of the faculty union, and of the provincial union of faculty unions), but he was busy taking my mom out to a birthday dinner. My opinion is that Rancourt's activities are probably not grounds for dismissal; I wouldn't at all be surprised to see the UofO losing in a lawsuit. Fish's readings in US case law are, of course, totally irrelevant to this case. Not only that, he is referring to cases mostly about subpoenas by companies of university researchers, which is not at all what's going on in the Rancourt case.
Fish seems to think that you can't brook any insubordination or else the entire faculty will start behaving like raving lunatics. He gives no evidence to back this up except for the case of Rancourt.