The College Fix

Institutional neutrality is having a moment.

The policy has been implemented at numerous top-tier universities in recent weeks, a trend that shows administrators are likely becoming weary of taking sides on hot button topics, thereby upsetting donors, alumni, lawmakers and students.

The changes also come after university leaders tried — often unsuccessfully — to appease both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict amid rancorous and sometimes violent campus protests during the 2023-24 school year, but ended up infuriating pro-Israel and Jewish contingents after leading campus presidents would not condemn the calls for the eradication of Israel.

Most recently, on Aug. 20, the private and elite University of Southern California informed that campus community that taking sides on controversial topics “can silence people, be seen as speaking for everyone, and lead to unintended consequences.”

“…In line with these ideas, going forward as individual leaders or on behalf of the university, we will not post statements or take sides in political or social debates unless it pertains directly to our institutional mission and operations,” the memo stated.

Also last week, the University of Texas System Board of Regents approved a new measure in its free speech policy “barring the system and its institutions, including the University of Texas, from taking political stances or making statements on matters not immediately pertinent to their campuses or operations,” the Austin-American Statesman reported.

It is not “the role of the UT System or UT institutions to adopt positions based on political or social passions or pressures,” the new rule states. “Institutions should not, in their official capacity, issue or express positions on issues of the day, however appealing they may be to some members of the university community.”

On Aug. 15, Johns Hopkins University leaders announced a “posture of restraint” and pledged to only issue university statements “in the limited circumstances where an issue is clearly related to a direct, concrete, and demonstrable interest or function of the university.”

The reason is that statements “can create a perception that there are approved, broadly held institutional views on political or social issues, views that don’t always align with those held by some members of the Hopkins community,” the school stated.

The university clarified that faculty are still entitled to make their own statements, that the restraint policy applies to the president, provost, and deans: “Moving forward, in considering whether and when to issue a statement, university leaders will determine whether the issue clearly pertains to the ‘direct, concrete, and demonstrable interest or function of the university.'”

In June, Purdue University leaders approved and adopted a “Statement of Policy on Institutional Neutrality,” which reflected the university’s long-standing practice, the institution announced.

The move was prompted in part by a sweeping new law in the state that requires intellectual diversity. Senate Bill 202 took effect in July and directed university trustees to form standards for intellectual diversity and free expression.

“As required by SEA 202, this policy provides that the university will refrain from taking an official institutional position on a government proposal or policy debate that touches on a social or political issue being contested in the public arena unless that proposal or policy has a direct bearing on the university’s fiscal affairs or on the tools afforded to it to advance its land-grant mission,” Purdue stated.

Other universities have made similar moves earlier this year, including Stanford, Syracuse and Harvard. And back in 2022, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Board of Trustees passed a resolution affirming the university’s commitment to institutional neutrality.

MORE: Syracuse breaks ‘institutional neutrality’ pledge after 3 days

IMAGE: Emory Law School YouTube screenshot

Like The College Fix on Facebook / Follow us on Twitter