Free Speech or Safe Speech: The Neoliberal University's False Dilemma
Azmanova, A. 
ORCID: 0000-0002-2471-2016 (2025).
Free Speech or Safe Speech: The Neoliberal University's False Dilemma.
Social Research: An International Quarterly, 92(2),
pp. 347-377.
doi: 10.1353/sor.2025.a961484
Abstract
The war between free speech and safe speech in universities has unleashed competition for victimhood among antagonistic groups whose battles empower administrators. Freedom versus safety is a false dilemma. Understanding its falsity and social origins can help us detect the forces deploying it for political control by fostering demands for patronage. In the "cancel culture" era, we should remember that the original purpose of the struggles for free speech was to empower the weak, not to shelter them. Universities should not become unfit-for-purpose social welfare agencies trying in vain to counter the ubiquitous insecurity neoliberal policies generate. The 2024 university campus protests against the Israeli atrocities in Gaza indicate a way out of the false dilemma.
| Publication Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Additional Information: | Published in Social Research: An International Quarterly Volume 92, Number 2, Summer 2025; pp. 347-377: 10.1353/sor.2025.a961484 |
| Subjects: | L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB2300 Higher Education |
| Departments: | School of Policy & Global Affairs School of Policy & Global Affairs > International Politics |
| SWORD Depositor: |
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