Statement from AAUP President Todd Wolfson on Raz Segal and the University of Minnesota

Since its founding in 1915, the AAUP has been the prominent guardian of academic freedom and shared governance-principles that are now under unprecedented stress. In Academic Freedom in Times of War, the AAUP stated that "it is in tumultuous times that colleges' and universities' stated commitments to protect academic freedom are most put to the test," reminding college and university administrators of their "obligation to defend academic freedom" and "resist demands from politicians, trustees, donors, students and their parents, [and] alumni" that compromise the principles of academic freedom and shared governance. Yet today-in a campus climate that has been called a "new McCarthyism"-many colleges and universities are not only failing to protect academic freedom and shared governance but are actively undermining their scope and meaning.

The AAUP condemns such diminishment of academic freedom and shared governance and expresses its concern over events that reportedly took place at the University of Minnesota. The AAUP has been informed that in June 2024, then-Interim President Jeffrey Ettinger, in coordination with Provost Rachel Croson and the board of regents, reportedly took a unilateral action in rescinding a job offer to Professor Raz Segal to serve as the faculty director of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. This action was allegedly taken in response to outside political pressure from groups who disagreed with Professor Segal's published analysis of the conflict in Gaza. In response, the University of Minnesota's Academic Freedom and Tenure Committee, its local AAUP chapter, its College of Liberal Arts Assembly, and its system-wide faculty senate each held that the administration improperly intervened into the university's established hiring processes, violating the principles of academic freedom and shared governance as well as compromising the integrity of the Center's directorship-a position that can only be filled by an expert scholar whose academic activities are fully protected against the threat of intimidation and retaliation.

Research, teaching, and programming on the topic of genocide and mass violence are inherently controversial. For this reason, no research center devoted to this topic can succeed without the fullest protections of academic freedom. As the AAUP's 1994 statement On the Relationship of Faculty Governance to Academic Freedom avers, "since the faculty has primary responsibility for the teaching and research done in the institution, the faculty's voice on matters having to do with teaching and research should be given the greatest weight." Moreover, all administrators, including the Board of Regents at the University of Minnesota, are bound to comply with a code of conduct which stipulates that they act in accordance with the values of academic freedom. For these reasons, the University of Minnesota faculty passed votes of no confidence in both Interim President Ettinger and Provost Croson for their actions against Professor Segal.

I join the local chapter in condemning the decision to rescind the job offer to Professor Segal to serve as faculty director of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies and request a correction of this egregious violation of academic freedom that would result in a reinstated job offer. Accordingly, the AAUP urges current University of Minnesota President Rebecca Cunningham and all college and university administrators to affirm the deliberation and judgment of faculty by respecting shared governance, abiding by extant hiring policies, and committing to a practice of noninterference that safeguards the faculty's right and ability to hire the candidates of their choosing.