Academic freedom is a threat to illiberal regimes. © SCRIPTS
Mrs. Börzel, you are researching the topic of academic freedom. Why is this so important for a liberal society?
Börzel: The idea of the critical individual is central to liberalism, think of the Enlightenment, i.e. the liberation from self-inflicted immaturity: science strengthens the ability to critically question, which forms an important basis for individual self-determination. To this end, science must be free, because narrowing the perspective from the outset to what politics and society find helpful and acceptable massively restricts the ability to think critically and reflect. For illiberal regimes, academic freedom is a threat because it critically questions the seemingly given and enables and encourages people to question critically.
Academic freedom plays a decisive role not only for individual, but also for collective self-determination: in a liberal society, there are different, sometimes conflicting interests that are reconciled through the exchange of knowledge-based arguments. Science is therefore essential for a democratic culture of debate. But we can only strengthen this, too, if science is free.
What specifically have you researched?
Börzel: We have examined academic freedom as a norm and part of a global liberal script. Is there a specifically liberal understanding of academic freedom that is shared worldwide? The starting point of our research is that the tension between individual and collective self-determination described at the beginning also characterizes the disputes surrounding academic freedom.
In Western democracies, the focus has long been on the individual freedom of academics in their research and teaching. According to Article 5, paragraph 3 of the Basic Law, research and teaching are free, but this freedom is subject to certain limits that are set collectively. At the same time, science as an institutionalized system is allowed to decide for itself how it researches and teaches, i.e. without external interference, for example by the state. As a collective dimension of academic freedom, the independence of academic institutions is becoming increasingly important in the face of political attempts to determine the content of research and teaching - for example in the USA, where public universities are being forced to limit their commitment to diversity and inclusion and to discontinue gender studies programs.