Subversives, Squeaky Wheels, and "Special Obligations": Threats to Academic Freedom, 1890-1960

• Autores: Ellen Schrecker
• Localización: Social research: An international quarterly of the social sciences, ISSN 0037-783X, Nº. 2, 2009 (Ejemplar dedicado a: Free Inquiry at Risk: Universities in Dangerous Times, Part I), págs. 513-540
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • The historical record of academic freedom in the United States since the end of the nineteenth century reveals that many of the college teachers who lost their jobs for political reasons were "squeaky wheels" - individuals whose prickly personalities and/or seemingly obstinate defense of their constitutional rights made them obvious targets when their politics came under attack. In almost every case, those politics involved the most fraught issues of the day and, in almost every case, the pressures that resulted in these peoples' dismissals came from outside the institution. Rarely did colleagues or administrators protect such unpopular individuals; nor, it turns out, did the procedural mechanisms established to bolster the academic freedom and autonomy of the faculty make much of a difference. As the dismissal of nearly one hundred college professors during the McCarthy era reveals, few American colleges and universities were able to resist strong external pressures to shed their most politically embarrassing professors.