Academic Freedom, Globalised Scholarship and the Rise of Authoritarian China
Asian Studies
Public Law
Final Report Abstract
This multidisciplinary project (legal studies and political science) studied and theorised the perspectives and decisions of actors from the United Kingdom (UK) and Germany engaged in academic collaboration with partners in authoritarian China. A related project goal was discussing responses to undue influence and infringements of academic freedom from a normative perspective. The norms and principles engaged in the context of academic collaboration with authoritarian China were primarily analysed by a team at King’s College London’s (KCL) School of Law, whereas researchers based at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) focused on collecting and analysing empirical data. The interview and survey data collected during the project provide some evidence of repressive practices by the Chinese party-state in the countries under study. These practices, however, affect some scholars more than others. As one particularly vulnerable group, the project focused on émigré academics from the Special Administrative Region Hong Kong, tracing repressive experiences of transnational nature but also resistance against such repression by the targeted academics. Our survey data suggest that, while only a few scholars organised in German-speaking China studies associations have experienced hard repression, so-called soft repression is more common. What is more, the fear of future repression appears to exceed concrete, lived experiences of repression that lie in the past. Whereas such fears arguably increase the risk of self-censorship, the survey data also include evidence of nuanced reflection on selfcensorship and its mitigation among China scholars in Germany. Our research into the perspectives and choices of China scholars at German and UK universities furthermore suggests a heightened awareness within the scholarly community that academic collaboration with partners in authoritarian China involves certain risks. A research framework on extraterritorial authoritarian practices and the socalled EVLN framework (exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect) guided our interview data analysis. On this basis, project members concluded that scholars and academic institutions outside China encounter various pressures in their collaboration with academic partners in the People’s Republic (PRC), prompting some to ‘exit’ their collaboration while others exercise ‘voice’ (i.e., adjust partnerships). The active decisions to ‘exit’ or exercise ‘voice’ are often preceded by periods of passive behaviour characterised by either ‘loyalty’ or ‘neglect’. When prompted to make active decisions, we find that ‘loyal’ actors tend to exercise ‘voice’, whereas those previously ‘neglecting’ their cooperation with Chinese institutions tend to opt for ‘exit’.
Publications
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How (not) to measure China’s autocratic influence. The Loop
Pelke, Lars & Kinzelbach, Katrin
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Universities’ responsibilities to respect and protect human rights transnationally: A critical discussion of UK universities’ collaboration and exchange with China. Global Campus Human Rights Journal 7 (2), 1-18
Genoud, Christelle & Eva Pils
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Wehrhafte Wissenschaft. Die Idee der Freiheit und ihre Semantiken, 321-334. transcript Verlag.
Kinzelbach, Katrin & Pils, Eva
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Academic freedom, national security, and academic collaboration with China. Internationalisation of Higher Education – Policy and Practice, 5- 21
Seiwert, Eva
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Spukt ein autokratisches Gespenst in der Chinaforschung? Erkenntnisse aus Umfragedaten zu grenzüberschreitenden Repressionserfahrungen. ASIEN 166/167, 108-140
Seiwert, Eva & Katrin Kinzelbach
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Universitäten in der Verantwortung. Wissenschaftsfreiheit in der akademischen Zusammenarbeit mit autokratischen Staaten. Zeitschrift für Menschenrechte, 17(2), 30-49.
Kinzelbach, Katrin
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“Telling China's Story Well” Through Higher Education Along the New Silk Road. Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, 54(3), 251-273.
Seiwert, Eva
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From Academic Partner to ‘Academic Threat’: German and UK Media Framing of European–Chinese Academic Cooperation since Xi Jinping Came to Power. Narrating China and Europe in Uncertain Times, 173-198. Bristol University Press.
Seiwert, Eva
