What Is Academic Freedom?
"Academic freedom" means the freedom of the academic community to conduct academic activities freely. It originates from German akademische freiheit, and English translates as academic freedom. Akademische comes from Plato's academy (akademy), and it has a variety of meanings including university, college, and academic. In different cultural backgrounds and situations, it contains different meanings. Regarding academic freedom itself, although there is a fundamental consensus in modern times, there are also various views on some individual topics.
Academic freedom
(University Academic Principles)
Right!
- "Academic freedom" means the freedom of the academic community to conduct academic activities freely. It is derived from akademische freiheit in German, English is translated as academic freedom, and akademische is derived from
- As
- In law, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I promulgated a decree in 1158 to ensure that academics are not punished for academic activities, but academic freedom was first clearly affirmed by Article 142 of the German Weimar Constitution of 1919, Article 15 of the United Nations International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights states that: States parties to this Convention undertake to respect the freedoms necessary for scientific research and creative activities, and is closely related to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights Article 18 deals with freedom of thought, and Article 19 deals with freedom of assertion and freedom of expression. Article 47 of the Chinese Constitution: Citizens have the freedom to conduct scientific research, literary and artistic creation, and other cultural activities, which constitute the constitutional basis for academic freedom in China. According to Marseille and others, 34 constitutions provided for academic freedom by 1975.
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- Academic freedom is
Academic freedom academic approver
- The rules for approving academics are simple. Whoever has the resources has the right to approve academics. Please see who holds all kinds of projects, projects, plans and rewards:
- National Office of Philosophy and Social Sciences Planning: National Social Science Fund projects, which are divided into key projects, general projects, youth projects, general optional projects, and youth optional projects.
- Ministry of Education: Project 211; Project 985; Humanities and Social Sciences Fund of the Ministry of Education; Youth Humanities and Social Sciences Fund; Humanities and Social Sciences "Tenth Five-Year Plan" Project; Major Projects of the Humanities and Social Sciences Base; Ministry of Education Cross-Century Talent Project; College Young Teacher Award; Outstanding Young Teacher Award Program; College Backbone Teachers Funding Program; University Specialized Research Fund for Doctoral Subjects; National Teaching Achievement Award for Higher Education; Famous Teacher of the Ministry of Education, etc. There are also the Huo Yingdong Education Fund, the Zeng Xianzi Education Fund, the Shaw Run Project, and the Yangtze River Scholars Award Scheme, which are entrusted by the Ministry of Education.
- Ministry of Science and Technology: 863 Program (National High-Tech Research and Development Program); National Science and Technology Research Program; Basic Research Programs, such as 973 Program (National Key Basic Research and Development Program), National Natural Science Foundation; Research and Development Conditions Construction Program, such as National Priorities Laboratory construction project plan, National Engineering Technology Research Center plan; Science and technology industrialization environment construction plan, such as Spark plan, Torch plan, there are five categories, and each type has several sub-items.
- Personnel Department: Post-doctoral mobile station; various funding programs for returning overseas students; professional funding programs such as cross-century academic and technical leaders, the new century multi-million talent project (formerly the "multi-million talent project"); special government allowances There are four major categories.
- In addition to the various ministries, there are many projects, projects, plans, and awards in various provinces, districts, and municipalities. Up to various levels of associations, societies, universities, colleges, departments, etc., have been established at various levels, and evaluated at various levels to form an approval network.
- These departments have a total of academic research resources in the end, which can not be accurately counted, but can be seen from the following figures: For example, the 973 program funding limit is divided into A: 30 million yuan or more, B: 10 million-30 million yuan, C Category: 5 million to 10 million yuan. Since its launch in 1998, a total of 133 projects have been established in 2002, with tens of billions of yuan invested.
- National Social Science Fund:
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- A total of 18.3 billion was invested in the 211 project during the Ninth Five-Year Plan period. The 985 project will each give Tsinghua Peking University 1.8 billion yuan from 1999 to 2001, and will give 1.2 billion yuan to Renmin University. Together with the above projects, the government has basically monopolized domestic public resources for academic research. Looking at the producers of academic results, if they do not have a project, it can be accurately said that they do not own any means of production and have no control over people, property, and materials. Most people do not even have a desk, which is spiritual. The "proletariat" of production. Of course, humanities and social science research depends more on a free academic environment than on tangible means of production, and some handed down works are not funded. But since the state and society have the ability to invest, it is necessary to enable the producers of academic achievements to automatically possess the necessary means of production through their duties, without having to apply again. Due to the monopoly of academic research resources by these departments, running the "Ministry" has always been a required course for university presidents.
Academic freedom academic graded
- Approving academic twins are grade academics. Hierarchical academics are formed because the authority to approve projects, projects, plans, and awards is ultimately in the hands of administrative agencies, while administrative agencies implement a bureaucratic system, and the level of projects depends on the level of the approving agency; Thinking, some non-administrative organizations such as universities and societies also grade projects and academic achievements. Hierarchical academic evolution is still very impressive:
- One: University level, Tsinghua University of Beijing, 985 Engineering University (about 10), 211 Engineering University (99 in total), universities directly affiliated with the Ministry of Education, universities under various majors, provincial key universities, provincial universities, and municipal universities . The level of university administration ranges from vice ministerial level to office level. There are also first-class universities, high-level universities, and general universities.
- Second: Project level, national level projects (such as the National Social Science Fund, National Natural Science Fund and other "national" projects), provincial and ministerial level projects, prefectural and provincial level projects, and department level projects (not commonly referred to as county group level) project).
- Third: Disciplinary level, national key disciplines (currently 964, of which 15 are in law, distributed among 9 second-level disciplines and 8 universities), provincial and ministerial level key disciplines, university key disciplines, and general disciplines.
- 4: Degree authorization level, the degree of authority granted by each university and research institution is different. The contents of the authority are divided into: doctoral first-level discipline, doctorate second-level discipline (doctoral degree), master's degree (professional degree), bachelor's degree (double Bachelor's degree), and universities that do not have the right to confer degrees.
- Fifth: talent level, this does not refer to the title level, but refers to the level of talent selected by governments and universities at all levels, such as the "Millions of Talents Project", which represents national talents, provincial and ministerial talents, and excellent Talent. There are also different plans and rewards. Among the professors, there are academicians and professors, members of the discipline review team, doctoral professors, master professors, and general professors. There is also a system of professors at the first, second, and third levels linked to job allowances that universities have implemented in recent years.
- Sixth: Publications are classified according to different methods. They are often referred to as authoritative journals (such as Chinese social science, Chinese science, and law research), core journals (such as comprehensive university journals), and general journals. There are also so-called national, provincial, and general publications; so-called special, first, second, and other publications.
- Seventh: the thesis level, which roughly corresponds to the publication level, there are special, first, second, and other types of papers.
- No. 8: Course level, such as the excellent courses of the Ministry of Education, outstanding courses, key courses, and qualified courses.
- Ninth: textbook grade, textbooks compiled by the Ministry of Education (such as 21st century course textbooks), textbooks prepared by various professional ministries such as the Ministry of Justice (such as law textbooks for colleges and universities in the "Ninth Five-Year Plan" period) And other teaching materials.
- Tenth: award level, national level (such as the National Natural Science Award, the National Education Achievement Award of the Ministry of Education), provincial level, school level, department level.
- Almost everything related to academic activities is graded. From an ideological point of view, it is really difficult to imagine a country that has written socialism as the basic principle of the nation for decades. From the inherent nature of academic activities, Is also unheard of.
Causes and disadvantages of academic freedom
- Examining and approving academics and academics have a deep background. This is the long-term planned economic system and the supporting administrative system with high social mobilization. However, the scale of academics and academics has not been around for a long time. It flourished in the 1990s. In the 1950s, there is still a tendency to intensify today. Before the 1990s, because people did nt deeply understand the significance of science education in rejuvenating the country, the country s financial resources were limited, and less investment in academic activities. After that, there were major positive improvements in both areas, especially the 211 project and the 973 project. Proposal, proposal of 985 project. China is a country with limited resources and a wide range of affairs. How to do as many things as possible with limited resources, how to build a first-class university, and how to achieve the Nobel Prize Zero breakthrough, has been testing the collective of various decision-makers, especially the government. intelligence. However, the decision makers did not form a suitable management and organization model, but mainly followed the old ideas of planned economy and administrative instructions: monopolizing resources, focusing on construction, and submitting approvals at various levels. This idea is based on "concentrated financial resources must be able to Based on the assumption of "significant results", coupled with the hard constraints and impulse of official performance of the official rules of "no political achievements and no promotion", a large number of "plans" and "engineers" have emerged, from key universities to 211 projects, 985 works.
- The focus on construction has ruled China for decades, and it has indeed become a major event in certain economic, technological, educational, and military fields. However, this thinking has also caused great damage to social fairness. For example, the "three rural issues" is a concentrated expression of social injustice, and it has gradually given way to fair competition through the market. Contrary to this mainstream tendency, in the academic field, key construction ideas still dominate, and there is also a tendency to strengthen. As mentioned above, most of the increase in science and education in the past ten years has been monopolized in the hands of governments at all levels and semi-official units. The distribution of these resources is heavily skewed towards a few universities, research institutions, and a few people. A few universities not only receive the key support of state funding, but also obtain more profits through special state authorization such as online distance education. State key investments and special authorizations have also increased the capital of these universities to absorb social funds. Due to the advertising effect, companies and other non-governmental organizations have a strong love for them, have donated generously, and set up various scholarships, reward funds, countries, enterprises, Individuals are vying for "the icing on the cake" rather than "giving charcoal in the snow." Over time, income, research funding, and working conditions in the field of science and education have been severely unfairly distributed. They are like university professors. Because they work in different universities directly under the Ministry of Education, their income varies by one or two times. Collect as many names as you can; some top-ranking universities spend hundreds of millions of dollars in planting grass and trees. This is one of the disadvantages.
- The second disadvantage is the huge cost of approving projects and grading academics. On the one hand, there are limited resources that can be invested in academics, and on the other hand, various investments to obtain these limited resources are surprisingly large. Guided by the principle of "procedural justice", various approval and grading activities have strict formal procedures. For example, the National Social Science Fund projects are reviewed once a year. The general procedure is: the project leader applies, and the university is based on the evaluation of the department. Screening and reporting, the provincial, district, and municipal social science planning offices or entrusted management agencies in Beijing to sign opinions, peer communication review, and subject review team review. Sometimes a project cost of 20,000 to 30,000 yuan, such as project argumentation fees, assessment fees at all levels, communication fees, travel expenses, paper and printing costs, and offense (publicity) costs account for almost half of the funding. In national-level project applications, applicants and their units do not count the cost. It is a common practice. Everyone is fighting for a name. The unit must meet the standard, go up the stairs, and create a first-class. Individuals must appraise their positions, awards, or secure their seats. Whether the level itself is "national". There are also specialized scientific research management institutions, such as the national and provincial philosophical and social science planning offices, the scientific research departments of various ministries, and the scientific research department of universities. The annual wages, benefits, and office expenses of their full-time staff may be different from the state's annual investment in philosophy and social sciences. Not much. In addition, the time cost of approval is even more incalculable. Some celebrities judged the West and the West, and then they frowned and regained their hearts. God knows how they read more than a dozen applications with at least tens of thousands of characters each day. Hundreds of ticks. Some university leaders in charge of scientific research often spend their day in organization, application, demonstration, review, and public relations of "planning" and "engineering".
- The third disadvantage is that it erodes the academic atmosphere and reduces the personality of scholars. Take the doctoral review as an example, the review was conducted every two years in the past. The general procedure is as follows: application at the grass-roots level, ranking of university review, peer communication review, review by the disciplinary review team, and approval by the Degree Office of the State Council. The ninth doctoral review due to various reasons was postponed, and the SARS subject review team also adopted an online review. Applicants understand the hard truth of "kung fu outside the poems", and research and competition outside the Internet have long begun: some local university leaders go to Beijing collectively and walk among the judges of Beijing; it is important to be generous in the name of the university Funds from the judges; donated at large academic conferences, for fear of not offending people who can affect the results of the review ... I believe that this is not the original intention of the applicant, it is helpless, everyone does this, you do not follow this type of potential The rules may be blocked, or no one will play with you. Moreover, as intellectuals, they are somewhat innocent, so begging, as some parties privately admit, their face personality has been degraded, bitter. However, no matter what excuses, the applicants for such actions will eventually lose their dignity as expected.
How academic freedom thrives
- The assumption that "concentrated financial resources must produce major results" has been falsified, at least if the decision maker cannot produce a detailed evaluation report to confirm that the major plan implemented and the project have achieved major results, it can be presumed to be proven False, the "inversion of burden of proof" should also be implemented here. And many projects lack scientificity and planning, and have not been organized for in-depth demonstrations. For example, the 211 project has not yet been completed, the 985 project has been launched, and the young teacher award of the university was originally the highest teacher award of the university. Now there is the famous teacher project of the Ministry of Education. What are they? The relationship, fear of decision makers can not tell. It is reported that the Ministry of Education has decided to start the Ministry of Education s Philosophy and Social Sciences Prosperity Plan, which includes six plans and ten initiatives.
- "These six plans are: major project research plan; key research base construction plan; talent cultivation and reward plan; academic excellence reward plan; liberal arts education reform plan; infrastructure and informatization construction plan. Ten initiatives include: starting a philosophy society Major scientific research projects; continue to implement the "Ministry of Education Humanities and Social Sciences Key Research Base Construction Plan"; implement the Ministry of Education's Humanities and Social Sciences New Century Academic Leader Training Program and Humanities and Social Sciences Academic New Talent Training and Training Program; The plan "sets up positions for specially invited professors of philosophy and social sciences, increases the proportion of philosophy and social science teachers in the" Outstanding Young Teachers Award ", and includes liberal arts teachers in colleges and universities in the" backbone teacher training plan "; encourages universities to establish philosophy based on actual conditions Senior professor of social sciences, and given the corresponding treatment to the bachelor of natural sciences and engineering sciences; the implementation of the philosophy and social science academic award program; the implementation of the philosophy and social science education reform plan; the implementation of the philosophy and social science infrastructure and information construction design Plan to strengthen the construction of philosophical and social science library materials, basic research databases, applied research databases, "China University Humanities and Social Sciences Information Network" and the original foreign language books and periodicals center library, and support the construction of a number of philosophical and social science laboratories; A major journal of philosophy and social sciences; a special fund for the International Conference on Philosophy and Social Sciences of universities ".
- From these six plans and ten measures, it is not difficult to see that the system for examining and approving academics and academics has been further strengthened. I thought that this would once again make the good intentions of prospering philosophy and social sciences tribal. Prosperous scholarship does not lie in a huge government plan, but in the conditions for creating academic freedom. Just review the classic and widely cited academic works, and look back at the growth history of thinkers and theorists. How many are The product of planning and engineering? Not to mention "Qu Yuan's exile, but to dismiss", after all, we can't deliberately put people in misery in order to make a handed down work, not to mention the humanities, the humanities research is the world of meaning, meaning The world is a personal world. The meaning and significance of things lies in the individual's inner feelings, emotional experiences, and spiritual intuition. This gives birth to "splashing tears when I feel, and hating other birds to be shocked." It also requires a personal soul. freedom of. Just look at the jurisprudence closely related to society and politics, masterpieces of the 20th century, such as Kelsen's "Pure Law", Hart's "The Concept of Law", Dworkin's "The Empire of Law", Haberma Sri Lanka's "Facts and Norms" have different causes, but probably cannot be said to be directly related to such a huge "prosperity plan".
- How to avoid a prosperity "plan"
- How to prosper academic instead of "prospering" and "planning", I thought that we should deal with the following issues:
- 1. What the government can and cannot do. There is indeed no axiom to follow, and rules vary in different countries and different fields. Academics are ultimately a matter for scholars. The government's ability is mainly to establish and maintain a basic academic order. This includes setting standards for the establishment of academic institutions and the selection of academic personnel, and handling disputes in this regard; second is the arrangement and financing of public academic institutions. Funds to ensure their normal operation; again, to formulate the necessary macroscopic and framework development plans; and finally to set up as few and sophisticated rewards as possible. The importance of these four decreases in order. As for subject construction, talent training, subject research, textbook compilation and use, academic evaluation, and post setting, all are handled by academic institutions and civil society.
- 2. According to this, a large number of government programs and projects on behalf of the government should stop. First, various key projects should be abandoned, such as the 985 project, the 211 project, the national key disciplines, the humanities and social sciences key research base, and the "ten million talent project". Fair competition is a necessary condition for talent growth and major academic achievements. Proven by national practice. This does not deny that there is a difference in level between academic institutions and scholars, but this should be caused by fair competition and not the result of artificial review. In particular, the problem of key life-long systems is serious. We have been engaged in key construction for decades, but we have not heard of any key university whose qualification has been cancelled. The universities that are already the focus, especially the top priority, should have the confidence. From now on, do nt take special care and start fair competition with other universities. Besides, in fact, you have already run ahead and have accumulations that others ca nt match. In order to convince the public, otherwise, even if you achieve more results than others, it does not mean that you are really better than others. As a government, resources should be distributed fairly, and resources should not be monopolized. Governments rely on approval to restrict universities, and universities rely on the president's bargaining power to obtain resources from ministers, and can no longer continue.
- 3. Establish an academic evaluation mechanism consistent with the nature of academic activities. The current evaluation system, which focuses on the evaluation of talents and achievements, incorrectly applies the standards for product quality grading in material production, which does not reflect the characteristics of mental activity. To establish a reasonable academic evaluation mechanism, consider the following aspects:
- The first is to relax the time scale and quantitative standards of evaluation. Every outstanding academic achievement should stand the test of time. The awards of three or two years' evaluation are too short to reflect the true level of the results. The results should have been created at least a decade ago. The annual review system for teachers cannot improve their academic ability. The results of scholars have a relatively long period and are uncertain. A person's creative peak is only a few (years), and a person can be said to have academic contributions. There are only a few articles. Most of the time is in the accumulation period. It is possible to create according to the rules of several books per year and several books per year. Even if it is done, most years are "writing".
- The second is to adopt more private evaluations and peer evaluations to minimize official evaluations. All evaluations should not be divided into national, provincial and ministerial levels, authoritative levels, and core levels. The level of thesis should not be determined as a journal. Learning in folk, good works without grades will also be popular. It does nt matter if you do nt find a recognized evaluation standard for a while. Scholars should not be anxious that the academic world has nt ranked themselves academically. Academics should be regarded as a career, and academics should be regarded as a way of life by scholars. (No private evaluation is more reasonable than official evaluation?)
- The third is to properly distinguish the nature of different disciplines and apply different standards. Although the trend of integration of disciplines is increasing, the relative boundaries between natural sciences, humanities and social sciences still exist, and there are differences among the three major sciences. Basic research and applied research can be roughly divided into each discipline. It should be slightly different in terms of quantity, quantity, and form. To put forward a philosophical proposition may not last a lifetime, it is enough to write a legislative proposal and demonstrate it for a few months and weeks. A standard is difficult to measure.
- 4. Academic institutions are minimized in organization. Unlike enterprises that emphasize efficiency and governments that emphasize fairness, academic institutions emphasize freedom. Therefore, in terms of internal management, we should not follow the way companies and governments manage and operate indefinitely, that is, we must reduce organizational, procedural, formal, and digital Degree, to give scholars a larger dominance space, so that they can immerse themselves in academic creation, especially not to make those with a sense of inner mission feel that engaging in academics is the result of the oppression of external procedures. Scholarship was originally a lonely and devoted cause, and creation originated from sincerity. The current various indicators, rankings, quantity requirements, grade regulations, approval procedures, and huge institutions established to implement this management model: scientific research offices, college-level academic and degree committees, discipline groups, and title evaluation leaders Internal organizations such as groups and offices, the National Philosophy and Social Science Planning Leading Group and Office, the Academic Degrees Committee and Office of the State Council, the Disciplinary Reviewing Group of the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council, the scientific research departments of various ministries, and provincial-level institutions appear to be over-organized, and academics cannot afford such organization Degree of importance.
- In the 18th century, German Enlightenment philosopher Gauw once said that the voice of conscience is a slight voice, and it is difficult to hear in the noise. Academic is also a good voice. It requires us to forget the world's excitement and listen together in silence.
- Freedom from serenity, freedom becomes academic.
- If we ask about China's academic freedom, modern China is only the Republic of China, and ancient China is only Spring and Autumn (Warring States).