(1)
IS ACADEMIC FREEDOM THREATENED BY
CHINA’S INFLUENCE ON U.S. UNIVERSITIES?
THURSDAY, JUNE 25, 2015
H
OUSE OF
R
EPRESENTATIVES
,
S
UBCOMMITTEE ON
A
FRICA
, G
LOBAL
H
EALTH
,
G
LOBAL
H
UMAN
R
IGHTS
,
AND
I
NTERNATIONAL
O
RGANIZATIONS
,
C
OMMITTEE ON
F
OREIGN
A
FFAIRS
,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:05 p.m., in room
2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. Smith
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. S
MITH
. The subcommittee will come to order.
And I want to welcome all of our very distinguished panelists
and guests to this hearing this afternoon.
And I would like to begin with an opening statement, and then
I will yield to my two distinguished colleagues if they would like
to make any opening statements.
This hearing is the second in a series probing the question of
whether maintaining access to China’s lucrative education market
undermines the very values that make
American universities great,
including academic freedom.
This hearing is timely for three reasons: The growing number of
satellite or branch campuses started by the U.S. universities in
China; the record numbers of Chinese students, 275,000 estimated,
enrolling in U.S. universities and colleges in China in each year,
bringing with them nearly $10 million a year in tuition and other
spending; and the recent efforts by the Communist Party of China
to regain ideological control over universities and academic re-
search.
Official Chinese Government decrees prohibit teaching and re-
search in seven areas, the so-called seven taboos or seven silences,
including
universal values, press freedom, civil society, citizen
rights, criticism of the party’s past neo-liberal economics, and the
independence of the judiciary. All of these so-called seven taboos
are criticized as Western values, which begs a very significant and
important question: Are U.S. colleges and universities compro-
mising their images as bastions of free inquiry and academic free-
dom in exchange for China’s education dollars?
Some may defend concessions made as
the cost of doing business
in an authoritarian country or dictatorship, such as in China.
Maybe a university decides that it won’t offer a class on human
rights in China. Maybe they won’t invite a prominent dissident, a
fellow, or visiting lecturer. Maybe they won’t protest when a pro-
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fessor is denied a visa because of his or her work that is critical
of a dictatorship. Maybe such compromises are rationalized as nec-
essary to not offend a major donor or for the greater good of main-
taining access.
If U.S. universities are only offering Chinese students and fac-
ulty a different name on their diploma or paycheck, is it worth the
cost and the compromises and the concessions?
Perry Link,
the eminent China scholar, argued during our last
hearing in this room just a few months ago that the slow drip of
self-censorship is the most pernicious threat to academic freedom,
and it undermines both the recognized brands of our major univer-
sities as well as their credibility.
Self-censorship may be the reason why NYU terminated the fel-
lowship of a world-class human rights activist and hero, Chen
Guangcheng. As NYU faculty said in their letter to the board of
trustees, the circumstances surrounding the launch of an NYU sat-
ellite campus in Shanghai and the ending of Chen’s residence cre-
ated a ‘‘public perception,
accurate or otherwise, that NYU made
commitments in order to operate in China.’’ Again, begs another
question: Did NYU make any commitment or in any way fashion
their response to Chen’s staying at NYU?
Let the record show that we had invited NYU’s president or fac-
ulty some 16 times to testify before this subcommittee without suc-
cess. However, we are very, very pleased that Jeffrey Lehman, the
vice chancellor of the NYU Shanghai campus, is indeed here with
us today.
On a personal note, I spent a considerable
amount of time with
Chen Guangcheng when he first came to the United States and
have continued that friendship ever since. Though NYU offered
him important sanctuary, he was, in my opinion, treated very rude-
ly at times, particularly when it was clear that he would not isolate
himself on campus. And that included times when I invited him to
join Speaker Boehner and Nancy Pelosi at a joint press conference
to hear from Chen Guangcheng about his beliefs about human
rights
in China, and it was a totally bipartisan effort, and yet that
was not looked at very favorably.
Though NYU offered NYU officials and others worked hard to
cordon off access to Chen, even on the days that he came. I was
literally moved to the side so I wouldn’t be able to have access to
him. And that is after holding four hearings, including two in this
room, when we got him on the phone when he was in a hospital
in Beijing and hooked him up right here at this microphone, and
he made his appeal to the American public and to the press that
he would like to come to the United States.
Reuters and The Wall Street Journal
also reported that there
was concern that Chen was too involved with so-called antiabortion
activists, Republicans, and others, which would fit me as a descrip-
tion because I am very pro-life.
We may never know if NYU experienced persistent and direct
pressure from China to oust Chen from his NYU fellowship or
whether they sought to isolate him in order to keep Chen’s story
out of the 2012 Presidential election, as Professor Jerry Cohen had
said in an interview at the time. Certainly, there is some interest
here, as Hillary Clinton spent a whole
chapter in her book detail-
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