General
A U.K. University Is Given a Record Fine Over Free Speech on Campus
A regulator penalized the school three years after a professor quit in response to what she said was a campaign of harassment over her views on gender identity.
British authorities issued a record fine against one of the country’s universities on Wednesday for failing to “uphold the freedom of speech and academic freedom,” an escalation in the debate over student and staff rights on campus.
The Office for Students, the regulator for higher education in England, imposed a penalty of 585,000 pounds, more than $755,000, on the University of Sussex. The fine followed an investigation into the university that began more than three years ago after Kathleen Stock, a philosophy professor, resigned saying that she had faced a campaign of harassment from students and activists over her views on gender identity.
Dr. Stock quit in 2021 after she was accused of being transphobic by students and activists for arguing that transgender women were not women. She said she faced a campaign of harassment, bullying and character assassination before quitting.
The university publicly defended Dr. Stock at the time. But on Wednesday, the Office for Students said the university’s policy statement on trans and nonbinary equality had created a “chilling effect” that could cause students and staff members to “self-censor.” The regulator said this included requiring course materials to “positively represent trans people and trans lives.” It also penalized the school for failures in government and management processes.
The university condemned the ruling, saying in a statement that it would make it impossible to create “policies to prevent abusive, bullying and harassing speech.” Sasha Roseneil, the university’s vice chancellor, promised to mount a legal challenge and said the regulator was mandating “libertarian free-speech absolutism as the fundamental principle for U.K. universities” and was “perpetuating the culture wars.”
