07 Dec 17 | Academic Freedom, News and features, Turkey, Turkey Uncensored
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”96838″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]A group of court reporters scurried along the halls of Istanbul’s massive Çağlayan Courthouse on the morning of 7 December, taking pictures of the tables showing the trial schedules of several high criminal courts to share them with other reporters make sure that none of the sessions of the day go unreported. There were too many trials, but too few reporters interested.
The journalists — all from the dwindling critical media of Turkey — were there to cover the trials of dozens of academics who will be tried by İstanbul’s 33rd, 34rth and 35th High Criminal Courts in the coming weeks and months. The academics are accused of having disseminated “propaganda on behalf of a terror organization,” when, in 2016 January, they signed a petition calling on the Turkish government to put an end to security forces’ operations in the predominantly Kurdish southeast of the country, where many alleged human rights violations — including deaths of civilians — took place under curfews declared in the region.
So far 148 people have been formally indicted, but a total of 1,128 academics signed the document, called the “Peace Petition” by its supporters. Nearly 500 of the “academics for peace” were expelled from university jobs with cabinet decrees issued under Turkey’s state of emergency declared after the failed coup attempt of July 2016. Nobody knows the exact number of those who left the country, to flee not the investigations against them and legal troubles as much, but the ever stifling and increasingly darker academic climate.
Only four academics — who were imprisoned between March and April 2016 for reading out the petition publicly– have so far been tried. The trials into the rest of the academics began on 6 December, with 10 academics appearing before a judge. One of them, Osman Olcay Kural, an academic from the Galatasaray University, has no regrets. “I am very glad that we signed that petition. I am thinking that we should have done it before,” he said, adding: “I will take this one step further. I don’t think anybody on that list regrets having signed the petition. If there are any, it has to be out of fear. They were frightened badly.”
And he is right. Some academics — although only a few — announced taking their signatures back after universities started investigating them back in early 2016. “And that, I respect,” Kural says. “People have children to take care of and bills to pay. It is the circumstances that have put them in this situation I regret.”
As the first academic to go on trial, Kural might have also inadvertently set the tone for the rest of the academic trials. The court hearing his trial rejected a request from Kural’s lawyer to try his client under Turkish Penal Code Article 301 — “denigrating Turkishness, the Republic and State agencies and organs,” which was the main accusation in the trial of the four academics who were tried earlier. The trial was adjourned until 12 April next year.
What about the others?
If there were 1,128 people who signed the petition, and if most of them are possibly all of them were investigated, then why have only 148 cases have been opened so far?
“Because the prosecutors chose to try them one by one. The text they are using in the indictments is the same; a single case could have been launched,” says Veysel Ok, a lawyer, who currently represents dozens of journalists and several of the peace academics. He, understandably, expects that number to go up in the coming days.
Attorney Ok says the “terror propaganda” and “denigrating Turkish state organs” accusations are vastly different in nature because a 301 conviction is better as it is not a terror crime. How can it be possible for a prosecutor to consider one in place of the other? “There is absolutely no legal explanation for this,” he says. “There is no incitement to terrorism or violence in that petition. For terror propaganda, such incitement is a requirement. To the contrary, the academics’ text wishes for peace. There is absolutely no legal basis for that accusation.”
Productivity in difficult times
“They are trying to make up a crime out of the petition,” agrees Emre Tansu Keten, a peace academic who was expelled from his position as a research assistant at Marmara University with a cabinet decree in February 2017. “This petition doesn’t fit either terror propaganda or 301.”
Keten, like the rest of the signers of the petition, will soon be on trial. However, like Kunal, he is unfazed by the government’s reaction. “As a political individual, I can’t say I was really shocked or that I went through an emotional breakdown when I was expelled,” he laughs.
Out of his university job, he keeps busy, “I work at a publisher as an editor, I am continuing on with my academic studies. I do a lot for [Turkish education professionals’ union] Eğitim-Sen, there is much to be done there.”
For many “peace academics” — and others under pressure in Turkey, such as journalists or rights activists — the unusually difficult times the country is going through need not put life on hold. So much has happened over the past few years: alliances forged by the government that were never expected to be broken have shattered; ministers have been listed as defendants in foreign courts; hundreds of civil servants, judiciary members, soldiers, police officers have been expelled or jailed; scores of President Erdoğan loyalists have fallen from grace and heads of mayors from the government party have rolled (of course, figuratively speaking, at least for now) over the upsetting results of a referendum that the government actually won. Yet, none of this has stopped the core of opposition in Turkey and people like Keten — who is also busy these days working on the final chapters of his doctoral thesis — have continued their prolific work.
When the tide turns, something good might even come out all of this.
“There has been a search for an alternative academia for more than a decade in Turkey,” Keten says. “We, the academics of solidarity, are teaching alternative classes in Ankara, İzmir and Eskişehir. There are other journals and serious publishing houses where we can write and be published.”
“To a certain extent, these policies of intimidation have worked,” he added. “Many [who signed the] peace petitions have left the country, but there is also a group which has, over the past two years, created a foundation for a struggle. There are those who have stayed, and who are working to change things. And that, gives, hope.”[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”96839″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”Mapping Media Freedom” use_theme_fonts=”yes”][vc_separator color=”black”][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/4″][vc_icon icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-times-circle” color=”black” background_style=”rounded” size=”xl” align=”right”][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”3/4″][vc_column_text]
Since 24 May 2014, Mapping Media Freedom’s team of correspondents and partners have recorded and verified 3,597 violations against journalists and media outlets.
Index campaigns to protect journalists and media freedom. You can help us by submitting reports to Mapping Media Freedom.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_separator color=”black”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”Don’t lose your voice. Stay informed.” use_theme_fonts=”yes”][vc_separator color=”black”][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]Index on Censorship is a nonprofit that campaigns for and defends free expression worldwide. We publish work by censored writers and artists, promote debate, and monitor threats to free speech. We believe that everyone should be free to express themselves without fear of harm or persecution – no matter what their views.
Join our mailing list (or follow us on Twitter or Facebook) and we’ll send you our weekly newsletter about our activities defending free speech. We won’t share your personal information with anyone outside Index.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][gravityform id=”20″ title=”false” description=”false” ajax=”false”][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_separator color=”black”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_basic_grid post_type=”post” max_items=”12″ style=”load-more” items_per_page=”4″ element_width=”6″ grid_id=”vc_gid:1512654177455-eea84219-c45f-10″ taxonomies=”55, 8607″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
19 Oct 17 | Academic Freedom, Academic Freedom Statements, Campaigns -- Featured, Statements, United Kingdom
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Index on Censorship welcomes the call by Minister Jo Johnson for freedom of expression to be better protected in universities. However, we would remind the minister universities already have a statutory duty under the 1986 Education Act to protect freedom of speech for university members, employees and visiting speakers.
While we applaud Johnson’s renewed commitment to ensure universities protect free expression we question whether it is possible to do so and also comply with other duties imposed on universities by the government, such as monitoring students under the Prevent anti-terror programme.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”Don’t lose your voice. Stay informed.” use_theme_fonts=”yes”][vc_separator color=”black”][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]Index on Censorship is a nonprofit that campaigns for and defends free expression worldwide. We publish work by censored writers and artists, promote debate, and monitor threats to free speech. We believe that everyone should be free to express themselves without fear of harm or persecution – no matter what their views.
Join our mailing list (or follow us on Twitter or Facebook) and we’ll send you our weekly newsletter about our activities defending free speech. We won’t share your personal information with anyone outside Index.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][gravityform id=”20″ title=”false” description=”false” ajax=”false”][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_separator color=”black”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_basic_grid post_type=”post” max_items=”12″ style=”load-more” items_per_page=”4″ element_width=”6″ grid_id=”vc_gid:1508403305697-89d061d7-f665-0″ taxonomies=”8843″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
07 Aug 17 | Academic Freedom, Campaigns, News and features, South Africa
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]David Benatar, a professor of philosophy and head of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Cape Town, was one of the proponents behind the invitation to journalist Flemming Rose, the editor responsible for publishing controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in 2005, to deliver the 2016 TB Davie Memorial Lecture on academic freedom. The invitation to Rose was rescinded by the university because Rose’s appearance might provoke conflict on campus, pose security risks and might “retard rather than advance academic freedom on campus.” In a guest post, Benatar, writing here in a personal capacity, shares his thoughts on the 2017 lecture. [/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”81181″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]In 2016, the executive of the University of Cape Town in South Africa overrode its academic freedom committee’s invitation to Flemming Rose to deliver the annual TB Davie academic freedom lecture. Mr Rose was disinvited over the protestations of the then members of the academic freedom committee. The irony of preventing a speaker from delivering an academic freedom lecture seems to have been lost on the university’s leadership, with the vice-chancellor, Dr Max Price, publicly defending the decision to disinvite.
Like all campus censors, Dr Price professed his commitment to academic freedom and freedom of expression before justifying his violation of these very principles. His arguments were roundly criticised by some. Other members of the university community supported the decision he and his colleagues had taken, which is part of a broader institutional pathology that, so far as I can tell, is even more pervasive than otherwise similar pathologies at various universities in North America and Europe.
The TB Davie Memorial Lecture was established in 1959 by students at the University of Cape Town. It is named after Thomas Benjamin Davie, vice-chancellor of the university from 1948 until his death in 1955. Dr Davie vigorously defended academic freedom against the apartheid regime’s imposition of racial segregation on higher education in South Africa, a battle that was ultimately unsuccessful.
A preface to printed versions of some past lectures in the series says that the “TB Davie Memorial Lecture keeps before the university a reminder of its ethical duty to defend and to seek to extend academic freedom”. The events of 2016 demonstrate that reminders are insufficient. One can remember the duty without fully understanding it, and one can understand it without having the courage to discharge it. Courage is needed to protect unpopular speech and speakers, not to protect orthodox views and their purveyors.
There have been some developments to this sad saga. First the good news: The South African Institute of Race Relations, upon hearing of the disinvitation of Mr Rose, invited him to South Africa to deliver the annual Hoernle lecture, which he did without incident in both Johannesburg and Cape Town in May 2017. While in South Africa, Mr Rose also spoke at the University of Cape Town, albeit unannounced and in a small class at the invitation of a single professor. There he addressed and had a pleasant and respectful exchange with the students.
The bad news is that the academic freedom committee’s term of office ended soon after Mr Rose was disinvited. The committee’s expression of outrage over the disinvitation was its final act. There is some reason to think that this committee’s stand on the Flemming Rose matter galvanised the dominant regressive sector of the university in a way that influenced how the committee was repopulated for the new term of office.
The result is an academic freedom committee that, on the whole, is significantly tamed. For example, the new members of the committee include somebody who had criticised the earlier invitation to Mr. Rose and someone else who had claimed that “human dignity and civility trumps” freedom of speech. It is thus a committee that is much less likely to highlight or object to the many threats to academic freedom and freedom of expression within the university. It is also a committee that is unlikely to test the university’s commitment to these values by, for example, its choice of speakers for future TB Davie lectures.
It was unsurprising that the new committee has shown no signs of endorsing the six separate nominations it received for Mr Rose to deliver the 2018 lecture. Nor is it surprising that it invited Professor Mahmood Mamdani to deliver the 2017 lecture. (Although Professor Mamdani, now at Columbia University, but at one stage a professor at the University of Cape Town, has had his disagreements with the University of Cape Town, his criticisms are the staples of the university’s self-flagellation and thus very far from a test of freedom of expression.)
I wrote to Professor Mamdani on 2 April 2017 to advise him of the events of 2016 and to ask him to refuse to give this lecture until such time as Mr Rose is permitted to give his. In my email, I acknowledged that he, Professor Mamdani, “might use the opportunity of the TB Davie lecture to criticise the university for having disinvited Mr Rose”, but that it would be far more effective if he refused to give the lecture. I said that until “Mr Rose’s disinvitation is reversed, the TB Davie lecture will be a farce”.
About a dozen other members of the university community, mainly academic staff, subsequently wrote to him to endorse my request. To the best of my knowledge, none of us have received a response, and the lecture is scheduled to take place on 22 August. Until Professor Mamdani gives his lecture, we cannot be sure what he will say. However, his failure either to withdraw from the lecture or to reassure those who had written to him that he would be taking a stand against the disinvitation of Mr Rose does not augur well.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_basic_grid post_type=”post” max_items=”12″ style=”load-more” items_per_page=”4″ show_filter=”yes” element_width=”6″ grid_id=”vc_gid:1502096677412-aee0a1d7-4cdb-4″ taxonomies=”4524, 8562″ filter_source=”category”][/vc_column][/vc_row]
06 Jun 17 | Campaigns, Campaigns -- Featured, Turkey, Turkey Statements
Nuriye Gulmen, a professor of literature, and Semih Ozakca, a primary school teacher, were both fired following the issuing of emergency decree 675 by Erdogan’s government.
In the wake of the July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dismissed over 8,000 academics from state institutions following Emergency Decree 675. Literature professor Nuriye Gulmen and primary school teacher Semih Ozakca were two such individuals affected by the purge. Both Gulmen and Ozakca were dismissed and have been detained by Turkish authorities over 30 times, most recently on 22 May, for their demands to be reinstated to their positions. They are now facing terror charges simply for asking for their job back.
We urgently need your help to call for the release of Nuriye Gulmen and Semih Ozakca and express your solidarity with their cause.
Gulmen and Ozakca began a hunger strike, which is currently on its 90th day, to protest the crackdown on academic freedom. Consuming little more than salt water, a single B vitamin, and a sugar solution, Ozakca has lost over 37 pounds and Gulmen has experienced heartburn, difficulty moving, and trouble concentrating. Both academics suffer from muscle atrophy and are now wheelchair bound.
Read more about Gulmen and Ozakca’s protest and the current crackdown on freedom of expression in Turkey
Index on Censorship stands in solidarity with Gulmen and Ozakca and pledges its full support for their right to protest. We ask you to do the same: demanding an end to the dismissal of academics and the immediate release of Nuriye Gulmen and Semih Ozakca. While their plight has gained international attention, both strikers have received little recognition from their own government. As such, we ask you to speak out on Ozakca and Gulmen’s behalf in the form of a brief video expressing solidarity with their strike and requesting academic freedom for Turkey.
Take Action
— Post a solidarity message on social media.
— Share the story of Nuriye Gulmen and Semih Ozakca with your network.
— Tweet: [socialpug_tweet tweet=”I stand with @nuriyegulmen, @semihozakca and #academicfreedom #DontletNuriyeAndSemihDie #Turkey” remove_url=”yes” remove_username=”yes”]
