Latest Turkish-Armenian dispute leaves academic freedom undented

A BID BY ARMENIAN AMERICAN advocates in Rhode Island to establish government monitoring of gifts to public universities fizzled in June amid concerns it would infringe on academic freedom. Armenian community representatives had proposed a bill to limit Turkish-government sponsorship of academic chairs, whose occupants, they allege, convey a biased view of Armenian history. Supported by a key legislator, faculty and free-speech advocates succeeded in rewriting the original proposal to win new protections for academic freedom in state law.

The bill signaled the most recent salvo by Armenian Americans against Turkish government funding of Turkish-studies positions on American campuses. No Turkish-studies chairs exist at public institutions in Rhode Island. But in an effort to pre-empt them, advocates for the Armenian community sought to give the state's board of governors, a fifteen-member political body, the power to review all outside grant sources, a function now performed by each institution.

"My concern was that academic freedom might be in jeopardy if the board of governors were charged with intervening and overseeing all potential sources of outside funding," says Judith Anderson, a professor of communications studies at the University of Rhode Island and a member of the AAUP's governing Council. Anderson testified against portions of the bill before the finance committee of the state house of representatives.

Since 1997, Armenian community groups have petitioned higher education officials in Michigan, California, and Oregon to limit public universities' acceptance of funds from the Turkish government. Chairs endowed by the government of Turkey have been flash points for conflict as some professors filling them have been accused of denying historical evidence of an Armenian genocide at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during World War I.

Ironically, both Turkish and Armenian groups now involved in the Turkish-studies conflict invoke academic freedom for their cause. "We believe we're protecting academic freedom. It's not just an abstract concept," says Rouben Adalian, a spokesperson for the Armenian National Institute in Washington, D.C., which closely monitored the Rhode Island dispute. Adalian says his community has objected to the Turkish-studies grants because they come with strings attached. He points to a 1998 grant issued to Portland State University in Oregon, which requires that the chair's occupant enjoy access to Turkish archives and strong ties to Turkish educators.

Akif Oktay, counselor for cultural affairs at the Turkish Embassy in Washington, confirms that his government has made grants of $750,000 to $2 million to endow a handful of chairs in Turkish studies. But he denies that his government puts conditions on the money that restrict academic freedom. In standing firm against the Armenians' "unjust campaign" to discredit the grants and the institutions that accept them, Oktay claims that his government is defending academic freedom.

In their efforts to revise the Rhode Island bill, Anderson and URI colleague Wendy Roworth, a professor of art history who also testified, drew enthusiastic support from Carol Mumford, a first-term Republican state representative from Scituate. "This bill was somehow touted as a bill against discrimination," Mumford says. "But that's not exactly what it was. Once I realized its implications for academic freedom, I spoke out loudly and quickly."

Mumford takes pride in the revised legislation, which, she says, "makes it clear that academic freedom flows from the grassroots, not from the board level down." The bill, signed into law after the legislative session ended in June, stipulates that the board of governors "shall ensure that state colleges and universities have a structure in place" to ensure that no grant would impinge on academic freedom at a recipient institution.

Copyright American Association of University Professors Sep/Oct 1999
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