Bernhard Müller

🚨 BREAKING: The Committee for Academic Freedom (CAF) has written to Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) on behalf of two senior academics who are refusing to complete mandatory training requiring assent to contested theoretical propositions about “unconscious bias”, potentially jeopardising their career progression and professional opportunities. The dispute concerns an assessment within What is Unconscious Bias? — part of QMUL’s Introducing Inclusion course, which is “mandatory for all staff”. The assessment requires participants to affirm that “unconscious biases help us to react quickly but can cloud our judgement”, and to identify accepting that “we have unconscious biases” as helpful. The accompanying feedback declares that such acceptance is “the first step to combating their negative effects”. Informed by their scholarly research, the academics we’re supporting dispute these propositions and have refused to complete the assessment rather than give answers contrary to their convictions. Under the assessment’s all-or-nothing marking system, refusing to affirm both propositions caps a participant’s score at 60%, below the 80% pass mark. Yet passing is a condition of eligibility for promotion, professorial review, including decisions on remuneration, and participation in recruitment and promotion panels. Although influential in social-justice-oriented scholarship, the concept of unconscious bias is contested within psychology, with researchers disagreeing about what it means, whether the processes in question are necessarily unconscious, and whether they exert a causal influence on judgement. Peer-reviewed research also questions whether acknowledging such biases improves behaviour. QMUL is of course entitled to provide training on its preferred theory of bias. But it remains just that: a theory. When such training is mandatory, requires staff to pass an assessment, and is tied to professional opportunities, there is a clear risk of compelling academics to affirm propositions they simply don’t believe. That’s why we’ve proposed a simple solution: amend the assessment so that academics who don’t all think alike can demonstrate understanding without having to endorse its underlying assumptions. Should QMUL decline to address these concerns, CAF is prepared to fund legal counsel to assist the academics, should they wish, in pursuing an internal grievance and subsequent complaint to the OfS. We believe there are strong grounds for such a complaint, given that such training may breach QMUL’s statutory duties to secure freedom of speech and academic freedom. Consistent with Article 10 protections against compelled expression, the Office for Students has also warned that universities “should not require training or induction that imposes a requirement on the person completing the training actively to endorse any viewpoint or value-judgement”. Sadly, this isn’t an isolated case. As CAF knows from its casework, universities often impose mandatory training in which the distinction between “understanding” and “endorsing” contested ideas becomes blurred. That’s why we hope this intervention marks the beginning of a wider pushback against compelled intellectual conformity on campus. If you’re an academic with similar concerns about mandatory training at your institution, get in touch. CAF can assess your case and, where appropriate, secure specialist legal advice and raise the matter with your university on your behalf. Contact us at [email protected] Full story via The Telegraph: telegraph.co.uk/gift/1060b26…