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Finkelstein tenure case exposes the commonplace cowardice of “responsible” professors
by Robert Jensen
For two years I have served at the University of Texas at Austin on the faculty committee on “academic freedom and responsibility,” a pairing of concepts that is common in higher education. While there is a fairly broad consensus on what “freedom” means, competing conceptions of “responsibility” lead to two very different ideas about the appropriate role for professors in public life.
Ben Heine / MWC NEWS
On one side is the conventional (which tends to be cowardly), and on the other is the principled (which tends to be progressive). Norman Finkelstein, the controversial DePaul University political scientist, is in trouble because he not only believes in, but puts into practice, this principled interpretation.
The conventional view is that professors should be free to investigate any question and go in any direction the truth, as they see it, takes them. But in speaking and writing publicly about their conclusions, faculty should be responsible -- which in practice usually means not upsetting people with real power. Faculty who pursue esoteric, self-indulgent, and/or irrelevant research generally will not be bothered (because no one really cares what they are doing), nor will those whose conclusions about relevant subjects are in line with views of the powerful (because their work helps reinforce the structures of power).
The principled view is that faculty members -- who have an extraordinarily privileged position in society, being paid to learn and convey that learning to others, with considerable autonomy that is rare in this corporate-capitalist economy, at a more-than-livable wage -- have a responsibility to pursue research addressing relevant questions that are meaningful in the lives of real people, especially the most vulnerable struggling for justice. That kind of research is likely to lead to trouble (because it challenges the prerogatives of the powerful to rule as they please).
In other words, academics pursuing their work in responsible fashion (in the principled sense) are the most likely to be labeled irresponsible (in the conventional sense).
Such is Finkelstein’s fate.
suggests that the strong support for Finkelstein among his peers may be ignored by the university’s top administrators, who are expected to decide in June.
By the promotion standards of universities such as DePaul, Finkelstein clearly deserves the job security that comes with tenure. But we all have a stake in his fate -- if we want universities to be a place where critical thinking is encouraged.
Finkelstein has been a provocative scholar since graduate school, when he dared to critique Joan Peters’ 1984 book From Time Immemorial, a fraudulent attempt to discredit Palestinian claims to their land occupied by Israel. Displaying considerable courage in the face of those happy to use Peters’ book to justify undermining the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people, Finkelstein challenged the bogus factual claims of the book and embarrassed those in the political and academic establishment who had praised the book.
From there, Finkelstein has pursued research not only about the Israel/Palestine conflict but the Holocaust and the politics of reparations. His recent books and public comments have only increased the numbers who would like to silence him and the intensity of those campaigns. Finkelstein’s critique of the work of Alan Dershowitz has upped the ante; the media-savvy Harvard law professor has made it a point to torpedo Finkelstein’s career.
I have never met Finkelstein, though I did once interview him over the phone for a radio program I produced about Middle East issues. I have listened to, or read transcripts of, interviews with him, and I find him contentious but consistently insightful. I have read his well-researched and well-reasoned books on the Middle East and found them helpful in my work. I’ve concluded that Finkelstein is (1) probably not temperamentally suited for the role of a facilitator or mediator, and (2) unquestionably a first-rate intellectual doing important work to bring to light sometimes harsh truths about the way power is exercised in
this world.
In short, Finkelstein is using his academic freedom responsibly.
Yes, he is polemical in public, sometimes harsh toward opponents, maybe even a bit cantankerous at times, which leaves me wishing Finkelstein were a colleague at my university. If I were a student at DePaul, I would sign up for any class he was teaching. We could use more like him in academic life.
When personnel decisions at DePaul are made next month, if Finkelstein’s name is not on the list of those granted tenure it will be no doubt a difficult day for him and a tragic one for anyone who cares about free and responsible intellectual inquiry.
In the United States there are fewer and fewer spaces where truth-telling is possible. Electoral politics has become a poll-driven, sound-bite enterprise.
Mass media specialize in the superficial and shallow. Universities, though dominated by corporate money and the corporate mentality, still provide one of the few remaining spaces for open and honest engagement. Protecting that space is important not only for those of us in the privileged position of faculty, but for the society more generally.
If Norman Finkelstein is denied tenure by DePaul, it won’t be because he was irresponsible but because he took his responsibility too seriously. If he is denied tenure, the loss will be not only Finkelstein’s and DePaul’s but also the larger project of real academic freedom and responsibility.
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Finkelstein caused a stir in 2000 when he wrote his book "The Holocaust Industry".
He also called Nobel Prize-winning Holocaust survivor Elie Weisel the "resident clown" of the "Holocaust circus."
It now appears that the Racist Zionist Lobby will finally succeed in their sustained campaign against this outstanding Jewish scholar.
Professor Finkelstein has exposed HOW the Racist Zionists perverted US public opinion. Here is a thumbnail sketch of the horrendous HUMAN REALITY in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) of Apartheid Israel\'s Occupation of ALL of the Holy Land for 40 years: post-invasion excess deaths (avoidable deaths, deaths that did not have to happen) 0.3 million; post-invasion under-5 infant deaths 0.2 million; 7 million refugees, 4.3 million registered with the UN in the Middle East; about 5,000 Palestinians, 1,000 of them KIDS, killed by Jewish Israelis since
September 2,000; annual undeer-5 infant death rate 0.5% as compared to 0.1% in Occupier Israel- evidence of gross violation by Apartheid Israel of the Geneva Convention; 2,400 under-5 year old infants die avoidably EACH YEAR due to Apartheid Israel war crimes, nearly as many as the total number of Israelis murdered by Palestinian \"terrorists\" since 1949 (2,600 according to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs); 80% of annual himicides in the Holy land are committed by Jewsih Israelis.
If you want to be utterly SHOCKED, simply go to UNICEF (see: http://www.unicef.org/index.php ) read of the APPALLING CONDITIONS in the Open Concentration Camp created by Apartheid Israel in the West Bank and Gaza for its 3.7 million hostages (illegally KIDNAPPED prisoners, three quarters of them Women and Children).
No less than outstanding Jewish American investor, philanthropists, humanitarian, Holocaust survivor and Holocaust hero George Soros has trenchantly criticized the Israel Lobby for perverting US foreign policy (this has cost the US $2.6 trillion for supporting Apartheid Israel and $2.5 trillion for the Bush War on Women and Children in Iraq and Afghanistan). Indeed George Soros has demanded the \"de-Nazification\" of Bush America (see MWC News).
It is about time that Americans wise up to the lying, human rights abusing Racist Zionists in their midst who have perverted US foreign policy, utterly perverted American values (notably \"all men are crreated equal and have an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness\") - and who most notably pervert American commitment to FREE SPEECH in their poisonous and vitriolic attacks on anti-racist humanitarian Jews such as Norman Finkelstein who dare to criticize Racist Zionist-run Apartheid Israel.
Of course false abuse of outstanding Jewish scholars is commonly regarded as anti-Jewish anti-Semitism just as criminal and abusive treament of Palestinian Women and Children SHOULD be regarded as equally repugnant anti-Arab anti-Semitism - the Racist Zionists dominating American life are gulity of BOTH forms of evil anti-Semitism.
Comprehensive intra-national and international sanctions are required to get Racist Zionist-run Apartheid Israel out of the Occupied Palestinian Territory - and should be applied ALSO to DePaul University if it falls in line with the egregiously anti-Semitic Racist Zionists by outrageously refusing tenure to Professor Norman Finkelstein.
Americans should take back their country from the Racist Zionists (RZs) who are traitorous agents of a nuclear-armed, human rights abusing, woman-and child-abusing racist and criminal FOREIGN POWER, Apartheid Israel.
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