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| Academics as spies to combat terror? | | |
Hasan Suroor
The British Government has been accused of trying to co-opt university teachers into "collaborating" with security outfits in combating terror.
ARE BRITISH campuses witnessing a return to the climate of the Cold War era when Western universities were a happy hunting ground for intelligence agencies? Well, not quiet. Not yet. But there are fears that they are getting there amid accusations that the British Government is trying to use academics as "spies" in its anti-terror campaign. University teachers are reported to be deeply worried at what they regard as covert attempts to co-opt them into "collaborating" with M15 and other security outfits in combating terror.
This follows revelations about two controversial plans — (1) a proposal which, in its original form, effectively amounted to asking universities to spy on students and report them to the police if they suspected them of supporting extremist activities; and (2) a Foreign Office-backed research project — shelved following an uproar — focussing on countries identified by intelligence agencies as sources of terror.
The "spying" plan, as it has come to be known, was envisaged in a consultation document prepared by the Department of Education. It warned that campuses had become "fertile recruiting grounds" for Islamist groups and recommended that besides monitoring their activities, university authorities should keep an eye on students whom they suspected of associating with such groups. It also suggested that "campus staff should volunteer information to special branch and not wait to be contacted by detectives."
The plan, first disclosed by The Guardian, was met with fury. Critics branded it as "McCarthyist" and said it appeared to target Muslim students. Although the proposal has since been amended, its thrust remains unchanged. According to those who have seen the revised draft, it retains the key recommendation — namely that universities should work with the Special Branch, which deals with anti-terror operations, to "identify" potential suspects.
It reportedly proposes that special branch contacts should be available at all universities to train staff in how to "recognise and respond to potential violence extremism."
In plain English, it means that detectives would be posted on campuses and, besides doing their own spying, they would groom university staff in intelligence-gathering.
Nervous government officials, anxious to avoid accusations of Islamophobia and racial prejudice, have been at pains to deny that there is any move to "spy" on students belonging to a particular religious or racial group. All that the Government is doing, they say, is offering "guidance" to universities on tackling extremism.
Deploying euphemisms to the hilt, a government spokesman said: "The Department of Education and Skills has undertaken a series of engagement activities with local communities and the commitment to provide higher education institutions with guidance on good leadership and tackling extremism is just one part of that engagement."
Meanwhile, the controversial research proposal — a joint venture of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), an independent research body — would have seen academics bid for more than one million pounds worth of funding to work on a project called, "Combating Terrorism by Countering Radicalisation."
According to The Times Higher Supplement, which revealed the details of the scheme, the project required academics to "scope the growth in influence and membership of extremist Islamist groups in the past 20 years," "name key figures and key groups" and "understand the use of theological legitimisation of violence." It said the research was to focus on six regions: Europe, Central Asia, South Asia, South-East Asia, North Africa, and the Gulf; and six specific countries including Turkey, Jordan, and Sudan.
Angry reaction
The disclosure provoked an angry reaction from academics who called it a veiled attempt to use academics as "spies" for intelligence agencies.
"This raises fundamental ethical issues. People feel that it smacks of the Cold War use of academics in counter-insurgency activities — essentially using academics as spies," John Gledhill, chairperson of the Association of Social Anthropologists said in a letter to his colleagues.
A spokesperson for the ESRC acknowledged to The Hindu that a "part of the academic community" had expressed "concerns" over the project but denied that the idea was "intelligence- driven." "This was not the case," she said adding that, however, after "some deliberation" the ESRC had decided to "withdraw the current call for proposals for Combating Terrorism by Countering Radicalisation."
A statement issued by the Council said: "The ESRC remains committed to making further investments in its key research challenge, `International Relations and Security'. ... As a result we are now engaging in discussions with senior academics from the security studies, area studies, anthropology, political science, law and sociology communities, and with the relevant Boards and Committees of Council, to draft a new call in the field of international relations and security."
Sceptics say that the Government's apparent retreat over the so-called "spy" plan and the anti-terror research project is not the end of the story. If anything, the shadow of the "war" on terror on academic life is set to grow with universities likely to face new forms of pressures to collaborate with police and intelligence agencies in the name of national security.
The truth is that extremist threat or no threat, all Governments, the world over, take special interest in what happens in universities because it is there that subversive ideas are played out, and no state worth its status-quoist instincts can afford to leave them alone. The British Government is simply following a time-honoured tradition.
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