Heterodox Academy’s Mike and Sofia Segal Center for Academic Pluralism closed its first academic year with a special workshop that brought together its 2023-24 visiting faculty and postdoctoral research fellows with the 2024-25 incoming fellows.

During the workshop participants discussed the 1915 Declaration of Principles of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), which helped codify the modern conception of academic freedom that many scholars have cherished and defended through the 20th and into the 21st century.

For some discussants, this was the first time they had reflected on the 1915 Declaration in many years. All discussants were struck by how the 1915 Declaration married a robust defense of academic freedom with an equally robust assertion that “the freedom of the academic teacher entail[s] certain correlative obligations.” The idea that the profession of academic scholarship might involve duties, responsibilities, or obligations commanded most of the discussion, with participants aiming to clarify how to understand the idea.

“It's refreshing to hear scholars talk not just about their rights, but also their responsibilities,” said Alex Arnold, Director of Research at the Segal Center. “My hope for the next year of research at the Segal Center is to devise an understanding of what our responsibilities as academics are, an understanding that is so compelling that it inspires the next generation of scholars to work to win back the public's trust.”

One proposal that surfaced in discussions was that academic scholars may have fiduciary responsibilities to one another, their institutions, and to the general public to conduct their research and teaching in specific ways and in a specific manner. To attribute fiduciary responsibilities to academic scholars fits with the 1915 Declaration’s understanding of the university’s relationship to the general public, as involving some kind of social compact built upon mutual trust.

All workshop participants ended the first session agreeing that questions about the responsibilities of academic scholars—and the nature of those responsibilities—are worth further thought and reflection.

Heterodox Academy recently announced a pledge of $5 million from the Mike and Sofia Segal Foundation to enable HxA to expand its research and policy projects at the Segal Center, and deepen its impact on colleges and universities.