AKA Review - 02.21.2025

From The Atlantic
A New Kind of Crisis for American Universities
By Ian Bogost

The administration’s cap on indirect costs will damage the pace and global standing of U.S. academic research, reduce college affordability, and harm even non-research institutions. As politically motivated as these cuts may be, they also reflect genuine declines in public confidence in higher ed. But the time for appeals to the benefits of scientific research passed during the years in which the public trust waned. While cutting back research funding is not in the nation’s interests, neither will institutions be able to insist on the status quo. Read this article

From Inside Higher Education
Why Are Campuses Quiet and College Leaders Silent When U.S. Democracy Is in Crisis?
By Austin Sarat

As the Trump administration attacks DEI, immigrants, and freedom of speech, the author pointedly examines the reasons that most college leaders, faculty and students are choosing silence over speech. He points out that even campuses committed to institutional neutrality typically make exceptions for issues at the core of higher ed.’s mission. And he concludes "Do attacks on diversity, on international students…, and on the rule of law and democracy itself ‘threaten the very mission of the university’? If they don’t, I do not know what would."
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From The New York Times
How a German Thinker Explains MAGA Morality
By David French

The "friend-enemy distinction" of Nazi-era political theorist Carl Schmitt helps explain why many Americans have gone from supporting Trump in spite of his hatefulness to reveling in his aggression, rejecting personal virtue to embrace political combat. This distinction applies as well to current campus conflicts as it does to society at large. Most colleges seek to be pluralistic communities similar to that envisioned for America by its founders—places where "enemies" flourish peacefully side by side. This goal demands that we teach ethics right alongside civics.
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From The New York Times
The Pharmaceutical Industry Heads Into Musk’s Wood Chipper
By Zeynep Tufekci

NIH’s cuts to research funding don’t make even cynical political sense—some big victims will be universities in red states. The cuts also endanger Americans’ health, go against decades of bipartisan support, and torch one of the U.S.’s most productive, envied industries. Pharma companies rely on the basic research that NIH funds to develop new treatments for cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and many more life-threatening diseases. Why risk sweeping changes to the world’s most vital research infrastructure solely in the name of cost savings? Read this article

From University World News
How Proximity to Each Other Amplifies Universities’ Success
By Thomas Chow and Nicholas Fisk

Global hubs of innovation have one common thread: world-class universities. And as the authors’ research shows, one third of the world’s top 100 universities lie within 16 miles of another. This proximity fuels "co-opetition"—simultaneous collaboration and competition that amplifies outcomes and creates ecosystems where academia, industry, and government collectively drive innovation and knowledge exchange. Geographic proximity thus underpins not only the universities’ success but also that of the larger communities they serve. Read this article