Show Notes
In this episode we are once again joined by our regular correspondent from the Free Speech Union (and the New Zealand Initiative), Steph Martin. We debrief about the FSU's panel events in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch on institutional neutrality and the draft academic freedom legislation. We also talk about that legislation (part of the Education and Training Amendment Bill No. 2), and more particularly about the response to it in Parliament by two opposition politicians.
More from Free Kiwis!
In their latest dialogue, Michael and James discuss whether an email sent by Grant Robertson in his capacity as Vice-Chancellor of the University of Otago breached the institutional neutrality provision introduced into the Education and Training Act just last year. Michael also asks James about the second rounds of the Peruvian and Colombian presidential elections, as well as both countries' troubled political pasts. Mario Vargas Llosa: Una Vida en Palabras: https://youtu.be/WiHzTF4W_SY?si=5E...
James talks to Fred Attenborough, Research Manager at the UK Committee for Academic Freedom, about the recent ruling in a landmark academic freedom case, University of Sussex vs. Office for Students. Will the ruling fatally weaken the Office for Students, which the new UK academic freedom legislation empowers to regulate universities, before the the new academic freedom regime even gets going? Freddie has a number of pieces on this case up on the CAF website: https://afcomm.org.uk/author/fred...
Mitchell Palmer is an economist at the Adam Smith Institute. We talked to him about his journey from Auckland to London via Singapore and Oxford; how to reform the UK student loan system; and the recent past and near future of the ACT Party. Mitchell's report on student loans: https://www.adamsmith.org/research/credit-crunch Peter Ainsworth's IEA report on student loans: https://iea.org.uk/publications/shares-in-students-a-new-model-for-university-funding/
Sarah McLaughlin is Senior Scholar, Global Expression at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). We talked to her about threats to free speech from various quarters (including the Trumpian right, the progressive left, the CCP and UAE) and about how to build a healthy and consistent free speech culture. Sarah was in New Zealand courtesy of the NZ Free Speech Union. Sarah's book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Authoritarians-Academy-Internationalization-Borderless-Censo...
Ilana Redstone is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champagne. She talked to James about the state of sociology, 'the certainty trap' of ideological extremism, and how much of today's progressive extremism can be traced back to the civil rights era. Ilana's book *The Certainty Trap*: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Certainty-Trap-Question-Ourselves-More/dp/1634312562 Richard Hanania's essay 'Woke Institutions is Just Civil Rights Law': https://www.richar...