University of Texas embraces state-funded ‘Liberty Institute’

The University of Texas is backing a state effort to fund an on-campus institute promoting conservative ideology, in the latest move by US lawmakers to adopt philanthropic tactics for dictating academic content.

In the Texas case, the state legislature would spend at least $3 million (£2.1 million) to create a “Liberty Institute” that, according to the university, would promote “free markets, economic development, private enterprise and personal liberty”.

The university’s president, Jay Hartzell, a professor of business, saw the idea as appropriate given the institution’s unique role as a forum for public debate, a university spokesman said.

“This institute would attract world-renowned academic scholars and faculty and offer unique educational opportunities and experiences for all of our students,” according to the spokesman.

The idea, however, is attracting criticism from student leaders concerned about both the prospect of political interference and the diversion of scarce state funding away from more critical student needs.

And beyond Texas, the effort is seen as part of a small but growing number of cases in which the battle against interference by big-dollar donors is now shifting more directly into the political arena.

Other instances in recent years, in Arizona and Florida, involve ideological programmes initiated by the billionaire conservative activist Charles Koch and then later funded by state lawmakers.

The shift towards state support, said anti-Koch crusader Ralph Wilson, appears to reflect the success that students have had blocking Mr Koch’s political foundations from directly using their donations to steer decisions on hiring and curricula across US higher education.

The new approach, said Mr Wilson, a co-founder of the UnKoch My Campus lobby group, involves those same donors channelling their money to politicians who then pursue the donors’ political goals.

The result, if not blocked, could prove even worse for academic integrity, he said. “It will be much harder for students to question what they are being taught if their pro-corporate curriculum appears to be state-sanctioned,” Mr Wilson said.

In Florida, the state paid to create a “professorship in economic prosperity” at Florida State University and to establish the Adam Smith Center for the Study of Economic Freedom at Florida International University.

In Arizona, lawmakers funded “freedom schools” at the University of Arizona and Arizona State University.

As with the proposed Texas institute, the Arizona schools were created with specific instructions to emphasise conservative buzzwords such as free-market economics, individual freedom and human prosperity.

Texas, however, saw no distinction between that kind of academic pursuit and the more than 200 institutes and centres already existing in a variety of subjects at the flagship Austin campus, the spokesman said.

"All are driven by the interests of faculty and researchers, who lead them independently, exercising academic freedom, as will be the case if the institute is approved," he said.

University of Texas student leaders disagree, circulating a petition asking for an end to any such “ideological-driven donor passion projects”. The petition asks state lawmakers to instead back more important priorities, including improved student housing and better services for marginalised groups on campus.

paul.basken@timeshighereducation.com