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not have been possible had I not been in the room,” he says.
According to Boyagoda, faculty and student bodies are
increasingly looking to their institutions and leaders to issue
position statements on global crises — as they largely did
over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but then are hesitant to
do so over the Israel-Hamas war. Prof. Boyagoda says that
“statement culture” is a significant reason why the Palestine
crisis has been so “incendiary” on campuses and argues that
institutions should instead remain neutral on such matters.
“I was struck by the immediacy and by the uniformity of the
response in the support for Ukraine…it created an institu-
tional precedent for universities demonstrating their public
commitment in a geopolitical conflict,” he says.
Because universities help students become productive
members of society, the world is “clearly seeking” help on Students protest at Columbia University
this issue — to help graduates have tough conversations and
to thrive in the workforce. “There is a great deal of public — namely that these young people are our students and we
interest in the project, because our getting this right strikes have a larger responsibility for their welfare, which includes
me as a responsibility of the university to society at large,” protection around protest,” adds Dirks.
he adds. David Smith, associate professor at the University of
Sydney’s United States Studies Centre, says some univer-
UNITED STATES sities have shown how protests could be dispersed peace-
Police invitation danger fully. For instance, the governing body of Brown University
showed a way through the conflict by committing to a vote
THE PERCEIVED FAIRNESS OF PUNISHMENTS on divestment from Israel if students disbanded their camp.
handed to student protest leaders will be crucial “There’s a long historical experience with protest that when
for whether US universities can heal after police you violently suppress it, you don’t make it go away — if
were invited to break up pro-Palestine sit-ins, according to anything, you encourage it,” he says.
a former college president.
Many staff and students have condemned leaders’ deci- UNITED KINGDOM
sions to invite police to campus, notably at Columbia Uni-
versity and the University of California, Los Angeles. In a Postgrad work visa debate
Substack post, Columbia history professor Adam Tooze UK UNIVERSITIES ARE STAGING A last-ditch
warned that many would “struggle to unsee and unfeel” the battle to resist further changes in the rules gov-
“violence (that) came from the police side…at the invitation erning international students, and stave off more
and request of the university administration”. financial damage to the sector, ahead of the release of a
Nicholas Dirks, former chancellor at the University of keenly anticipated report into the graduate visa route.
California, Berkeley, who was previously a dean at Colum- With the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) set to
bia, says management had been in a no-win situation be- conclude its investigation into “abuses” in post-study rights
cause “they are either too lenient, for those who complain of overseas students by May 14, critics have been pushing
about, say, anti-semitism, or they are far too draconian, the government to take ever more drastic measures to bring
in not defending both academic freedom and freedom of down the number of international students, arguing for an
speech”. overall cap, and for some institutions to be prevented from
However, calling the police “raises the volume” of such sponsoring visas at all.
complaints, he says. “Such calls invariably lead to arrests The sector has been warned to “brace for the worst” as a
that go beyond university codes of conduct and modes of ad- fraught political climate on immigration — exacerbated by
judicating violations of them and frequently involve violent poor local election results for the Conservative Party — has
altercations,” says Prof. Dirks. “These interactions are now put pressure on Downing Street to take further action on
all recorded and circulated on video clips, so they become the two-year graduate route, after removing the right for
discursive tools to disseminate arguments about police vio- Masters students to bring dependants, which was blamed
lence, and, by implication, further evidence of the ill intent for a 44 percent drop in January enrolments.
of administrators.” Options understood to be on the table include scrapping
“The healing process will include whether students re- the visa entirely, reducing its duration to six months or a
gard the punishments as fair and, ultimately, whether de- year, or placing extra conditions on its use, such as a salary
cisions about students are made with that fact top of mind threshold. In an 11th-hour attempt to protect the visa, sector

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