For David Abulafia, a distinguished professor of Mediterranean history at Cambridge, the launch of a university “reporting tool” encouraging students to denounce people for “micro-aggressions” was particularly sinister.
An ancestor, Samuel Abulafia, was arrested in the 15th century during the Spanish Inquisition for maintaining Jewish practices after Jews had been expelled from the country. The man eventually changed his name to Lopez so that no one would recognise his origins. Another Abulafia was one of the first to be burnt by the Inquisition for the same crime.
Today Abulafia, a bestselling author and historian, believes that the new tool allowing students anonymously to accuse members of faculty of “racism, discrimination and micro-aggressions” draws from the same well that gave birth to the barbaric Inquisition.
The list provided by the university of transgressions includes “raising eyebrows when a black member of staff or student is speaking” and making “backhanded compliments”.
Particularly concerning for Abulafia is the definition of racism on its website, which states it is “a system where people from racially minoritised backgrounds are more likely than white people to face multiple obstacles in life, from being targets of direct or indirect discrimination and micro-aggressions”.
He said: “Under that definition, my white Jewish ancestors were not victims of racism — it’s nonsensical. Of course, people are free to embrace these beliefs if they wish to do so, that’s part of a free society, but to impose them on everyone else is quite extraordinary.
“As for reporting someone if you feel they have committed a micro-aggression against you, this may actually hinder minorities as lecturers could be apprehensive about providing them with one-to-one tuition in case they make a perceived transgression.
“I’m not comparing what is happening to the Spanish Inquisition but we have seen throughout history how dangerous it is for people to be told to think in a certain way.”
The tool, called Report + Support, was launched this month as part of the university’s “change the culture” campaign. It provoked an immediate backlash.
Some academics regard it as just the latest in a series of attempts by the university’s leadership to pander to the extreme elements of vocal fringe groups.
In 2019 it rescinded an offer of a visiting fellowship to Jordan Peterson, a psychology professor and bestselling author who has been outspoken about, among other things, trans issues.
Stephen Toope, the vice-chancellor, a Canadian human rights scholar, withdrew the offer after Peterson was photographed with a fan at a book signing who was wearing a T-shirt that said: “I’m a proud Islamaphobe”.
Sir Partha Dasgupta, an economics of poverty and nutrition professor, said: “Two days later I read a piece by a young American PhD student at Cambridge. He was adopted as a child, overcame tremendous hardship and was now a scholar at Cambridge. He said the one thing that helped him was Peterson’s writings and that Cambridge’s decision to disinvite him made him feel he didn’t belong here.
“I wrote to him and invited him to lunch. I told him that I could assure him that if there’s one person who belongs here, it’s him. It made me feel sick.
“Under the university’s logic, we would not invite Nietzsche, I’m not a fan of his but he was one of the greatest thinkers of the 19th century.
“I come from India and I have been around. I just think sometimes we belittle ourselves — it’s not the greatest of societies but it’s a damn good one.
“Suppose a senior and junior colleague are engaged in a joint research project, working through the calculations, and the senior person says, ‘That’s a stupid idea’ — that’s common place, a very natural way of conversing, what if they decide to use that against them? It curtails the free flow of ideas. I’ve been here for 35 years, I have a deep affection for this university, it’s one of the greatest universities in the world, I don’t like it to be tarnished with useless complaints.”
Arif Ahmed, a reader in philosophy at Gonville and Caius College, led a campaign last year that challenged a free speech policy backed by Toope requiring academics, students and visiting speakers to treat others and their opinions with “respect”.
His campaign, endorsed by the broadcaster and writer Stephen Fry, successfully argued that people holding views such as creationism should not be respected, but “tolerated”. Following thousands of votes, his amendment to the policy was carried by a landslide majority of 86.9 per cent.
Ahmed said: “I was disappointed that after such a decisive vote the university would put forward something even more insidious six months later. It’s encouraging people anonymously to write detailed screeds against people they don’t like about minor slips, even if they’re unintentional, which will stay on their records. The university may even be required to tell grant funders about these allegations. This might mean the university has to disclose unproven allegations from years before.
“Individual liberty is the most important value that western society has. We’re not on our way to the gulag, but another form of despotism is already here. It’s Lilliputian oppression, like Gulliver being held down by lots of small ropes — there is this constant encroachment which is impossible to evade. This tool’s definition of racism is so divisive and obviously absurd. This is not just an esoteric debate at an elite university: this is happening at other universities and these issues spill into society.” It seems debate on the issue will continue to grow. The University of Manchester and the University of Southampton have their own, less subversive, versions of the tool.
Following the furore, Cambridge took down the site and Toope claimed that “certain ancillary material” had been “included in error” because it went “beyond the approved policy framework”.
However, academics at the university are sceptical and point to the increasing number of controversies around free speech at the university over which its leadership has presided.
Last year Sally Davies, former chief medical officer for England and now master at Trinity College, sent an email to students and staff in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests in which she urged recipients to “confront your own beliefs” and asked “are any of your views about other races based on stereotypes and not experiences?”
The email contained a link to the Black Lives Matter website, which linked to a donation page that stated: “We’re guided by a commitment to dismantle imperialism, capitalism, white-supremacy, patriarchy and the state structures that disproportionately harm black people in Britain and around the world.”
John Marenbon, senior research fellow at the faculty of philosophy at Trinity College, said: “We were told we were all prejudiced and didn’t sufficiently examine our prejudices. I thought it was very bad that this sort of thing should come round officially. I think it has become so normal at the university that it just washes over the people in charge.”
One academic who was seemingly pleased with the Report + Support tool was Priyamvada Gopal, professor of postcolonial studies at Churchill College. In response to a newspaper column about the issue, she tweeted mockingly: “The jewels in our crown would remain sparkling white and unblemished by melanin.” She posted an image of a witch’s cat stirring a cauldron and wrote: “The more the White Right Boys & their pets get upset by Cambridge slowly changing for the better, the more whining sputtering op-eds they produce, the more I . . .”
Last month the government introduced the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill designed to help to stamp out unlawful silencing after a series of “no-platformings”. It remains to be seen whether the bill would have allowed the existence of the Report + Support tool before it was pulled. Since then, the university has uploaded a much more basic version of the tool.
Privately, Cambridge academics are calling for Toope to consider his position. Faculty members say they are weighing up taking legal action against the university and waiting to see what the permanent version of the tool looks like. The Free Speech Union has pledged to seek a judicial review if the website returns in a similar form.
A spokesman said: “The university aligns its definitions with those outlined in equality legislation. The definition of racism that appeared in error reflected much wider policy and academic discussion across the community and it is not part of any university policy. The Report + Support site has now been updated. As a democratic institution, we are in the process of setting up a working group to review our anonymous reporting policy.”
