The erosion of academic freedom poses a major threat to democracy around the world. Can the U.S. higher education institutions play a role in the reversal of this global trend? Arien Mack, founder and director of the New University In Exile Consortium, and Judith Friedlander, Professor Emerita of Anthropology at Hunter College, discuss the historical roots of the New University in Exile and its current activities.

The New University in Exile Consortium is an expanding group of universities and colleges publicly committed to the belief that the academic community has both the responsibility and capacity to assist persecuted and endangered scholars, to help protect the intellectual resources that are jeopardized when universities and scholars are under assault, and to advocate for academic freedom around the world. Wellesley College is a founding member of the Consortium.

Arien Mack is the founder the New University in Exile Consortium. She is the Alfred and Monette Marrow Professor of Psychology at The New School for Social Research, where she has edited Social Research since 1970. She established the Social Research conference series in 1988, and she continues to direct it through the Center for Public Scholarship at the New School. As a research psychologist, her most recent work focused on perception, cognition, and attention. Her publications include more than 60 articles and the coauthored volume Inattentional Blindness (1998). In 2007, she launched Endangered Scholars Worldwide, dedicated to drawing attention to the plight of scholars, students, and researchers around the world whose lives and livelihoods are under threat due to the nature of their work or political positions.