Taking Institutional Neutrality Seriously on Campus

Neutrality sounds good in theory, but it is impossible in practice

Veritas = Truth

This week I will be participating in a workshop focused on the future of U.S. universities. The timing could not be more important, with the Trump Administration engaged in an apparent punitive effort to destroy Harvard University, among other actions targeting faculty and students on campuses across the country. As THB readers know, I have some strong criticisms of universities (see my recent five-part series). At the same time, I also believe strongly that universities are essential institutions — They should be improved, not destroyed. Below is a short paper invited in advance of this week’s workshop, focused on the notion of “institutional neutrality” that has become fashionable to say on campuses, but is wickedly complex in practice. The workshop this week is under the Chatham House Rule, which means I can report on it, but not attribute specific comments or to identify participants. Look for a follow up soon.

In 2024, Academic Freedom Alliance, Heterodox Academy, and the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression called for colleges and universities to formally adopt institutional neutrality, defined as:

“When a contested social issue arises that does not directly concern the academic mission of our college or university, institutional leadership will not issue a position statement on that issue. On rare occasions when a public issue arises that directly affects the mission of this college or university, institutional leaders may issue statements that articulate the significance of that issue to our campus community.”

In contrast, the American Association of University Professors opposes institutional neutrality:

“An institution’s decision to make statements on political or social controversies does not necessarily violate academic freedom . . . [AAUP] does not agree that the issuance of institutional statements necessarily infringes on the academic freedom of the institution’s members.”

The AAUP argues:

“It strains credulity to think that an institution known to protect academic freedom would meaningfully stifle research, say, on climate change simply by announcing and explaining its choice to divest from fossil fuels.”

My experiences at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder) are sufficient to demonstrate that the AAUP needs to be more credulous: I retired from CU Boulder in December 2024 after more than 23 years as a faculty member — promoted to full professor at age 35, directing two internationally successful research centers, teaching very popular classes, holding various successful administrative roles, and leaving as one of the most cited faculty members on campus. Despite all this, I was (in my judgment) pushed out based on my research and writings that some on campus disagreed with on the subject of climate change science and policy.¹

My views are entirely mainstream: published widely in the peer-reviewed literature, cited in all 3 Working Groups of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and influential in climate policy. Apparently, this last bit was problematic. I have long taken issue with the dominant approach to climate policy (i.e., the notion of making energy more expensive to force change) and have called for climate advocates to pay more attention to scientific integrity. In response, there was an orchestrated campaign against me, including being attacked by the White House, investigated by Congress, and subject of a decade-long vendetta by the Center for American Progress, as revealed in the Hilary Clinton Wikileaks emails.

Over the past decade CU Boulder has become increasingly non-neutral with respect to climate change, adopting multiple strong institutional positions in favor of climate advocacy. Despite tenure and the university’s commitment to academic freedom, climate campaigning faculty and administrators ushered me out. CU Boulder ostensibly adopted a stance of institutional neutrality in August 2024. In June 2025, CU Boulder will host a high-profile climate advocacy conference with no research or teaching content.

My experiences reveal some of the challenges in implementing institutional neutrality on campus. Consider an example: Is it acceptable for a medical school promote childhood vaccination? Today, vaccines are certainly a “contested social issue” and vaccine advocacy is not central to either research or teaching. Most would find little problem with a medical school adopting a non-neutral position on vaccination. In contrast, imagine a university taking an institutional position on conflict in the Middle East, favoring one side of the conflict. Many would find such non-neutrality to be problematic.

What is the difference between vaccination and the Middle East? Is climate change more like vaccination or the Middle East? What about an Economics Department that has a stance of promoting free markets? Or a Political Science Department that supports Marxism? Or an Ethnic Studies Department that opposes structural racism?

Institutional neutrality is appealing in the abstract but wickedly complex in implementation. There can be no formula or objective demarcation that distinguishes acceptable from problematic non-neutrality. Leadership on campus will always need to make judgment calls — Adoption of institutional neutrality policies is no substitute for the hard work of effective leadership.

My view is that university leaders today need to exercise a much greater degree of institutional restraint when considering the adoption of non-neutral positions in any unit on campus. Today there are strong incentives for universities, and their subunits, to engage in overt political advocacy — where advocacy is defined as efforts to reduce the scope of policy or political alternatives.²

I see four motivations underlying the turn to advocacy on campuses:

1. Academics have been asked to demonstrate “impact” of their work;

2. Academia has become increasingly politically homogeneous and employs more who are activist in their orientation;

3. Universities have external incentives supporting on-campus advocacy, including from funders and donors, the media, and politicians (in both opposition and support);

4. A increasing view among scholars that winning public battles over data and science can dictate political outcomes, hence the rise of “misinformation research” and “science communication.”

One result of the turn to advocacy is that some on campus now see universities (and their subunits) as political actors much like NGOs, with a mandate to advance the causes and interests of its members, using the authority of the institution as a resource in political battle. A proliferation of units on campus has contributed to the adoption of advocacy agendas as the mission of such units. For instance, CU Boulder has a new Center with a mission to: “design and test interventions that nudge and boost people toward sustainable attitudes, beliefs, and behavior that will meet the climate challenge.”

One consequence of the turn toward overt political advocacy on campuses has been a broad-based diminishment of public support for higher education and an increase in partisan polarization, as people readily see the activist agendas. The major exception is among highly educated, wealthy, liberal whites. University leaders need to remember that their institutions are a public good in service of all Americans, not just a subset aligned with the views of its faculty, who are far from representative of the nation.

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More on “institutional neutrality” at THB:

1. My experiences are well documented. See: 2016, WSJ; 2021, The Hounding of Roger Pielke Jr; 2025, How to Get Rid of a Tenured Professor

2. I discuss advocacy in depth in Pielke Jr., R. 2007. The Honest Broker: Making Sense of Science in Policy and Politics (Cambridge University Press).