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By Stuart Taylor, Jr., President of PFS
Since the University of Chicago paved the way in 1967 with its Kalven Committee Report, some 30 other American universities and colleges have followed suit by insisting on “institutional neutrality” on political and social issues, while also affirming their commitment to the academic freedom of faculty and students in the face of suppression from internal and/or external entities.
The case for institutional neutrality is a broadly shared perception that a university, college, president, dean, provost, or academic department should not take a public position on a political or social issue unless it threatens the very mission of the University and its value of free inquiry. The reason is that the effect could be to deter students and faculty members from expressing their own opinions lest they appear at odds with their institutions.
Campuses that have adopted the institutional neutrality principle include Harvard, Stanford, Yale, Dartmouth, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Virginia, the University of Texas System, Purdue, and Northwestern.
Princeton has not done so. And President Eisgruber has repeatedly rejected calls from groups, including Princetonians for Free Speech, that it adopt institutional neutrality.
In his May 27, 2025 Commencement address, Eisgruber detailed reasons, including this: “Some current-day proponents of the neutrality standard . . . appear to become uneasy when, for example, scholars expose and analyze the role of race, sexuality, or prejudice in society and politics.”
To the contrary, the institutional neutrality standard suggests no limit at all on what individual scholars or students can say or do. It calls for the institutions where they work to avoid taking collective positions lest they chill the freedoms of speech and thought of the scholars and students.
The chill is evidenced by, among other things, responses to our annual PFS surveys of Princeton students, the last of which shows that “52% of Princeton students would be somewhat or very uncomfortable expressing disagreement with a position that Princeton or their academic major’s department has publicly taken, with only 9% being very comfortable doing so.”
In addition, Eisgruber cites no standard to explain why or why not Princeton is taking a position.
As the Kalven Committee report said: “The instrument of dissent and criticism is the individual faculty member or the individual student. The university is the home and sponsor of critics; it is not itself the critic. [It] cannot take collective action on the issues of the day without endangering the conditions for its existence and effectiveness. There is no mechanism by which it can reach a collective position without inhibiting that full freedom of dissent on which it thrives.”
In his Commencement address, Eisgruber also saidthat “though I agree with much that is said in the Kalven Report, I have never liked the language of ‘neutrality,’ partly because ‘neutral’ has multiple meanings,” with synonyms including“innocuous,” “unobjectionable,” “harmless,” “bland,” and “colorless.” He added: “‘Neutral’ can mean ‘impartial,’ which is a more precise way to capture what the Kalven Committee had in mind.”
So call it “institutional impartiality,” if you prefer. But please be clear that the principle would impose no limitation on what any individual scholar or student can say.
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Since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term, top colleges and universities have faced an onslaught of federal attacks: slashing grant money for research, pressuring schools to end diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, cracking down on visas for international students, and ending graduate program sponsorship for active duty military at top schools. However, some Ivy League universities — the center of many of Trump’s ongoing attacks — have decreased messaging on the potential consequences of these federal directives.
“One thing that’s been clear is that a lot of universities have felt that publicity would bring no advantage or do them no good,” history professor David Bell GS ’91, who has been outspoken about federal actions against universities, said in an interview with The Daily Princetonian.
As a professor who is known to dissent from progressive ideologies that are dominant at universities such as Princeton, where I’ve taught for nearly 40 years, I’m frequently asked by students for advice about how to navigate a campus they worry will be hostile to them. Some are pro-Israel, or politically and socially conservative, or religiously observant.
They fear being treated unfairly by faculty members who are hostile to their beliefs. Many are afraid of being regarded as outcasts by their more liberal or progressive peers. They worry about being excluded from academic opportunities or not treated equitably in social or other extracurricular activities. To these students I say, with regret: You’re right to worry. I’ve seen these things happen.
Universities may be tempted to treat these capabilities as inevitable improvements in education. Students will be able to consume vast amounts of information, more than ever before. But like AI writing itself, such consumption would be vast but shallow. The more interesting possibility, then, is that AI will force universities to rediscover the value of intellectual work that cannot be outsourced.
