[Beren]

CEU faces existential threat under proposed legislation

MARCH 29, 2017 BY JUSTIN SPIKE

An article published Tuesday afternoon on pro-government website Origo.hu asserted that Budapest’s George Soros-founded Central European University (CEU) is guilty of operating unlawfully, citing numerous alleged regulatory infractions. The online daily claimed vaguely that “Soros University” had failed to live up to requirements concerning the registry of public data, was not in possession of proper program accreditation, and had committed “actual fraud” by offering courses which were not registered with Hungary’s Educational Authority (OH).

The article referred to a report prepared by the OH which revealed that an investigation had been launched on 28 foreign universities that are allegedly operating unlawfully in Hungary. The article also predicted that the government can be expected to tighten laws regulating foreign universities, thus raising the “obvious question of whether Soros University will be closed after legal changes.”

Indeed, a law was submitted to Parliament Tuesday by the Minister of Human Resources Zoltán Balog, who oversees education, which would introduce a litany of new requirements with which foreign universities would have to comply in order to continue operating in Hungary. According to 24.hu, in the case of CEU, the law would effectively make it impossible for the university to operate in its current form via several new regulations including:

• the requirement that the Hungarian government engage in a bilateral contract with the university’s country of origin. For CEU, such a contract would have to be entered into by either the United States or the State of New York,
  
• the requirement that CEU establish another campus in the State of New York and offer comparable degree programs there, and
  
• the requirement that all academic staff from non-EU countries receive working permits in order to continue in their positions. This would mean the elimination of a good-faith waiver currently waiving that requirement for CEU, and would place the university at particular disadvantage given its reliance on non-EU faculty.

A number of requirements proposed in the law appear to target CEU specifically, including the requirement that only those universities originating from outside the European Union require a bilateral contract between governments. CEU is one of only four such extra-EU universities included in the 28 mentioned in the government report. The law would also prohibit both the American and Hungarian entities from sharing the same name. Central European University, as a direct translation of the Hungarian Közép-európai Egyetem (KEE), would no longer be able to operate in Hungary under that name. Finally, the law would appear to prevent Hungarian universities (such as Közép-európai Egyetem) from offering programs or awarding degrees from non-European universities (such as Central European University, an American higher educational institution, with which KEE is in partnership.)

CEU President and Rector Michael Ignatieff in a statement issued Tuesday afternoon said the legislation directly targeted CEU and was therefore “discriminatory.” Ignatieff demanded “an immediate correction to falsehoods about our institution published this afternoon by origo.hu,” and insisted that the claim that CEU lacks program accreditation is entirely false, as is the claim that the university had failed to meet its obligations regarding data to official public registry.

“Any legislative change that would force CEU to cease operation in Budapest would damage Hungarian academic life and negatively impact the government of Hungary’s relations with its neighbors, its EU partners and with the United States,” Ignatieff said. “I call on the government to enter into negotiations with us to find a satisfactory way forward that allows CEU to continue in Budapest and to maintain the academic freedoms essential to its operation.”

Ignatieff also assured students that those currently enrolled will be allowed to continue their studies and complete their degrees under the proposed law, referring to a provision of the law which states that those universities which do not comply with new requirements by February 15, 2018 would have their operating licenses revoked by the Educational Authority, but all students registered by September 1, 2018 would be permitted to complete their programs by no later than the 2020-2021 academic year. He invited all faculty, staff and students to a community forum Wednesday afternoon to discuss the developments.

“It is time for our community to gather together to defend our institution,” he added.

Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of the United States to Hungary David Kostelancik issued a statement Wednesday, where he expressed concern about the proposed legislation. Kostelancik said CEU has employed and educated thousands of Hungarians, and represents “an important success story in the U.S.-Hungarian relationship[…]It enjoys strong bipartisan support in the U.S. Government. The United States opposes any effort to compromise the operations or independence of the University.”

CEU also released a statement Tuesday which can be read here. The university plans a press conference for Wednesday, March 29 at 2 p.m.

The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2014-2015 placed CEU among the world's top 100 universities in the social sciences category.

All programs of Central European University are highly competitive. The university is placed 29th worldwide in the field of politics and international studies, and among the top 51-100 worldwide in philosophy by the 2015 QS World University Rankings. The University also ranks among the top 51-100 worldwide on the 2015 QS Subject Rankings for sociology. It also places for history (101-150), economics (151-200) and legal studies (151-200). Additionally, despite its small size and young programs (fewer than a hundred students), the Economics department of the university has recently ranked eighth in Europe by the ERC (European Research Council), based on research excellence.

The CEU Business School offers the thirteenth best MBA program in Europe, according to the QS TOPMBA survey 2012. In this survey, CEU Business School is consistently placed among the twenty best business schools in Europe.

According to a study published by German newspaper Die Zeit, the CEU Department of Political Science is among the top five political science departments in Europe.

CEU's Department of Legal Studies was ranked first in Central Europe by the Czech newspaper, Lidové noviny. The survey included Austrian, Czech, German, Hungarian, Polish, and Slovak universities.

A recent report prepared by the Magyar Rektori Konferencia stated that CEU faculty has the highest number of international publications per capita (recorded in the Web of Science) among Hungarian universities. The same applies to the amount research support grants received in the framework of EU’s Sixth and Seventh Framework Programmes for Research and Technological Development. In the recent round of the European Research Council Starting Investigator Grant – the most prestigious grant for young researchers in Europe – Central-East European countries received a total of eight grants. Of the three that came to Hungary (the highest number of among C/EE countries), two were awarded to CEU faculty.

Central European University is not present in general world university rankings, for it is only a postgraduate institution and lacks undergraduate programs of study.

It's not Trump University as you can see. I wonder how it's going to develop.

[Beren]

Well, there are some developments.

Hungary passes bill targeting Central European University

Protesters have created a human chain around the Central European University

Supporters have gathered at a Budapest university after MPs passed a bill which could force it out of Hungary.

The 199-seat parliament head earlier voted 123 to 38 in favour of the legislation, which places tough restrictions on foreign universities.

The main target is believed to be the Central European University (CEU) and its founder, George Soros.

It is the latest battle declared by the right-wing Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, against liberalism.

But within hours of the legislation being passed, staff, students and supporters had surrounded CEU waving blue signs saying "veto" to show their support for the university.

CEU, meanwhile, has vowed to fight the bill.

The English-speaking university, which is still partly-funded by Hungarian-born Mr Soros, is ranked among the top 200 universities in the world in eight disciplines.

But Zoltan Balog, a government minister, told MPs on Tuesday it went "against Hungary's interests to host experiments, financially supported and evading democratic 'rules of the game' in the background, which aim at undermining the lawfully elected government or leadership".

The demonstration began just hours after parliament passed a new bill which could force it from the country

Hungary's governing Fidesz party - officials from which have repeatedly referred to CEU as "the Soros university" - see it as a bastion of liberalism.

The prime minister is a known critic of liberal NGOs which are partially funded by Mr Soros, 86, with whom he has a strained relationship.

This bill will effectively force CEU from Hungary - where it occupies prime real estate in the centre - as it requires foreign universities to have a campus both in the capital and their home countries.

CEU only has a campus in Budapest.

It also bans universities outside the EU from awarding Hungarian diplomas without an agreement between national governments - in this case, the US.

Despite this, a CEU spokesman has vowed to "maintain the integrity and continuity of its academic programmes... whatever the circumstances", adding : "This fight is not over. We will contest the constitutionality of this legislation and seek all available legal remedies."

CEU Rector Michael Ignatieff has previously said the bill marks "the first time that a member of the European Union dared to legislate an attack on the academic freedom of a university".
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The Central European University

Founded to "resuscitate and revive intellectual freedom" in parts of Europe that had endured the "horrific ideologies" of communism and fascism

Occupies a building that began as an aristocrat's palace before becoming state-owned offices for a planned socialist economy

Has 1,440 students - 335 from Hungary and the rest from 107 other countries

Presents itself as a champion of free speech, with links to universities in Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia and Kazakhstan

Academic Freedom, Under Threat in Europe

By MICHAEL IGNATIEFFAPRIL 2, 2017

BUDAPEST — Academic freedom is a cornerstone of democracy and a free society. As Montesquieu argued in “The Spirit of the Laws,” a text the American founders revered, a free society is defined by robust self-governing institutions that regulate themselves under the law and pursue their objectives without interference from government.

Academic freedom is a threat to authoritarian regimes everywhere. In Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia, the European University at St. Petersburg has endured repeated attempts to shut it down. In Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey, the government is closing campuses and jailing students and teachers.

The latest threat to academic freedom is occurring in the heart of Europe. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government has introduced a bill in Parliament that would effectively abolish the freedom of Central European University, a private American-Hungarian graduate institution (of which I am the rector and president) that has been granting American- and Hungarian-accredited masters and doctoral degrees for more than 20 years.

The bill would forbid the university from issuing its American degrees, require it to open a campus in the United States (it operates only in Budapest) and put it under the control of the Hungarian government. The government would have the power to deny work permits to faculty members from outside the European Union and use the visa system to restrict the university’s ability to choose its students.

The university’s trustees — who include the chancellor-elect of the University of California, Berkeley; a former provost of Columbia; the vice chancellor of Oxford; and the president of Bard College — have rejected the legislation as an outrageous attack on an institution that has been a vital part of Hungarian higher education for more than 20 years.

The government has accompanied the bill with a defamatory attack on the university, claiming that it “cheats” by awarding both American and Hungarian diplomas and thus violates Hungarian law. As the government well knows, because its own accreditation authorities have repeatedly confirmed it to us, Central European University has been in full conformity with the law throughout its operation.

What is at stake is clear. If the bill passes, it would mark the first time that a member of the European Union dared to legislate an attack on the academic freedom of a university. It would also mark the first time that an American ally, a member of NATO, openly attacked an American institution on its soil.

There may not be much love lost between the Trump administration and universities, but it is difficult to see how an avowedly “America First” administration can ignore such a direct assault on an American institution, one chartered in the State of New York and accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.

It is also difficult to imagine that the European Parliament and the European Commission could allow a member state to get away with such a direct attack on a core principle of European freedom.

Central European University was founded, with a visionary investment by the Hungarian-born philanthropist George Soros, in 1991 to create a world-class graduate university to help Eastern and Central Europe to recover from the ravages of Communism and begin to build free societies. One beneficiary of Mr. Soros’s generosity was none other than Viktor Orban, then a promising young dissident. Over 25 years, the university has become a proud part of Hungarian academic life, luring great Hungarians back to Budapest to teach, and offering scholarships to thousands of Hungarians as well as students from more than 100 other countries.

The university’s departments regularly feature in the top 50 international rankings. Its researchers have been awarded an outsize share of prestigious European Research Council grants, and its scholars are research colleagues and collaborators with professors from the best universities in the world.

The Hungarian government’s legislation is either a piece of reckless political vandalism or a spectacular exercise in self-harm. While the stated aim is to attack any institution associated with the name of George Soros, the actual aim is to send a chill through Hungarian higher education and eliminate one of the few remaining institutions in Hungary that can stand up to the government.

Academic freedom is not a partisan issue. Even in these partisan times, all lovers of freedom can surely come together on the principle that self-governing institutions should be left alone to govern themselves free of state interference. This is as true in Europe as it is in the United States.

Americans should also find it easy to agree that the United States should not allow any ally to intimidate an American institution. As for Central European University, its board and its administration will never surrender its academic freedom to anyone.
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Michael Ignatieff is the rector and president of Central European University.

I wonder if they go back to Prague, where they originally started.

I also wonder if haters know what CEU is and they would rather go to Trump University.