US professors urge Western universities to end ties to China's Confucius
Institute
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10907971/US-professors-urg
e-Western-universities-to-end-ties-to-Chinas-Confucius-Institutes.html?fbs
In a serious blow to China's soft-power outreach, a leading association of
American professors warns that Confucius Institutes break basic standards on
academic freedom
Chinese soft-power diplomacy has suffered a major rebuke after the leading
association of American university professors accused China's network of
Confucius Institutes of flouting basic rules of academic freedom and
integrity.
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) called for
agreements between Confucius Institutes and nearly 100 universities to be
either cancelled or renegotiated so that they properly reflected Western
values of free speech.
"Confucius Institutes function as an arm of the Chinese state and are allowed
to ignore academic freedom," the AAUP said in a statement, urging US
universities to "cease their involvement" with the institutes unless major
reforms are instituted.
China's network of 300 Confucius Institutes – including 11 branches in on
British university campuses – can be a lucrative source of funds for
universities but are exempt from many of the basic rules government academic
discourse.
They are designed to project a favourable image of China's ruling Communist
Party around the world through language and cultural programmes, but are
allowed to restrict discussions of topics unpalatable to China's ruling
Communist Party such as the occupation of Tibet.
"Most agreements establishing Confucius Institutes feature nondisclosure
clauses and unacceptable concessions to the political aims and practices of
the government of China," the AAUP statement added.
"Specifically, North American universities permit Confucius Institutes to
advance a state agenda in the recruitment and control of academic staff, in
the choice of curriculum, and in the restriction of debate." Concerns over
how China is uses its vast cash resources to buy influence in academia have
been mounting in recent years.
Earlier this month The Telegraph revealed that Cambridge University had
allowed a charitable foundation linked to China's former prime minister Wen
Jiabao to endow a chair of Chinese development studies.
One academic accused Cambridge of allowing the Chinese government to
"purchase a professorship" at one of Britain's most prestigious universities.
The AAUP is a 47,000-member association which was founded in 1915 to guard
academic freedom. It's call to cancel Confucius Institute agreements is a
huge blow for China's premiere soft-power project which Beijing says is
equivalent to the UK's British Council or Frances's Alliance Français.
However the AAUP drew a clear distinction between the British and French
organisations, which existed off-campus and openly fulfilled their mandates,
with the on-campus Confucius Institutes that are allowed to bypass basic
tenets of academic freedom in exchange for money.
The Confucius Institute website says the Institutes are intended for "the
promotion and dissemination of Chinese language and culture" more generally,
however critics have accused them merely of being the propaganda arm of the
ruling Communist Party of China.
According to the AAUP statement, the academic activities "are under the
supervision of Hanban, a Chinese state agency which is chaired by a member of
the Politburo and the vice-premier of the People's Republic of China".
The universities of Edinburgh, Manchester, Cardiff, Central Wales,
Nottingham, Sheffield, Soas, the London School of Economics, London South
Bank University, Liverpool and Central Lancashire are all listed as having
Confucius Institutes.
In the past, China has batted away criticism of its Institutes, with the
Chinese ambassador to London accusing critics of submitting to "Cold War
thinking" in 2012 after Christopher Hughes, a China expert at the London
School of Economics, raised concerns about hosting such centres in the wake
of a scandal over the LSE's taking funding from the regime of Libyan dictator
Muammar Gaddafi.
Similar concerns were raised earlier this month in Toronto, Canada, after
trustees of the Toronto District School Board's newly minted Confucius
Institute recommended suspending its partnership with the Chinese government
because of concerns over censorship.
They are due to vote on whether to end the partnership on Wednesday.
翻譯米糕 中國在歐美設置一堆孔子學院並且提供大量資金
美國人說這會破壞學術自由、學術倫理，因為他們借開課程之便安插很多中國教師，美國
教授學會要求各大學不要跟孔子學院有合作。