Why UK’s ‘Prevent’ programme doesn’t work
In 2015, a new statutory duty was placed upon universities across the UK: to remain vigilant to signs of extremism. And, on top of not helping to curb “extremism” in universities across the UK in any substantial way, these measures are also endangering basic academic freedoms. One interviewee said: “Staff are just simply not qualified to do this, academic staff are not psychologists or psychiatrists, they’re not counterterrorist practitioners.” Our study also demonstrated that authorities are not giving adequate support, training and guidance to the academic staff about the counterterrorism duties imposed upon them. As there are roughly 201,380 academic staff and 208,750 non-academic staff working in UK Universities alone, the numbers provided by the Home Office confirmed our fears that the training efforts are inconsistent at best, and academic staff are completely left to their own devices to identify and report “radical behaviours” in most cases. Academic staff are being encouraged to report their students for reasons like discussing certain “sensitive” topics, asking certain questions or even reading “suspicious” textbooks.
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