Seminar Academic Freedom in Jordan
On the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Freedom Center for Development and Human Rights, in cooperation with the Amman Center for Human Rights Studies (ACHRS), organized a seminar entitled “Academic Freedom in Jordan”, hosted by the Mousa Al Saket Center in the city of Al-Salt.
The Chairman of the Board of the Freedom Center for Development and Human Rights, Dr. Ali Al-Dabbas, said that the workshop was held because the organizers strongly believe in the importance of the role of academic freedom and in its contribution to effectively build the capacity of teachers and students. He believes that this is an important step to take in order to build a society in which the rights are respected and individuals are able to express themselves. He added that the choice of hosting such event in the city of Al-Salt was because of its historical role. Al-Salt represents a city with great educational system in Jordan since the first secondary school in the Kingdom was built there.
Dr. Abdulrahman Al-Abadi, Professor of Public Law at the Faculty of Law at the University of Jerash, discussed the concept of academic freedom and its reality in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. He pointed out how academic freedom in universities constitutes a great role in the formation and dissemination of knowledge. Also the role of the professor in universities is fundamental to shape scientific knowledge and creative activities in societies in general and in the formation of knowledge. Moreover, he reviewed the position of the Jordanian legislation with regards to academic freedom, indicating the provisions of the law of the universities in Jordan, for instance Article 8 from the year 2018 that fully guarantees academic freedom. He therefore presented the reality of academic freedom in universities in both its positive and negative aspects. At the end of his speech, he provided a few recommendations in order to improve the reality of academic freedom in the forefront of promoting the dissemination of thought and he encouraged having a culture of constructive dialogues far away from intolerance, narrow thinking, and hatred towards who has different opinions.
Dr. Nizam Assaf, Director of the Amman Center for Human Rights Studies, discussed the role of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in promoting academic freedom, such as the Arab Society for Academic Freedom. He mentioned the 13 Principles listed in the Amman Declaration on Academic Freedom to promote and protect academic freedom. This declaration helped, through the Arab Society for Academic Freedom, to suggest the promotion and respect of academic freedom in the constitutions of Tunisia, Algeria and Palestine. He also emphasized the role of ACHRS in holding a number of activities that contribute to the promotion of academic freedom such as the symposium on the reestablishment of the “Jordanian Teachers Syndicate” and the symposium on the right to establishment a special union for the professors in university.
The workshop was attended by a group of civil society activists and university professors, who presented a series of speeches that showed a number of issues faced to promote academic freedom, in particular the ongoing traditional method of teaching in universities that does not allow students to express their own opinions and engage in creating students unions.
