How foreign funding in U.S. higher education by authoritarian regimes – widely undisclosed – predicts erosion of Democratic norms and antisemitic incidents on campus
NCRI and ISGAP conducted thorough research in creating this report:
In this paper, we report 4 studies examining the extent of different avenues of foreign funding and its statistical relationship to campus political climate and events. Because much of this foreign funding was provided by authoritarian regimes, we examined the levels and sources of such funding and the extent to which this funding correlated with a deterioration of liberal democratic norms around free speech and academic freedom, as well as antisemitism on campus. Because campus antisemitism is not well characterized in peer-reviewed literature, we sought to assess its concurrent validity among other national assessments of antisemitism (reported by the FBI, ADL). All r’s were high (~.50) indicating strong spatial correspondence between the three assessments.
- At least 100 American colleges and universities illegally withheld information on approximately $13 billion in undocumented contributions from foreign governments, many of which are authoritarian.
- From 2015-2020, Institutions that accepted money from Middle Eastern donors, had, on average, 300% more antisemitic incidents than those institutions that did not.
- Campuses receiving undocumented funds exhibited approximately twice as many campaigns to silence academics as those that did not.
- Speech intolerance was higher at institutions that
received undocumented money from foreign regimes. - Campus-level antisemitic incidents forward predict county-level antisemitic incidents.
The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) is a global interdisciplinary research center dedicated to the academic study of antisemitism.
The Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI) provides pioneering technology, research, and analysis to identify and forecast cyber-social threats targeting individuals, organizations, and communities. The NCRI is committed to empowering partners to become proactive in protecting themselves against false narratives that create rifts of distrust that impact institutions, capital markets, public health, and safety.
