Academic freedom in post-Soviet universities of Ukraine

The Ukrainian higher education system comprises a significant number of universities that were established during the Soviet times, and used to cultivate unfreedom among lecturers and students. Russified and militarised, these universities served the imperialist agenda of the Kremlin, the embarrassing history of which is still a significant and inconvenient part of their institutional memory. After thirty turbulent years of reforms in the independent state of Ukraine, these universities are still home to legacy-holders nurtured through traditions of bureaucracy, formalised learning and uncritical thinking. Subjects to laws and ministerial regulations, these institutional actors comfortably follow top-down mandates and agendas. This serves well the hierarchy of privileged rectors who enjoy lobbying powers and institutional control. Yet, this also undermines social and economic transformations in the country that seeks to build a strong and sustainable nation-state, and is in need of highly-capable cadre for competitive education, science, industry, trade and services. This paper examines dilemmas faced by Ukrainian political actors in applying legal, administrative and intellectual instruments to advance institutional autonomy and resilience in higher education, and stimulate freedoms to teach, learn and govern in post-Soviet universities. Drawing on 60 interviews with Ukrainian policy-makers, managers and academics dealing with post-Soviet transformations, the presentation analyses legacy-innovation tensions and generates a typology of agency positions that political actors develop to empower professors and students for a greater autonomy and responsibility. Using Tierney’s (2001) analytical heuristic on academic freedom, the paper proceeds then to discuss the Ukrainian universities’ dilemmas within the post-Soviet and global discourses on freedoms to teach, learn, and govern. The analysis contributes to the emerging discussion of freedom-related challenges in post-totalitarian contexts of higher education. Political actors that are constrained by lacking capacities for critical inquiry in research and education, experience deficit for informed criticism in governance and policy making within universities. This contributes to a poor quality of knowledge production, social consultations, and transformation strategies. Meanwhile, “surrogate academic freedom” undermines prestige and power of academic profession and alienates political engagement of progressive students and alumni (Oleksiyenko 2021a). Despite random efforts to de-Sovietise higher education in Ukraine (Oleksiyenko 2021b), doubts grow about the political actors’ ability to achieve a system-wide and long-term impact. Several questions have been looming larger for these actors: How can the growing resistance among the powerful oligarchy of the Soviet-days universities be mitigated? Who should become the driving force in deregulating the whole system and advancing the idea and practice of academic freedom, especially when narratives of identities and memories collide and contribute to conflicts in the government and society at large? These questions become more difficult and more important to answer in view of the growing concern about the country’s sovereignty, regional security, and international politics.