Finkelstein case: Academic freedom loses to Israeli lobby

DePaul University's Promotion and Tenure Board's 8 June 2007 decision to deny tenure to professors Norman G. Finkelstein and Mehrene Laurdee has placed DePaul University on the brink of a legitimacy crisis that threatens to irrevocably harm the very fabric of a university that has placed social justice and activism at the heart of its Vincentian mission since 1898. What does it mean that this Vincentian University has denied tenure to two passionate advocates of social justice who not only met the tenure requirements of their departments and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences but clearly surpassed them? What would St. Vincent de Paul have made of this year's tenure and promotion decisions? Would he have agreed with them? From what I know of St. Vincent de Paul's life and work, I'm almost certain he would be distressed by what has transpired under the name of "Vincentian tenure standards," which are transparent code words for "proving one's ideological serviceability to the interests of the powerful," in this case DePaul's would-be patrons. Finkelstein and Larudee apparently failed that test.

Norman Finkelstein has written passionately about the plight of the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, indicting powerful elites who capitalize upon the moral capital of the Holocaust for financial gain while demonstrating indifference toward the suffering of those on the receiving end of US high-tech weaponry in the Palestinian occupied territories and south Lebanon. Larudee, the sister of International Solidarity Movement leader Paul Larudee who was jailed in Israel for a brief time, is a specialist on international organizations and developing countries. During their time at DePaul, Finkelstein and Larudee have inspired numerous students to create a better world, sparked vigorous debate on the issues of our age, and dared to speak truth to power, which is an era of clichés and political correctness is the minimum intellectual responsibility requires.

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