The difficult plight of conservatives in academia | STAFF COMMENTARY
The discrimination against conservatives and conservative thought in higher education is everywhere and self-reinforcing.
Pew surveys and others show widespread concern over liberal bias, including the finding by a multi-university research team that “77% of Americans — across party lines — are concerned about liberal bias on campus.”
An Inside Higher Ed author argues that “liberal faculty members consistently outnumber conservative faculty members in faculty surveys,” citing studies from the Heterodox Academy.
Professor Eric Kaufmann, writing for Newsweek, not a bastion of conservatism, argues that conservatives are usually cowed on campus due to the aggressive liberalism that inhabits academe.
“Seventy-five percent of conservative academics in the social sciences and humanities in the U.S. and Britain say their departments are a hostile environment for their beliefs,” writes Kaufmann. “In the U.S., fully seven in 10 conservative academics in the social sciences or humanities say they self-censor. Over 90% of Trump-supporting academics wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing their views with a colleague, and 85% of their Democratic colleagues agree that Trump supporters should stay silent.”
But you don’t need empirical studies to demonstrate the difficulty conservatives have in higher education.
For half a century, I was a member of the National Communication Association (NCA), the premier national organization of media and communication studies.
In the last 10 years, that organization, from which I was honored due to my publication and teaching record, has become so hostile to those on the right that, except for one president with tremendous integrity, the leaders have tried to minimize any conservatism in the organization.
They do this by eliminating presentations at their conventions and sociologically limiting any right-wing participation.
Their main political journals will print no articles supporting President Donald Trump, but they are rife with progressive celebration of issues and leaders.
I left the NCA due to its leadership’s refusal to allow me to sponsor a cash prize for those studying my well-known Agenda-Spin method in rhetoric and its general political one-sidedness.
Days after I sent my proposal to the Eastern Communication Association, the award was accepted.
College and university prejudice against conservatives is variegated.
I know scores of conservative professors and more than scores of students in academia who claim they cannot be treated fairly in the halls of ivy. Their essay grades reflect this; their class discussions reflect this; and their general treatment by their professors reveals the imbalanced treatment.
Some cannot get jobs; some cannot find journals in their field that will print their scholarship; and some find that tenure goes almost exclusively to those on the left in public universities.
I taught and wrote from Towson University for almost 50 years, and when I was attacked by left-wing ideologues on campus — a minority, to be sure — I was protected by the excellent administrations we have had at Towson, particularly but not exclusively the current exemplary leadership.
The near-ubiquity of anti-conservatism in higher education is evident in the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), the Washington-based union and association of academic professionals.
The national AAUP is liberal throughout, but usually not so grossly that they never allow dissent. Recently, however, they shockingly announced their support for Abdul El-Sayed, the far-left Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan.
Their meetings have a few — a few — conservatives, but are rife with liberals, progressives and progressive thought.
Individual colleges and universities’ AAUP chapters have varied ideological freedom, even though they are ostensibly politically unbiased.
At Towson, we had decades of excellent AAUP leadership until the most recent rendition, which is run by hyper-anti-conservative leadership.
They turned the Academic Senate, of which I was the longest-serving member, into an anti-right, censored discussion group by stopping consideration and discussion of the treatment of conservatives on campus.
There is little hope for a radical reconsideration of the treatment of those Tories in colleges and universities until the powerful left-wing sociologists take a look at themselves and realize that higher education must be the place for all students and faculty to be able to hold reasonable ideological views without being punished, whether through low grades or the withholding of recommendations, promotions, tenure and academic awards.
Public colleges and universities: Dare to be fair; dare to be disinterested; and dare to be open to varying points of view.
Richard E. Vatz (rvatz@towson.edu) is professor emeritus at Towson University and author of “The Only Authentic Book of Persuasion: The Agenda-Spin Model.” His column will appear periodically.
PUBLISHED:
September 23, 2026
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