Institutional Neutrality Has Gone Too Far

When Mathias Risse, the director of Harvard’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, recently commented on the Israel-Hamas war, he was careful to specify that he was speaking as a professor — not in his capacity as the Carr Center’s head.

Risse’s clarification wasn’t a mundane addition — it was seemingly mandated by Harvard’s new institutional voice rule, which restricts various academic and administrative leaders from speaking publicly on controversial issues unless they directly pertain to their function within the University. While perhaps warranted in some cases, this restriction, as a blanket directive, is excessive and counterproductive.

Harvard’s institutional voice policy appears to be a direct reaction to a year fraught with protests, public criticism, and internal turmoil, culminating in the resignation of the University’s president. In an apparent attempt to protect Harvard from further controversy, the guidelines obligate a whole slate of University figures to remain neutral on public matters unrelated to the University’s core operations.

However, rather than limiting the policy to purely administrative roles like the president, provost, and deans, it extends to department heads as well as the leadership of academic centers and programs. By silencing the very scholars whose work engages with the world’s most pressing issues, Harvard risks undermining its most important contributions to society — not to mention, its intellectual mission.

Dozens of Harvard’s centers were established to address global challenges — many of which are inherently political — and are meant to foster intellectual engagement and lead public debates. While Harvard’s policies afford some flexibility to those centers that aim to “translate knowledge into action,” the exact scope of the loophole is unclear, nor is the boundary of these organizations’ acceptable speech. By enforcing neutrality on its leaders, Harvard limits their effectiveness and distances itself from the kind of meaningful discourse that has long defined its role in the world.

Institutional neutrality is a reasonable policy for administrators tasked with safeguarding the University’s reputation and operational integrity. However, it’s unlikely the public would mistake statements from academic center heads as official University positions. Scholars in leadership roles are expected to engage with the world through the lens of their expertise. Silencing them not only weakens their ability to contribute to public discourse — it diminishes the academic centers’ potential intellectual contributions.

Harvard’s reputation as a global leader in higher education, founded on its commitment to academic freedom and public engagement, has ironically been jeopardized by a policy intended to shore up these values. While it may be necessary for administrators to remain neutral to foster an environment wherein academics feel free to voice their own views, extending the same restrictions to scholars undermines the University’s broader intellectual mission in an unnecessary policy overreach.

Rather than retreating into silence, Harvard should embrace the expertise of its professors, enabling them to engage meaningfully in the world’s most pressing issues.

In trying to tame the beast of bias, Harvard may have unleashed something far more insidious. The University must rethink the policy before more harm is caused.

Isaac R. Mansell ’26, a Crimson Editorial editor, is a Statistics concentrator in Kirkland House.