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Oxford University students who specialize in studying China are being asked to submit some papers anonymously to protect them from the possibility of retaliation under the radical new security law introduced three months ago in Hong Kong.
The anonymity rule will be applied in classes and group tutorials will be replaced by individual ones. Students should also be advised that it will be considered a disciplinary offense if they record lectures or share them with outside groups.
Hong Kong’s security law was imposed on June 30 by Beijing after more than a year of pro-democracy protests and had an immediately corrosive impact on political freedoms in the territory. Its provisions also give the Chinese government powers to arrest people who are not Hong Kong residents, for actions or comments made outside the territory.
The powerful extraterritorial powers claimed in the law have raised fears among those studying in the UK, particularly those with personal and family connections to Hong Kong and mainland China.
Universities UK, the group of presidents, will hold talks with Chinese academics to discuss national security law early next month. A group of academics is also expected to advance a draft code of conduct this week on how universities should treat students from authoritarian states.
The national security law that China imposed on Hong Kong in June 2020 has brought about profound changes in the region of more than 7 million people.
From who is actually running Hong Kong now to the fate of the pro-democracy movement and how the world’s top businesses are grappling with the implications of the new law, our reporters in China, Hong Kong, London, the US, and Australia have investigated how the unprecedented crackdown affects not just Hong Kong, but the world.
In addition to mapping out the new restrictions on civil liberties and liberties, the series looks for voices of hope and acts of resistance, wondering what’s next for Hong Kong, which is at a crossroads in its history.
The number of Chinese students in UK higher education has increased by more than a third in the last four years and now exceeds 120,000.
In 2018-19, 35% of all non-EU students were from China. The numbers are expected to rise again this year, but the full impact of the Covid-19 pandemic is not yet known.
Foreign students are a valuable source of income for the UK university sector as they often pay two to three times more than UK students.
Patricia Thornton, Associate Professor of Chinese Politics at the University of Oxford, said: “The whole spirit of the tutorial, which is based on collective critical inquiry, increases or decreases the institution’s ability to guarantee freedom of speech, freedom of expression and academic freedom for all.
But how to do this in the wake of China’s new national security law for Hong Kong, which invites self-censorship with its lack of red lines and generous extraterritorial provision? How is academic freedom protected when China claims the right to intervene everywhere? “
She said: “I have decided not to alter the content of my teaching. However, like my colleagues in the US, I am aware of my duty to care for my students, many of whom are not UK citizens. My students will submit and submit work anonymously in order to provide additional protection. “
Your students will be asked to read anonymized assignments in weekly classes, and small group tutoring will be replaced by individual lessons. “This means that my lectures, reading lists, and tutorial essay questions will remain largely the same, but students will be asked to submit anonymous work from one of their classmates.”
He said a notice is being issued that if classes are held online, no attempt should be made to record the content or share the material with anyone outside the group.
Stating that “we are all Hong Kongers,” he noted that the extraterritorial provision possibly makes deportation a possibility.
The decision at Oxford follows similar moves by elite American universities. At Princeton University, students in a Chinese politics class will use codes instead of names in their work, and Harvard Business School may excuse students from discussing politically sensitive topics if they are concerned about risks, the Wall Street Journal last month.
Lord Patten, former British Governor of Hong Kong and fierce critic of the Chinese Communist Party, said: “Students who come from China to work in our universities come from universities where there are cameras in the classes and there are informants and drug traffickers paid to tell them what is happening. We have to be very careful that it doesn’t leak into our universities.
“Hong Kong represents all those values that China is nervous about, be it freedom of expression, recognition of the universality of human rights, determination to provide open education.”
Eva Pils, a law professor at King’s College London, said: “There is great concern about the new national security legislation in Hong Kong and its impact on freedom of expression. The crimes recently introduced by this law are vaguely worded, leading to the fear that any criticism of the government could be treated as a crime. There is also concern about the institutions created to implement the law. There is also the risk that an individual’s case could be transferred to the mainland, where the legal process is deeply flawed.
“If you are a student or academic visiting, for example, the UK from Hong Kong or planning to visit Hong Kong and working on issues that are perceived as politically sensitive in Hong Kong, then you have some reason to worry that your work may in trouble, and that’s what is happening. The effect can be suffocating and oppressive, even in the classroom. “
The British Association for Chinese Studies warned universities that the response to the security law “cannot be that teachers err on the side of caution in their teaching content or that certain China-related modules are removed from the curriculum. studies because they are too challenging to deliver safely. “
