The Ministry of Defence says the partnership will build a whole-of-society approach to defence, but concerns have been raised around lack of transparency and student consultation.
On 13 July, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the University of Glasgow announced that Glasgow would join 35 UK universities as a founding member of the Defence Universities Alliance (DUA). According to the MoD announcement, the partnership “will bring together defence and academia,” with Professor Tim Dafforn, Chief Scientific Advisor, Ministry of Defence, stating that it will “fundamentally change the way Defence, universities and industry work together”.
The DUA forms part of a wider £182m Government defence skills package aimed at creating more skilled career opportunities in the sector.
The MoD clarified to The Glasgow Guardian that the DUA “is not a funding mechanism and will not provide or distribute funding to member universities”. MOD-funded research will continue through existing routes, and the partnership instead exists to strengthen collaboration.
In its announcement, the University said the DUA would strengthen its contribution to UK national security and support skills development and economic growth. It also highlighted its existing ethical safeguards, stating that “all research […] is governed by [the University’s] Code of Good Practice in Research, alongside established processes for ethical review, due diligence and trusted research”.
The Glasgow Guardian spoke to Peter Jackson, Chair in Global Security at Glasgow University, about what this partnership could mean for staff and students.
He sees the DUA as recognition by the government that universities have much to contribute to national security, emphasising that defence goes beyond just military and weapons research. “You have to think about security very broadly”, he said. “We lived through the [COVID-19] pandemic, and so we should think about it as public health. We should also think about it in terms of the environment. And universities have a lot to contribute in these areas.”
Jackson said he hoped the partnership would help to remind the government of the value universities can offer. “There is a funding crisis for higher education research”, he said. “My hope is that this engagement will… remind government that we have a lot to offer.”
Speaking to The Glasgow Guardian, Tom Smith, Academic Director of the Royal Air Force Academy, agreed, highlighting the importance of supporting a broad curriculum for national security. However, he said he had not seen an announcement that would give him confidence funding would stretch to areas outside of STEM. “I think the lower-hanging fruit will be the STEM stuff; new technological platforms, [and] defence applications for new technologies”, he said.
The MoD stated that the DUA “takes a broad view of defence and national security”, with areas of interest including “public health, environmental security, social sciences and languages, alongside science and technology”.
However, concerns have been raised by academics and members of the university community regarding the transparency of the alliance, and what Glasgow being a founding member will look like in practice.
Smith expressed concern over this lack of transparency from both the Universities involved and the MoD. “The Defence Universities Alliance [was] announced by the government…to little fanfare… and then sort of radio silence as to what that actually meant, what it materially constituted for the universities”, he said. “It was all done behind closed doors, from what I can see. There was no public consultation.”
Smith added that the universities and the MoD were not handling the process in “a very robust fashion”, failing to openly face criticisms of the partnership, and to engage sensitively with anti-military rhetoric on campuses.
The Glasgow University Students’ Representative Council (SRC) has also raised
concerns that they were not consulted over the decision.
Speaking to the Glasgow Guardian, Molly Corbett, President of the SRC, stated that they first became aware of Glasgow’s potential involvement with the DUA on 15 April, when the issue of defence-linked research was brought to the University Court by Professor Chris Pearce, Vice President for Research and Knowledge Exchange. The SRC learned of the University’s successful application on 13 July, when it was publicly announced. Corbett said that while they were notified that the University would apply, they were not consulted.
Corbett said that following the announcement, the SRC contacted University Principal Andy Schofield directly with their concerns. In response, Schofield said the University senior management are not normally expected to consult the SRC on research matters.
Corbett disputed this claim. “It’s difficult to accept that the principal believes there’s no status quo of consulting the SRC on research matters”, she said. “We’re an elected representative body, and we represent thousands of postgraduate students, of whom research is a direct marker of their student experience.” She said research also forms part of the student experience for other students, making the decision not to consult the SRC “particularly confusing”.
Jackson agreed that students should have been consulted before the University joined the DUA, even if not through the SRC. “I think it was probably a mistake not to have done some form of consultation”, he said. “I think that the university has a responsibility to take into account the views of its students.”
When contacted for comment, the University did not directly address these concerns, instead reiterating its 13 July statement announcing the partnership.
Corbett also disputed the DUA being characterised as a purely research-based alliance. She said the Charter contains three categories of obligations: defence research, “improving support for defence skills requirements, and promoting careers in defence”, and a general obligation to collaborate, that requires members “to assist the wider defence community where applicable”.
One of the SRC’s key concerns is obligation 3d of the charter, which commits members to “take robust and proactive steps to detect and resist any foreign interference” that restricts the freedom of speech and academic freedom of staff, students, or visiting speakers. Corbett said the SRC fears that this could result in increased surveillance of international students and campaigns against the arms industry.
However, Jackson said he did not expect academic freedom to be compromised by the partnership. “[The University’s] obligation, their moral and professional obligation, is to protect their academic freedom, absolutely, and protect the rights of their students to disagree with government policy”, he said.
The same clause has drawn concern from GU Divestment Coalition, a group made up of over 80 clubs and societies advocating for the University to divest from the arms industry.
In an 11 August Instagram Post, the group publicly urged students to “resist the Defence Universities Alliance”.
Speaking to The Glasgow Guardian, Isaac Baldwin, an active member of the coalition, highlighted obligation 3d, as well as obligation 2c, which requires the University to “allow and support” defence sector firms and the Armed Forces to attend career events.
He believes the student and staff-led protest movement against arms contractors at career fairs, as well as protests over speakers who the coalition says have supported Israel’s genocide in Gaza could be targeted by these clauses. “The concern is [that] the DUA asks the University of Glasgow to securitise our campus, specifically targeting and squashing protests so that arms companies can come back onto campus again and specifically recruit students”, he said. Baldwin acknowledged that this was the group’s own interpretation of what the Charter may mean in practice.
In response to the concerns raised, the MoD said obligation 3d “is not intended to apply to lawful student or staff-led protest activity”, and that the DUA “will not have any role in, or influence over, how individual universities manage protests, freedom of speech or academic freedom on their campuses”. In terms of obligation 2c, the MoD says the DUA “does not remove universities’ discretion over which organisations attend careers events”, and aims to promote defence careers “as part of a balanced portfolio”, not “at the expense of other career paths”.
Despite concerns raised over transparency, consultation and the implications of the Defence Universities Alliance, what the University of Glasgow’s founding membership may look like in practice remains unclear.
The MoD said that, as of yet, specifics around programmes or timelines have not been agreed. The initial focus is to lay the foundations and governance structures for long-term success, and future activity will be shaped jointly by alliance members once these are in place.
As of August, the SRC had asked the University to disclose further information about the application process and said it would lodge a Freedom of Information request if this was not provided. Corbett said that the issue of the DUA is ongoing, and the SRC will continue to raise concerns over Glasgow’s membership with senior management.
Image Credit: Innes McNicol, Photographer
