A special report by Nathan Honeycutt and Lee Jussim: “The Implementation of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Academia”

You can read Honeycutt and Jussim’s report, here. ¹

This report, “The Implementation of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion,” is published on Jussim’s Substack, Unsafe Science. If you wish, you can subscribe to Unsafe Science for free, or access more content and support research for a very modest fee.

(I’ve introduced Lee Jussim in an earlier post, here.)

Executive Summary

1. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) values and programs are being widely instituted throughout academia.
2. “Diversity” has two meanings: i. Variety (pluralism, people from all walks of life); ii. making extra efforts toward welcoming and providing extra benefits toward groups progressives consider deserving of special protections. DEI implementation is often disingenuous in that much academic rhetoric is about the first meaning of diversity, but the implementation of DEI is almost entirely focused around the second.
3. DEI attempts to mobilize individual forms of affirmative action and selective preferences for those groups progressives consider protected. Most Americans oppose selective preferences based on race and gender.
4. Mandatory DEI statements are on the rise, and typically require applicants to commit to a progressive political action agenda akin to affirmative action.
5. Objections to the use of mandatory DEI statements include that they are: i. a mechanism of political discrimination against non-progressives; ii. a form of either compelled speech or censorship; iii. an infringement on academic freedom; iv. likely to impair the quality of teaching and scholarship by restricting (sometimes severely) the pool of applicants from which new faculty are selected; v. there is currently little evidence documenting their effectiveness or unintended side effects. 
6. A research agenda and recommendations for better DEI initiatives and protecting academic freedom are provided.

Resources

[1]Nathan Honeycutt and Lee Jussim, “The Implementation of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Academia,” Unsafe Science, Reports, Lee Jussim, Substack, November 27, 2022, https://unsafescience.substack.com/p/the-implementation-of-diversity-equity?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email . Accessed December 19, 2022.