U.S. branch campuses in China create ‘ethical quandaries’ for free speech, criticism of China: expert

Sarah McLaughlin started working at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education back in 2012 as part of Drexel University’s undergraduate co-op program, where she worked directly with students and faculty facing rights violations as part of FIRE’s Individual Rights Defense Program.

In recent years, she’s turned her attention to the relationship between American higher education and the rest of the world, writing smart, insightful pieces about the influence of foreign governments on campus free speech rights in the U.S.

“I’ve been digging into what it means for academic institutions with free speech obligations to expand into countries with worse, and in some cases extremely restrictive, speech policies,” McLaughlin told The College Fix. “It’s an issue that provides a lot of insight into the difficulties of defending free speech in an age where censorship is less bound by traditional borders.”