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Academic freedom is currently under pressure. The most obvious cases in Europe are those of Hungary and Poland, where the state interferes directly in core academic issues by chan-ging the laws. More generally, research and teaching are at risk in European democracies. Except in Hungary and Poland, this is not only due to political constraints: society itself seems to have lost its trust in science. Scientific results are declared “fake news” and students and lecturers are not allowed to discuss social, gender or integration issues (keyword: “trigger warning”). Such threats to research and teaching curb scientific autonomy directly and indirectly.
Universities in Germany and other countries have recently undergone comprehensive reforms: they are expected to contribute to social development through exchange with external actors. These exchanges are commonly termed “third mission”. In this context knowledge and technology transfer can prove to be particularly critical to academic freedom, because market logic and economically rational behaviour may lead to goals in conflict with the institutional logic of scientific communities.
This chapter focuses on the German reaction to the Covid-19 pandemic, in relation to the employment of both the funds from the NGEU and the internal funds. The Deutscher Auf-bau- und Resilienzplan (DARP) is a national recovery and resilience plan that is undoubtedly small, as it uses few resources when compared to the rest of Europe. Nevertheless, Germany has undergone a Copernican revolution both in its domestic economic policies, in which an investment package has been approved that violates the balanced budget, and in its relation-ship with European policies, which have seen resources injected to achieve ambitious reform goals.