Why house this initiative at the New School?
The answer to this question is simple. The New School for Social Research was the home of the original University in Exile. It was created in 1933 by the New School’s first President, Alvin Johnson, in response to the growing threat of Nazism in Europe. It was his way of helping to save the European scholars and intellectuals whose lives and livelihoods were threatened by the rise of Hitler.
Johnson brought a significant number of these scholars to The New School in New York City where they were originally identified collectively as the University in Exile and then in 1934 became the Graduate Faculty of Political and Social Science. He also helped many other threatened scholars to obtain positions at other universities in the United States.
It was our own past as the first University in Exile that led us to once again look for ways to assist the many scholars who are currently threatened by conflict and persecution. It seemed incumbent upon us to defend against today’s atrocities that undermine the independence of thought and research upon which and for which universities are founded.