Darian-Smith’s Policing Higher Education earns dual honors
Darian-Smith’s Policing Higher Education earns dual honors
- July 7, 2026
- National book awards from Society of Professors of Education and Foreword INDIES recognize the global legal scholar’s contributions to understanding challenges shaping higher ed
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Eve Darian-Smith, UC Irvine global and international studies and law Distinguished Professor, has been recognized with two book awards for her latest work, Policing Higher Education: The Antidemocratic Attack on Scholars and Why It Matters (Johns Hopkins University Press).
The first - an Outstanding Book Award from the Society of Professors of Education - spotlights her efforts to help readers understand the relationship between education and the broader social contexts in which schools operate. The second - a Foreword INDIES Silver Medal in Education - honors the book as one of the top education titles published in 2025 by an independent or university press, highlighting its discussion of key trends in higher education.
Released in May 2025, Policing Higher Education explores on-going and increasing threats to academic freedom at home and abroad. Using a global framework to examine instances of arrests, surveillance, curriculum control, denial of tenure, and more, Darian-Smith, who also chairs the Department of Global and International Studies, exposes intense and connected struggles over economic, political, and social power at the core of this international crisis. The work was recognized in December by Forbes as one of the ten best higher education books of 2025.
Notably, Darian-Smith’s work as a fellow at the American Association for University Professors Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom over the past two years has informed her appreciation of how vulnerable universities and colleges are to political censorship and ideological oppression seeking to undermine democracy.
Hear more from Darian-Smith in our Experts On series, and check out her author Q&A where she contextualizes threats to academic freedom alongside a global trend toward authoritarianism, urging a reexamination of the critical role universities play in safeguarding democracy.
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