Billionaire financier and philanthropist George Soros has announced that he is donating $1 billion for a new global university network that will support and train students, especially underrepresented populations, worldwide, to build more open societies where “free expression” and a “diversity of beliefs” become the norm.
The global network is called the Open Society University Network (OSUN), said Soros last week at the World Economic Forum in Davos. His Vienna-based Central European University (CEU) and New York’s Bard College will form the core of the new network. Soros called the new initiative “the most important and enduring project of my life,” and urged supporters worldwide to also contribute to this higher education collaboration, which he hopes will counter the rise of nationalism, “the great enemy of open society.”
Over the last 30-plus years, Soros has given more than $32 billion to education and social justice causes, according to his philanthropic arm Open Society Foundations. One of his first efforts, in 1979, was a scholarship program for Black students living in apartheid South Africa.
“This initiative seems very much in line with what Soros wants to do, in a positive way, to break down national borders and use international education to foster a more cosmopolitan world,” said Dr. Daniel Bessner, associate professor in American foreign policy at the University of Washington. “Hopefully this [donation] will augur a new transition to the return of funding for universities.”
Soros’ latest effort complements CEU, which was forced out of Hungary last year, reportedly for political reasons. OSUN’s chancellor is Dr. Leon Botstein, president of Bard. The two entities will partner with Arizona State University and other institutions around the globe, such as the American University of Central Asia in Kyrgyzstan and BRAC University in Bangladesh, said Open Society Foundations in a statement.
Bard has been the recipient of significant philanthropy from Soros for 25 years, and since 2011, has worked more intensively on building a network of undergraduate liberal arts institutions with a focus on underserved and underrepresented populations, said Dr. Jonathan Becker, Bard’s vice president for academic affairs, who now also serves as OSUN’s vice chancellor.
“The vision for OSUN is to work with colleges and universities across the U.S. and the globe that have a commitment to various forms of diversity,” said Becker. Bard in the U.S. has worked to reach underrepresented populations through work like its prison initiative and early college outreach, which is funded not just by Soros’ foundations, but by other philanthropic efforts as well. “Our commitment is to address social justice issues of populations and OSUN will further that.”
