Over the last few years, in the context of widespread mobilisations in Italy in solidarity with the Palestinian people, student organisations and broader civil society have repeatedly urged Italian universities to terminate their academic collaborations with Israeli partners involved in international law violations in Palestine. While a few institutions have suspended ongoing agreements (namely the universities of Milan, Pisa and Florence), a larger group has decided not to renew or conclude new ones. Although different in scope, these decisions share the common feature of being informed by, and based on, universities’ statutory commitments to promote peace and human rights throughout their academic and institutional activities.

An emblematic case is the decision of the University of Pisa to suspend two framework agreements with Israeli counterparts, which shortly followed an amendment to the University’s Statute that now “recognises peace as a fundamental principle and commits to promoting its application across all institutional activities”. Accordingly, the Academic Senate held that all collaborations must be evaluated in light of “the Statute’s core values of peace, justice, and ethical responsibility”. Similarly, the University of Padua’s decision not to undertake new agreements with Israeli partners “that contribute to the continuation of severe violations of international law and the illegal occupation of Palestinian territory” explicitly refers to the University Statute, according to which the University “promotes the development of a culture founded on universal values such as human rights, peace, environmental protection, and international solidarity”. Along the same lines, the University of Milan’s decision not to “sign or renew any agreement with universities, institutions or other stakeholders that are implicated directly or indirectly in these violations” was based on the premise that “all academic cooperation agreements must be consistent with fundamental rights, the promotion of peace, as well as any other rights protected by the University Statute”.

These developments suggest a growing willingness on the part of Italian universities to acknowledge their role and responsibilities in promoting peace and human rights, as well as to act accordingly. They also indicate that international agreements not aligned with universities’ statutory commitments should, in principle, be avoided or suspended. At the same time, however, it should be noted that the decisions mentioned above were adopted mainly in response to public pressure and as exceptional measures, rather than pursuant to pre-established criteria and procedures. In fact, even the institutions that decided to suspend or review agreements have not, to date, developed human rights policies specifically aimed at preventing academic collaborations from being concluded with partners involved in human rights violations, leaving it unclear how such decisions will be concretely implemented. A limited step in this direction can be found in the recent amendment to the Dual−Use Research Guidelines of Sapienza University of Rome, which introduces due diligence requirements for certain collaborations with non-EU partners. However, limiting screening mechanisms to dual−use research fails to address universities’ human rights responsibilities as broadly defined in their statutes.

Therefore, in order to ensure full consistency between formal commitments and practice, Italian academic institutions should consider designing and implementing due diligence procedures for all their academic and institutional activities, including international agreements. Moreover, although universities’ statutes normally refer to peace and human rights as fundamental principles, these references are often vague and do not properly define the nature and scope of such commitments. In particular, there has so far been no debate within Italian academia on whether universities have mere social responsibilities to respect human rights – similarly to business enterprises under the international business and human rights framework – or whether they are directly bound by international human rights norms as State organs under international law. Arguably, addressing these theoretical issues and developing operational frameworks regulating the conclusion of international collaborations would not only enhance coherence between formal commitments and practice, but also allow universities to respond to human rights concerns – such as those raised by partnerships with certain Israeli institutions – more rapidly and effectively than they have done in recent years.