It is unclear why the media have remained so soft on the most important questions arising from the Jason Arday affair. Indeed, one could reasonably ask whether the current focus on media reporting surrounding his career and then death has, intentionally or otherwise, shifted attention away from the University’s own role in the story.
By Branislav Radeljić
There are at least five basic questions that Cambridge should be able to answer, and none of them necessarily requires the internal inquiry that Cambridge has stated it would conduct:
These are not speculative questions. Nor are they questions about race, political ideology, or Jason Arday’s personal circumstances. They are questions about a university recruitment process and about the institutional safeguards that are supposed to operate when a university appoints someone to a professorship.
If the media’s objective is, as The Guardian has stated, to “establish what was true,” then surely the process by which Cambridge established that Arday was suitable for a professorship should form a central part of that inquiry.
To help the media do their job: What did Cambridge know when it appointed him? What was it told? What did it check? Who assessed his academic record? Who made the final decision? What information was available to the decision-makers? And, perhaps most importantly, did anyone raise concerns at the time?
These questions do not require anyone to speculate about Arday’s intentions. They do not require journalists to make judgements about his character. They do not require access to private medical information or other sensitive personal material. They require Cambridge to explain, to the extent that it can, how its own appointment process operated.
And this matters for a very simple reason: obtaining an academic position, let alone a full professorship, at Cambridge is not easy. One would therefore reasonably assume that the pool of candidates was strong, that the appointment process was competitive, and that the candidate ultimately appointed had undergone substantial academic scrutiny and due diligence.
That is precisely why the information that has subsequently emerged about Arday’s CV and academic record raises questions about Cambridge itself.
Those questions are not questions about race. They are questions about hiring procedures, academic standards, and meritocracy. Personally, unless there is a quota involved, I do not care about his or anyone else’s skin colour; I care about fairness and accountability.
If Cambridge applies its appointment procedures consistently, then those procedures should apply irrespective of the candidate’s protected characteristics. The relevant question is therefore very simple: was the same standard of scrutiny applied here that would have been applied to any other candidate for a professorship at Cambridge?
If the answer is yes, Cambridge should be able to explain how its procedures worked and why the appointment was considered appropriate.
If the answer is no, then that is a very serious institutional matter. This leads to a difficult but entirely legitimate counterfactual question: had Cambridge properly followed its own procedures and conducted appropriate due diligence, might it have reached a different decision on awarding Arday a professorship?
If the answer to that question is potentially yes, then a further question follows: could Cambridge’s own failure to identify problems at the appointment stage have contributed to the subsequent disaster? These are uncomfortable questions for Cambridge. But the fact that a question is uncomfortable does not make it illegitimate.
We have already seen statements that Jason was offered support following his resignation. Whatever precisely that means, particularly given how offers of “support” can sometimes be framed by HR departments following a dismissal or resignation, it does not answer the fundamental institutional questions.
Support after resignation is not an explanation of how the appointment was made. It does not tell us what the job advertisement said. It does not tell us who else was interviewed. It does not tell us what references or external assessments were obtained. It does not tell us whether concerns were raised. And it does not tell us whether Cambridge’s internal procedures operated as intended.
The whole Arday affair is so troubling that it almost invites a different, and decidedly provocative reading: was the hiring panel, aware of the mounting problems in higher education, actually determined to hire Arday because his case had the potential to expose the sector’s, including DEI policies’, failings?
This is why the current direction of the media discussion is troubling. There appears to be considerable interest in establishing what was reported about Arday before his death, and whether particular reporting contributed to the circumstances surrounding him.
Those are legitimate questions in themselves. But they should not become a substitute for asking what Cambridge knew, what Cambridge did, and whether Cambridge’s own processes failed.
Indeed, one has to ask whether the intense focus on the media’s role risks creating a very convenient narrative for the University. If the central issue becomes whether journalists behaved appropriately, Cambridge itself can become a secondary character in the story rather than one of the institutions whose decisions require scrutiny. This is not to suggest that the media should not examine their own conduct.
They should. Nor to suggest that the circumstances surrounding Arday’s death are irrelevant. They are obviously serious and deserve appropriate consideration. But there is a fundamental distinction between what journalists subsequently reported and why Cambridge appointed him in the first place.
That seems to be the most obvious place for any serious investigation to begin. And if Cambridge did everything correctly, there should be nothing particularly threatening about answering these questions.
If, on the other hand, the University failed to exercise the level of due diligence one would reasonably expect before making a professorial appointment. The public deserves to know that, too. And so do the other shortlisted candidates who the process may have disadvantaged and may wish to seek justice. That is what accountability means.
Branislav Radeljić is a London-based academic, consultant, and expert witness. His scholarly interests focus on European and Middle Eastern political and socioeconomic developments. He is the author and editor of numerous publications, and he has regularly provided services to various government entities and non-governmental stakeholders.
