Athenai Institute

The organization has drafted model legislation for state legislatures to adopt called the Action to Halt the Expansion of Neo-Authoritarian Influence (ATHENAI) Act, which would require colleges and universities to close their Confucius Institutes on penalty of losing state subsidies. ^{2 3}

Background

The Athenai Institute is a college student-led organization that seeks to limit the influence of the Chinese Communist Party on U.S. college campuses. The organization was started in consultation with activists such as Yang Jianli, Teng Biao, and Nuri Turkel. ⁴ John Metz is the president of the Athenai Institute. ⁵

The Athenai Institute, founded in May 2020, made three requests of colleges and universities. The first is to stop taking money from the Chinese Communist Party or its proxies. The second is to stop investing in companies linked to the Chinese government. The third is to disclose all financial entanglements with China. ^{2 3}

As of early 2023, the Athenai Institute had 21 state chapters. ⁶

The group contends universities cannot be trusted to educate students about the Chinese Communist Party’s threats to liberty around the world if they have ties to the Chinese Communist Party. ⁷

The Athenai Institute contends between 2018 and 2021 that U.S. universities received more than $1 billion in gifts and contracts from mainland China, which includes funding for Confucius Institutes, research partnerships and joint degree programs. ⁵

Opposition to Confucius Institutes

The Athenai Institute drafted model legislation for state legislatures to adopt called the Action to Halt the Expansion of Neo-Authoritarian Influence (ATHENAI) Act. The legislation requires colleges and universities to close their Confucius Institutes on penalty of losing state education funding. The bill also prohibits continuing Confucius Institutes under different names. ¹

Shortly after its founding, the Athenai Institute released the Washington Appeal that called for the closure of all Confucius Institutes nationally, and made the case to chapters of the College Democrats and the College Republicans. ¹

More than 80 universities hosted Confucius Institutes when the Athenai Institute began in May 2020. By early 2023, the number had declined to seven nationally. ⁶

The Confucius Institute U.S. Center claims the Athenai Institute inaccurately portrays how local Confucius Institutes address controversial issues in their programming, and that the local CIs choose their own textbooks and materials. ⁸

Advocacy

The Athenai Institute wrote an open letter to “presidents and governing boards of U.S. flagship public universities” calling for divestment from China for both moral and fiduciary reasons. The April 26, 2022 letter reads: “We are asking you to take all possible steps to investigate your institution’s endowment, including the endowment of any institutionally related foundation, for ties to entities complicit in the genocide of Uyghurs, and to divest from any such holdings.” ⁹

The letter was signed onto by current and former public office holders including members of Congress, former Trump administration Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, former undersecretary of state Keith Krach, as well as several organizations that include College Democrats of America, College Republicans National Committee, Human Rights Foundation, the Jewish Movement for Uyghur Freedom, Tibet Action Institute, and Hong Kong Watch. ^{10 11}

In 2021, the Catholic University of America was the first school to commit to auditing its endowment for any potential links to companies tied to China’s human rights abuses. ²

The Athenai Institute supported the establishment of the House Select Committee on China, which gained bipartisan backing in 2023 with a 365-65 vote. ³

The Athenai Institute joined Heritage Action for America and the Foundation for Defense of Democracy Action to support the Preventing Malign CCP Influence on Academic Institutions Act. The bill would increase transparency requirements for universities that receive funding from individuals, universities, think tanks, companies, or programs that have members of the Chinese Communist Party sitting on their boards. ¹²

The Athenai Institute also has a divestment campaign targeted at endowments of U.S. military-affiliated institutions, including the U.S. Naval Academy, Air Force Academy, Military Academy at West Point, Coast Guard Academy, and National Defense University. ¹³

The institute established the Frank Wolf-Tony Hall Fellows Program named for Wolf, a former Republican congressman from Virginia and Hall, a retired Democratic congressman and U.S. Ambassador from Ohio. The program accepts eight undergraduate college students each year to learn about the need for higher education institutions to disentangle financially from China. The fellows participate in biweekly seminars hosted by experts on China human-rights issues, competition with the U.S., other related Chinese matters, as well as conversations with Uyghurs, Tibetans, and Hong Kongers. ¹⁴