Equality and social justice : the university as a site of struggle

Despite the proclaimed allegiance of most countries to the principles of equality enshrined in the UN Declaration on Human Rights, inequality is a pervasive feature of the global order. Yet, it is important not to be overwhelmed by the scale of global injustice. In every country there is resistance to power and privilege, with people working at many levels to create more equal societies.
In this paper we will summarise the reasons why we came to establish Equality Studies in UCD almost 20 years ago as one way of responding to injustices (for a more detailed discussion see Lynch, 1995), and why in 2005, we further institutionalised an academic space for this work by forming a School of Social Justice, and a network of scholars from across the University who are committed to research and teaching in social justice to form the Egalitarian World Initiative (EWI) network www.ewi.ie . We begin by explaining why universities have a particular remit to challenge injustice and why it is important for them to retain that responsibility in a market-led era in higher education.