Friday, July 23, 2010

Warburg Institute, Saved From Nazis, Faces Bureaucratic Threat

A great cultural foundation that was saved from the Nazis is now under threat from a different, more insidious menace: the bureaucratic policies of modern British higher education.

The Warburg Institute at London University is renowned throughout the scholarly world for its remarkable library, founded over a century ago. Yet today its existence as an independent entity is in doubt, and may be decided in court.

The story is a long and sad one. “Everybody has a feeling of disbelief that we have got to this point,” the director of the Warburg, Charles Hope, said in an interview. “The university has said that it wishes to change the Trust Deed, according to which the Warburg was originally handed over to the University of London in 1944, and is talking to its lawyers -- and we are talking to our lawyers.”

Click here to read the article from Bloomberg

See also our earlier article Professor Peter Mack appointed Director of Warburg Institute