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Over the past few weeks, Northwestern University has become embroiled in scandal sparked by allegations of a pattern and practice of hazing among football players.
According to Northwestern President Michael Schill: “The hazing included forced participation, nudity and sexualized acts of a degrading nature.” Many outside the university, and some within it, have blamed Northwestern as an institution for allowing a toxic culture of oppression. Northwestern, in turn, has so far held accountable only head football coach Pat Fitzgerald for not stopping the abuse, though its own internal investigation reportedly found no evidence that he actually knew about it. Northwestern is now facing multiple lawsuits, and a new investigation has been commissioned. This all may well be appropriate.
What is surprising, however, is how little discussion there has been of responsibility by the players themselves — both by the university and outside commentators.
This omission is strange. Messaging from Northwestern has emphasized the university’s support for its players and has asserted that student athletes are “unfairly being implicated by a broad brush.” Indeed, a narrative is emerging that all players are victims, even those who committed the acts of hazing. But if hazing in the football team happened as described, many players participated.
Northwestern, like all universities, has a student handbook that sets forth a code of conduct, which under Illinois law is typically a contract. Northwestern’s student handbook from the 2021-22 school year defines hazing as “any action taken or situation created … to produce: mental, physical, or emotional discomfort; servitude; degradation; embarrassment; harassment; or ridicule for the purpose of initiation into, affiliation with, or admission to, or as a condition for continued membership in a group, team, or other organization.”
The handbook calls for discipline of individual perpetrators up to and including expulsion as well as discipline of student organizations that “actively or passively” condone hazing. The conduct alleged in news reports clearly violates the university’s code of conduct, and consequently any players involved in hazing have violated their agreement with the university. Though details are still emerging, the conduct alleged may also violate Illinois’ Hazing Act.
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Chicago Tribune Opinion
In other times and contexts, the university has punished individuals, groups and organizations involved in hazing. In 2006, when Northwestern discovered evidence of hazing in its athletic teams and among its costumed school mascots, Northwestern swiftly imposed penalties on individual athletes and whole teams. The women’s soccer team was suspended, all male swimmers were placed on disciplinary probation and the school mascots were fired.
Northwestern and other universities have likewise punished entire fraternities for the conduct of some members, including hazing. Indeed, Northwestern’s handbook explicitly authorizes the university to take disciplinary action against “groups of students and recognized student organizations” for violations of the code of conduct. In the future, one may wonder how Northwestern can enforce such discipline in good faith against other students and student organizations if it does not now undertake a serious investigation of individual football players and the team as a whole. The perception that some groups are untouchable is dangerous and indeed may be partially responsible for Northwestern’s current problems.
We agree with Schill about the importance of organizational leadership. Leaders should sometimes be held accountable for conduct they should have known about, even if they did not know directly. Though in this case, it seems difficult to explain why the same logic of leadership responsibility does not extend to those lower down and higher up on the organizational chart. Northwestern’s policy is that all university employees are mandatory reporters when they hear of or observe abuse, and head and assistant coaches have affirmative obligations to monitor for such behavior. If such monitoring was not in place or was inadequate, the failure was systemic. We doubt very much that the sole responsibility lies with Fitzgerald.
Although we agree that organizational structures matter and that universities must put in place procedures and policies to prevent and correct hazing and other forms of harassment, the misconduct alleged was engaged in by students. The additional investigation may provide an opportunity to address this missing piece. To acknowledge the responsibility of students and hold them accountable for misconduct, if proved, is not to absolve leaders or institutions of their responsibility. It is instead to treat students as more than victims of their environment. It is to treat them as individuals with autonomy and agency — even under conditions of constraint and pressure. It is also to give them an opportunity, in the appropriate university forum, to defend themselves if the prevailing narrative is untrue.
It is, in other words, to treat them as adults. That is the dignity and respect Northwestern owes to all its students, both perpetrators and victims.
Max Schanzenbach is the Seigle Family professor of law and Kimberly Yuracko the Judd and Mary Morris Leighton professor of law at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law.
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