The Professional Costs of Speech Sanctioning Events: Evidence from Academia

Abstract

Public controversies over employee speech where individuals face backlash for expressing views deemed controversial, unpopular, or misaligned with prevailing norms - sometimes colloquially referred to as “cancel culture” - have become increasingly prevalent. Yet, systematic evidence of their professional consequences remains limited. Leveraging a novel dataset of U.S.-based academics involved in such events, combined with bibliometric data, we employ a series of difference-in-differences designs to measure the effects on individuals’ productivity and recognition. We find that, following these events, affected scholars experience a decline in the recognition of their prior body of work, with citations declining by 4.8%, reflecting a form of peer-to-peer distancing. Furthermore, affected scholars experience a decline in their productivity, publishing 20% fewer papers compared to a comparable set of scholars. These citation declines are disproportionately driven by scholars who are closely connected to the affected individual, consistent with a mechanism of professional distancing. Our findings highlight the professional and career costs associated with speech sanctioning events.

Keywords: Science, Free Speech, Academic Freedom, Politics of Science, Economics of Science, Political Economy, Innovation