The Test of the Institutions

In canceling its spring events, PEN America loses sight of its core mission.

The 2023 PEN America Literary Gala. (Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for PEN America.)

The center is not holding. 

Take a recent outrage that follows numbingly familiar dynamics. The writer-support organization PEN America comes under sustained assault from a more radical wing and, after multiple open letters and much back-and-forthing, cancels its Literary Awards ceremony and World Voices Festival. 

PEN America’s mission is—without qualification—admirable. As part of the international network of PEN centers, it describes its core work as “unit[ing] writers and their allies to support creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible.” PEN prides itself on a “big tent” approach and a “singular … commitment,” as nine past presidents put it in a recent letter, to “embrac[ing] dissent” within the organization. Nonetheless, in February, a group, eventually garnering over 1,300 signatures, wrote an open letter to PEN contending that “PEN America continually perpetuates fascist nation-statehood” and demanding that PEN “wake up from its own silent, tepid, neither-here-nor-there, self-congratulatory middle of the road and take an actual stand against an actual genocide.”

It wasn’t that PEN was so pro-Israel; in fact, since October 7, PEN has published more than 35 statements about the war, many of them critical of the suppression of Palestinian voices. It was that PEN hadn’t gone far enough. As the letter put it: “We demand PEN America release an official statement about the [writers] killed in Gaza and name their murderer: Israel, a Zionist colonial state funded by the U.S. government.” 

PEN, in its reply, appeared to move closer to the position of the open letter, calling for “an immediate ceasefire” and describing “the ravages of the current war” as “a stain on humanity for generations to come” but also reiterating the organization’s commitment to “diversity of opinions and perspectives, even if, for some, that very openness becomes reason to exit.”

As should have been obvious, though, there really was no room for negotiation—and that was made more than clear in the response by the splinter group, now self-described as being “in solidarity with one another and with the people of Palestine.” Their letter read in part: 

When PEN did decide to speak, the statements that followed show a lack of proportional empathy, and were often laced with ahistorical, Zionist propaganda hidden under the guise of neutrality. Neutrality is indeed a betrayal and PEN’s statements and actions demonstrate not only an immoral reliance on corporate dollars, but a lack of writerly courage. PEN America states that “the core” of its mission is to “support the right to disagree.” There is no disagreement. There is fact and fiction. Israel is leading a genocide of Palestinian people.

With nearly half of all nominees withdrawing, PEN canceled its Literary Awards ceremony. Several days later, facing a boycott, it canceled its signature World Voices Festival as well. In its press release PEN wrote: 

Many [writers] expressed genuine fear to us. As an organization that cares deeply about the freedom of writers to speak their conscience, we are concerned about any circumstance in which writers tell us they feel shut down, or that speaking their minds bears too much risk. Amid this climate, it became impossible to mount the Festival in keeping with the principles upon which it was founded 20 years ago.  

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In the media, there has been a great deal of consternation about the extremist outlook of the radical splinter group. As George Packer rightly noted in The Atlantic, “It isn’t a pretty sight when writers bully other writers into shutting down a celebration of world literature.” Indeed, it is hard to not feel sympathy for PEN’s leadership and the difficult position they have been placed in—with writers facing ostracism just for accepting their invitations to PEN’s events. 

But in our current emotionally-charged atmosphere, it shouldn’t be a surprise that groups express extreme positions. What matters is whether institutions, under pressure, are able to remember their core missions—which, so far, across American society, they seem to have had trouble doing. 

So while there is something deeply shocking in the language deployed by the splinter group—in the idea that a group of writers would award itself the right to adjudicate “fact and fiction” while unilaterally insisting that PEN abjure its century-old principle of neutrality—I am equally disturbed by PEN’s willingness to cancel its planned events. 

The Charter of Pen International, anticipating situations very much like this one, holds, “Literature knows no frontiers and must remain common currency among people in spite of political or international upheavals.” That means continuing PEN’s work no matter what. PEN has branches all over the world. Some of them are in authoritarian and repressive countries where the atmosphere is intrinsically hostile to freedom of expression. And in those situations—no matter how overpowering the prevailing political sentiments, how vituperative the animosity towards writers and journalists who fall afoul of them—PEN continues its mission. Often, that involves advocating for writers who are already in prison. 

The basis of an organization like PEN is that it transcends politics. Whatever the political gusts of the moment happen to be, there will still be people writing and PEN sees itself as supporting those writers and their freedom of expression. Maybe that seems like tepid neutrality, but it is actually a principled position that requires a great deal of institutional courage and clarity of vision. For an organization like PEN to cancel its events because of political pressure sends a clear signal that its commitment to writers and expression is not so ironclad after all, that political considerations prevail. 

I do understand the intense pressure that PEN, like all American institutions, is under at the moment. “Everyone I’ve spoken with there is in a state of high panic and deep sadness,” writes Gal Beckerman in The Atlantic. Those organizing the boycott have, apparently, been “merciless” in pressuring other writers to withdraw. In its press releases canceling the spring events, PEN sounds as if it’s been taken hostage (which may well be exactly how its leadership feels). It was “impossible” to host the World Voices Festival and “a very difficult decision” to cancel the Literary Awards ceremony, PEN wrote. 

But I’m sorry. The political center, if it is to survive, has to be made of tougher stuff than that. Okay, so many of the writers who had been nominated for awards withdrew their names. So the Israel/Gaza situation hangs heavily over PEN’s events. So maybe its awards ceremony and its black-tie gala wouldn’t be so fun this year. But so what? The whole basis of an organization like PEN is that it’s there for writers when things aren’t so glamorous. The ceremony could, if nothing else, have been conducted over Zoom. Writers who were worried that speaking their mind carried “too much risk” could have been given the opportunity to show their commitment to a profession which is, you know, all about speaking one’s mind even when there’s a risk involved. 

PEN held the line at the splinter group’s demands. They didn’t use the word genocide. They didn’t accept the splinter group’s characterization of the conflict. But by canceling their events, they made an even more significant concession to the splinter group: They demonstrated that the organization would grind its activities to a halt in the face of concerted-enough criticism. And that is, unfortunately, wholly symptomatic of institutions in our era (universities come to mind as well). They are used to easy and unquestioned authority. When they suddenly find themselves facing a challenge to their legitimacy, their tendency is to conciliate, and, when that isn’t possible, to bend. 

At the heart of that failure of nerve is a misunderstanding of the nature of an institution. To be an institution involves walking a thin line. It’s not about being morally right or wrong in every case. It’s about having core values—and sticking to them. American society is being pulled apart more than it has at any point in my lifetime. The extremes are having their say—and doing so with ever-greater vigor. To get through this period with something like the social fabric intact, the institutions will have to do something that they haven’t in a long time: They will have to find their backbone and reason for existing. They will have to continue with their organizational missions even when it hurts. 

Sam Kahn is an associate editor at Persuasion and writes the Substack Castalia.

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