by Claude Opus 5.5
Jennifer Freyd’s concept of “institutional betrayal” describes harm done when trusted institutions fail victims. Does it apply here, given that Cornell did impose expulsions?
The psychologist Jennifer Freyd, with Carly Parnitzke Smith, introduced the concept of institutional betrayal to describe the harm that occurs when an institution people depend on fails to prevent or respond appropriately to wrongdoing within it. Their research, including a widely cited 2014 article in American Psychologist, found that students who experienced sexual assault and also felt betrayed by their institution showed more severe trauma-related symptoms than those who did not. The betrayal compounded the original harm.
Freyd and Smith identified several forms institutional betrayal can take: failing to prevent abuse where it could reasonably have been prevented; creating an environment in which abuse seems normal; making it difficult to report; responding inadequately to reports; covering up; and punishing or disbelieving those who report. Freyd later proposed the contrasting idea of institutional courage: an institution’s commitment to seek the truth and act rightly even at cost to itself.
The question is whether this concept applies to Cornell, which, unlike many institutions accused of betrayal, did hold a lengthy hearing and impose serious sanctions, including expulsions.
The case that it does not apply
On the most obvious reading, institutional betrayal involves inaction or cover-up. Cornell investigated, held a twelve-day hearing with more than thirty witnesses, and found several respondents responsible. It closed the fraternity chapter. It expelled some students. These are not the actions of an institution that ignored a complaint. If the concept applies here, the worry is that it applies to almost any institutional response that falls short of perfection, which would make it too broad to be useful.
The case that it may apply
But Freyd’s concept is not limited to total inaction. Several of her categories could be relevant, depending on the facts.
Inadequate response. If, as alleged, some respondents received sanctions widely regarded as trivial for serious findings, such as a reflection paper for attempted sexual exploitation, the complainant may experience that as the institution failing to take her harm seriously, even if other respondents were expelled.
Process burden. A process lasting many months, with live cross-examination, may itself be experienced as harmful. Freyd’s research suggests that how a complainant is treated during a process matters as much as its outcome.
Campus police. Reports suggest that campus police may not have interviewed the accused and that the summary statement on which the district attorney relied is disputed. If a university’s own police service mishandled the initial report, that is an institutional failure, separate from the Title IX process.
Information flow. If the institution’s records never reached prosecutors, and the complainant had to act as the conduit, the institution’s structures may have left her carrying burdens it should have borne.
Public response. Describing criticism as a “false narrative” while withholding information may be experienced by the complainant as the institution protecting its reputation rather than supporting her.
Can an institution betray someone while following its own rules?
This is the deeper question. Freyd’s concept suggests that it can. Betrayal is defined in terms of the reasonable expectations of those who depend on the institution, not in terms of compliance with internal procedures. An institution can follow every rule and still betray, if the rules themselves are inadequate, or if their application leaves the person who reported feeling abandoned.
That does not mean every dissatisfied complainant has been betrayed. The concept has normative content: it applies when an institution fails to do what it reasonably should. Assessing that requires facts that, in this case, are still emerging.
Mixed responses
The Cornell case may illustrate a phenomenon that the concept has not fully addressed: mixed responses. An institution may act courageously in some respects, by expelling respondents and closing a chapter, and fail in others, through inconsistent sanctions, policing failures or defensive communication. The complainant’s experience may reflect both. A useful refinement of Freyd’s framework would assess institutional responses as a whole, recognising that betrayal and courage can coexist.
Such an approach would also help institutions themselves. If betrayal is treated as all or nothing, an institution that has done some things well may conclude that criticism is simply unfair. If it is treated as a matter of degree, the institution can acknowledge specific failures while defending what it got right.
For discussion
Is it possible for an institution to do many things right and still betray someone? What would “institutional courage” have looked like in this case? And should the complainant’s own sense of betrayal be decisive, or should there be an objective standard?