Taliban’s Ideological Reengineering of Higher Education in Afghanistan
The Taliban’s impact on higher education is already evident. They are implementing extensive changes across the sector to align it with their ideology, resulting in significant academic suppression in the country.
This piece reports the recent updates to the textbooks and the enforcement of the ban. These changes are being implemented under the guidance of the Taliban’s supreme leader, with his close associates translating his directives—set forth in the Law of Vice and Virtue and other regulations—into evaluation criteria.
At the start of this academic year, the Taliban’s Ministry of Higher Education formed a committee of religious clerics and university lecturers to review the textbooks used at both undergraduate and graduate levels. Unofficial reports indicate that this committee rejected only about 10 percent of the materials, which was below expectations. Unhappy with this outcome, the ministry appointed a second committee of 270 religious figures closely aligned with the supreme leader to conduct a more thorough review. According to a directive from the ministry, this committee was tasked with examining textbooks and curricula from ideological, religious, and policy perspectives that align with Taliban priorities.
This time, the committee reportedly rejected nearly 679 out of more than 700 (unofficially reported) textbooks—over 90 percent of the previously approved materials. Banned subjects included sociology, law, political science, research, history, diplomacy, public administration, the arts, literature, economics, and most other fields. In their place, the ministry mandated that only alternative books conforming to Sharia principles and the Taliban's policies be utilized in academic programs.
Upon reviewing the list of banned subjects, the reasoning and patterns behind the Taliban’s decisions become clear. Any information or academic discourse that could empower students to critically question, reject, or ultimately challenge Taliban ideology is targeted for exclusion. A key aspect of this pattern is the suppression of ideas that contradict their worldview, particularly regarding the unequal status of men and women and the strict division between believers and non-believers. Materials presenting alternative perspectives are systematically banned and substituted with content intended to reinforce the Taliban’s ideology and social structure.
This act is part of a broader campaign to ban books and control the production and circulation of knowledge in Afghanistan. The Taliban have already confiscated thousands of books from libraries and bookstores, claiming they contradict the group’s ideology and policies. These actions extend beyond censorship; they represent a systematic effort to reshape Afghan society and erase the intellectual and academic advancements made over the past two decades, replacing them with the Taliban’s own vision of social and cultural order.