In western democratic countries, the government doesn't typically exercise very much control over academia (and in fact academia is a huge source of criticism of the government and its policies in most such countries). There are exceptions (eg that thing recently where the government of Texas harassed an A&M academic over criticising His Holiness the Lieutenant Governor) but that was exceptional enough that it got significant news coverage, and the government of Texas is definitely on the dysfunctional end of western democracies.