Faculty support research policies

Faculty and administrators strongly endorsed the University's policy of not evaluating sources of research funding from an ethical standpoint yesterday. In fact, many said the acceptance of research grants from the Pioneer Fund, an allegedly racist foundation, is an example of the University's dedication to protecting the freedom of academic pursuits. Sociology Professor Paul Allison said the practice of applying ethical tests to sources of research funding could result in a "serious limitation of academic freedom." "You put yourself in a position of being captive of various political audiences who don't like particular points of view [when you apply such standards]," he said. Controversy over the University's policy arose this summer when University alumnus Harlan Girard asked the University Board of Trustees to look into a $6,500 grant from the Pioneer Fund to Associate Regional Science Professor Daniel Vining. A book published earlier this year states that the Pioneer Fund promotes eugenic racism -- an idea that the human race can be improved by eliminating its "negative" traits through controlled selective breeding. University President Judith Rodin said Monday that many officials consider motivations behind the Pioneer Fund "noxious." But, she said, an attempt to create a uniform moral standard from which to judge sources of funding would cause more problems than it would solve. "The issue of who defines what is ethical or not in an institution in which we believe in breadth of freedom of expression is something that most universities are not willing [to take on]," Rodin said. Jane Menken, director of the Population Studies Center, said she does not like the idea of applying ethical tests to funding sources, but feels the research itself has to be conducted in an ethical manner. "There should be freedom of inquiry with the protection of human subjects, meaning that no research should be damaging to the people participating in it," Menken said. Allison and Menken both claimed that the denial of grants from foundations based on ethical considerations would significantly restrict areas of research. "You have to be careful not to censor people's research topics [or] restrict their ability to ask questions," Menken said. Allison said no topic of research should be off-limits to social scientists. "My gut reaction is that there is no topic that ought to be, in principle, out of bounds, even though it may be politically sensitive and make people uncomfortable discussing it," Allison said. "Research on the relationship between race and intelligence is one obvious example," he added. According to Vining, the 1992 grant from the Pioneer Fund backed his research on the relationship between intelligence and birth rates of Jews and Arabs in Israel. Arthur Caplan, director of the University's Center for Bioethics, said researchers like Vining are responsible for determining the appropriateness of the source of a research grant. "I think it's very difficult to monitor the behavior of foundations and grant-givers," Caplan said. "I wouldn't like to see the University try to police foundation conduct. "I think it is the researcher's obligation to know where the money is coming from," Caplan added. Stephen Gale, former chairperson of the Regional Science Department, emphasized the importance of faculty members' making their own ethical decisions about sources of funding. "To set ethical guidelines puts [the University] in an enormously strained position," Gale said. "The faculty member must use his or her own judgment whether or not to associate with a particular organization." Allison, who has been involved in the field of sociological research for 20 years, said he personally would not accept research funding from a foundation like the Pioneer Fund. "I would feel very uncomfortable accepting money from such an organization," Allison said. "And I think that if any other social scientist came to me, I would counsel them not to [accept the money]."