Jennifer Washburn

Jennifer Washburn:  Academic Freedom and the Corporate University
Commercial threats on campus have mounted—from industry control of research and corporate ghostwriting to restrictive sponsored-research agreements and intellectual property deals that place profits ahead of public health.

Heightened commercialism on campus is pulling universities and their faculties away from higher education’s core commitment to academic research, teaching, and the production of reliable public knowledge. Nearly a century ago, similar threats led to the birth of a new faculty organization—the American Association of University Professors—dedicated to advancing the scholarly professions across all disciplines and to safeguarding intellectual and academic freedom.

The founding of the AAUP in 1915 was largely a response to the overweening influence that powerful corporate interests and wealthy donors then exerted over the internal academic affairs of American colleges and universities. In their classic 1955 history, The Development of Academic Freedom in the United States, Richard Hofstadter and Walter Metzger point to nearly a dozen well-documented academic freedom cases between the late 1880s and early 1900s that exhibited essentially the same ugly pattern: a professor had criticized the social order or espoused economic reforms and had thereafter been targeted for summary dismissal, often by a local industrial magnate, a wealthy donor, or a powerful businessman who sat on the university’s board of trustees.

The AAUP, and the academic community generally, struggle today—and have been largely ineffectual—in their response to heightened forms of academic commercialism that threaten the university’s core academic purposes.

Academic-industry relationships are certainly not new or uniformly a problem: indeed, they have contributed to the advancement of science, the birth of new academic disciplines, and the development of important technologies. Over the past thirty years, however, commercial threats to campus activities have mounted as a result of the rapid growth of academic patenting and proprietary controls on academic knowledge, the rise of a more market-driven university administration, the expansion of financial conflicts of interest (both at the faculty and institutional levels), cutbacks in public support for higher education, and a variety of other forces (topics discussed in detail in the November–December 2010 issue of Academe). In many cases, commercial influences are affecting academic standards of scholarship and professional norms (through serious conflicts of interest, growing secrecy, suppression of negative results, and so on), while also challenging universities’ oft-stated commitment to the pursuit of truth and the advancement of reliable knowledge, in contrast to “corporate-contract research for hire.”

Two cases—involving two prominent professors at Brown University, David Kern and Martin B. Keller—illustrate some of the acute challenges that academic commercialism poses to academic freedom. Holding up a mirror to these two contrasting cases, and the responses they elicited, helps show why faculty need to confront excessive commercialism and financial conflicts on campus more aggressively.

Over the years the Kern and Keller cases have been the subject of considerable media attention, scientific journal articles, and critically acclaimed books. Most of this publicity and criticism came well after the events had occurred, however, raising critical questions: Will the academic community find ways to respond to commercial threats in a timely manner? If not, how can the universities’ commitment to scholarship, free inquiry, and public values be preserved?

Jennifer Washburn: Science's Worst Enemy: Corporate Funding
And You Thought the Bush Administration was Bad

In recent years there have been a number of highly visible attacks on American science, everything from the fundamentalist assault on evolution to the Bush administration’s strong-arming of government scientists. But for many people who pay close attention to research and development (R&D), the biggest threat to science has been quietly occurring under the radar, even though it may be changing the very foundation of American innovation. The threat is money—specifically, the decline of government support for science and the growing dominance of private spending over American research.

The trend is undeniable. In 1965, the federal government financed more than 60 percent of all R&D in the United States. By 2006, the balance had flipped, with 65 percent of R&D in this country being funded by private interests. According to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, several of the nation’s science-driven agencies—the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Agriculture, the Department of the Interior, and NASA—have been losing funding, leading to more “outsourcing” of what were once governmental science functions. The EPA, for example, recently began conducting the first nationwide study on the air quality effects of large-scale animal production. Livestock producers, not taxpayers, are slated to pay for the study. “The government is clearly increasing its reliance on industry and forming ‘joint ventures’ to accomplish research that it is unable to afford on its own anymore,” says Merrill Goozner, a program director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group.

Jennifer Washburn: Stanford's Deal with Exxon Mobil Raised Concerns

The alliance between the oil giant BP and the University of California, Berkeley, stands out because of its $500 million price tag, its commercial scope and the potential for BP to exert excessive influence over the academic research. But it isn’t an isolated case.

The second largest such partnership is a 10-year, $225-million deal Stanford University signed with Exxon Mobil and other energy firms in 2002 to fund a Global Climate and Energy Project.

The Stanford deal was controversial from the start, but one aspect recently captured headlines. The San Jose Mercury News reported March 11 that Steve Bing -- a movie producer and environmentalist -- was withdrawing a $2.5 million donation to Stanford and all future donations. (Bing had already donated $22.5 million to the school.) Why? Because Exxon Mobil has exploited its close relationship with Stanford in ads -- on TV and in print -- that seek to portray the company as a "green" company.

The most egregious of these was an ad in The New York Times, part of a series appearing on the commentary page, which celebrated the company’s new research partnership with the "best minds" at Stanford.

The ad suggested the global warming debate is ongoing: "Although climate has varied throughout Earth’s history from natural causes, today there is a lively debate about ... the climate’s response to the presence of more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere." The ad was signed by Lynn Orr, who directs the Global Warming and Energy Project.

Jennifer Washburn: Universities For Sale
Academics are exploiting weak conflict-of-interest policies and cashing in on their research

Most of us place enormous faith in our universities. We trust that they are autonomous, independent institutions committed to education, scholarship, academic freedom and the production of knowledge free from the influence of special interest groups. Right?

Wrong. In the last 25 years, the United States has given birth to a market-model university, one where professors increasingly work “for hire.” Just last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that a major academic study — which found that antidepressants were safe and effective for pregnant women — was tainted by undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Apparently, although the study itself was financed by the federal government, most of its 13 authors — including many prominent academics — also served as paid consultants to manufacturers of antidepressants. None of these financial ties were made public.

Jennifer Washburn: The Best Minds Money Can Buy

Most of us place enormous faith in our universities. We trust that they are autonomous, independent institutions committed to education, scholarship, academic freedom and the production of knowledge free from the influence of special interest groups. Right?

Wrong. In the last 25 years, the United States has given birth to a market-model university, one where professors increasingly work "for hire." Just last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that a major academic study -- which found that antidepressants were safe and effective for pregnant women -- was tainted by undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Apparently, although the study itself was financed by the federal government, most of its 13 authors -- including many prominent academics -- also served as paid consultants to manufacturers of antidepressants. None of these financial ties were made public.

Reports like this have proliferated in the last decade. Today, it is common for professors to moonlight as consultants for drug firms. They receive generous stipends to join company advisory boards. For a nominal fee -- anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000 -- some professors will even agree to be named as authors on journal articles ghostwritten by the drug industry and published without disclosure of company involvement.

Editors at top medical journals have warned that such commercialism threatens to undermine the integrity of academic science, but the blurring of academia and commerce continues.

Jennifer Washburn: University, Inc.: 10 Things You Should Know About Corporate Corruption on Campus
All the ways big business is intruding on your campus – from the Kmart Chair of Marketing to threats to U.S. Innovation.

Where are your tuition dollars going? Are universities wisely managing these funds? Are corporate donors and other commercial forces changing your universities’ priorities? Are student’s interests truly being served?

Here are 10 things that you—the students—might be interested to know…

Jennifer Washburn: Rent-a-Researcher

Earlier this month, Sheffield University in Britain offered $252,000 to one of its senior medical professors, Aubrey Blumsohn. According to a copy of a proposed settlement released by Blumsohn, the university promised to pay him if he would agree to leave his post and not make any detrimental or derogatory statements about Sheffield or its employees. For several years, Blumsohn had been complaining of scientific misconduct. His concerns primarily revolved around a $250,000 research contract between Sheffield and the Ohio-based Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals. Blumsohn claimed that the company had denied him access to key data and then tried to ghostwrite his analysis of it. He further alleged that P&G had engaged in such practices before.

Jennifer Washburn: Selling Out. Shouldn't we be pleased that universities are increasingly business minded?

Elias Zerhouni, director of the US National Institutes of Health, last week took one small step along the road to repairing the tainted ethical reputation of government science. New conflict-of-interest rules that he announced will at last bar NIH scientists from moonlighting as consultants for private industry. The move follows a series of investigations by The Los Angeles Times and the US Congress that uncovered extensive financial ties - many previously undisclosed - between agency scientists and the drug and biotech firms that have a financial stake in the outcome of their research.