Les Green has been doing yeoman's work at keeping information flowing about the genuine threat to academic freedom posed by Minister of Science Gary Goodyear's intervention in the SSHRC peer-reviewed grant-making procedure. Academics who are on facebook, please come join the group he's formed and read and circulate the open letter from York faculty, also quoted below.
Sometimes there's a tendency to cry "academic freedom" only when one's own ox is being gored-- especially on Israel/ Palestine questions. If I were to attend the conference at York, I'm pretty sure that I'd be annoyed-to-outraged by a great deal of what I'd hear. And lots of invocations of academic freedom these days are just complaints that one is being criticized.
But politicized interference in what are supposed to be arm's-length impartial systems of peer review-- that's an absolutely clear violation of academic freedom. SSHRC has already compromised itself by agreeing to the extraordinary review of the grant at ministerial request; it needs to not only maintain the funding but also make a strong statement about the inappropriateness of political intervention in peer review.
Anyway, please come join the facebook group both to follow the news and to convey the support of the academic community for the York faculty who are taking the lead in this fight.
Open Letter to SSHRC President from Faculty members of Osgoode Hall Law School
June 14, 2009
AN OPEN LETTER FROM MEMBERS OF THE FACULTY OF
OSGOODE HALL LAW SCHOOL AT YORK UNIVERSITY
Dr. Chad Gaffield
President
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
350 Albert Street, P.O. Box 1610
Ottawa, Ontario, K1P 6G4
Dear Dr. Gaffield:
Re: Review of SSHRC Funding for Conference at York University: “Israel/Palestine: Mapping Models of Statehood and Paths to Peace”
We are writing as members of the faculty of Osgoode Hall Law School at York University to express our extreme dismay that SSHRC appears to be acceding to political pressure by revisiting its decision to fund the above-noted academic conference.
As you know, two of our esteemed colleagues, Professors Susan Drummond and Bruce Ryder, have taken a lead role in planning this event and we write in part to support them and their co-organizers, Professor Sharry Aiken and PhD Candidate Mazen Masri. However this issue has grown far beyond the need to support individual colleagues. Your decision as SSHRC President to require a special pre-conference accounting from the conference organizers, outside the normal post-conference reporting procedures for conference grants, raises the much larger question of your agency’s integrity as a funder and promoter of independent university-based research in Canada.
As a group we have extensive experience with the organization of academic conferences and with SSHRC granting procedures. We believe there is no basis at all for the suggestion that “major changes” were made to the plan for this conference after the grant application had been peer reviewed and funding granted. Nor do we believe that you could
possibly see any basis for this suggestion. Rather, it appears that the special accounting was demanded of our colleagues in direct response to the unprecedented and entirely inappropriate political intervention of Minister Goodyear.
We believe that SSHRC made a serious error in acceding to political interference in this manner. Whether or not SSHRC ultimately submits to the demand for a new peer review that better meets the Minister’s political ends, and whether or not the funding for this conference is ultimately jeopardized, we fear that SSHRC has already compromised the autonomy of academic research in this country. By intruding into the planning of an academic event after a funding decision has been made, SSHRC’s actions are likely to have a most unfortunate chilling effect on academics considering the exploration of controversial or unpopular topics. In addition, by casting doubt on the integrity of its own procedures, SSHRC has empowered those who would devalue academic research and discourse by insisting that academic freedom be reserved only for those who happen to share their point of view.
We hope that SSHRC will very shortly stand up to defend its own granting procedures and the values of academic excellence and autonomy they are designed to protect.
Sincerely,
Harry W. Arthurs, Professor Emeritus, Former Dean, Former President
Margaret E. Beare, Professor
Neil Brooks, Professor
Ruth Buchanan, Associate Professor
Jamie B. Cameron, Professor
Mary G. Condon, Professor
Carys J. Craig, Associate Professor
Giuseppina D’Agostino, Assistant Professor
Paul D. Emond, Associate Professor
Trevor C.W. Farrow, Associate Professor
Simon R. Fodden, Professor Emeritus
Shelley A.M. Gavigan, Professor
Joan M. Gilmour, Associate Professor
Leslie Green, Professor
Richard Haigh, Visiting Professor
Balfour J. Halévy, Professor Emeritus
Doug Hay, Professor
Allan C. Hutchinson, Distinguished Research Professor
Shin Imai, Associate Professor
Shelley Kierstead, Assistant Professor
Sonia Lawrence, Associate Professor
Jinyan Li, Professor
Michael Mandel, Professor
Ikechi Mgbeoji, Associate Professor
Louis Mirando, Chief Law Librarian
Janet Mosher, Associate Professor and Associate Dean
Mary Jane Mossman, Professor of Law (sign. after initial release)
Roxanne Mykitiuk, Associate Professor
Obiora Chinedu Okafor, Professor
Lisa Philipps, Associate Professor
Marilyn L. Pilkington, Associate Professor and Former Dean
Poonam Puri, Associate Professor
Sean Rehaag, Assistant Professor
Benjamin J. Richardson, Professor
Brian Slattery, Professor
Sara Slinn, Assistant Professor
James Stribopoulos, Associate Professor
Craig M. Scott, Professor
Kate Sutherland, Associate Professor
François Tanguay-Renaud, Assistant Professor
Eric M. Tucker, Professor
Gus Van Harten, Assistant Professor
Robert S. Wai, Associate Professor
Garry D. Watson, Professor
Cynthia Williams, Osler Chair in Business Law
Stepan Wood, Associate Professor
Alan N. Young, Associate Professor
Peer Zumbansen, Canada Research Chair & Associate Dean (Research, Graduate Studies and Institutional Relations)
Cc:
Bruce B. Ryder, Associate Professor, Osgoode Hall Law School
Susan G. Drummond, Associate Professor, Osgoode Hall Law School
Sharry J. Aiken, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, Queen’s University
Mazen Masri, Ph.D. candidate, Osgoode Hall Law School
Mamdouh Shoukri, President, York University
Stan Shapson, Vice-President (Research & Innovation), York University
Patrick Monahan, Dean of Law and VPA-Elect, York University
Mr. J. Craig McNaughton, Senior Program Officer Strategic Grants and joint Initiatives, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
James L. Turk, Executive Director, Canadian Association of University Teachers
The Hon. Gary Goodyear, Minister of State (Science & Technology)
The Rt. Hon. Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada
Dr. Marc Garneau, Liberal Critic for Industry, Science and Technology
Mr. Jim Maloway, NDP Critic for Science and Technology
M Robert Vincent, Bloc Critic for Science and Technology
No comments:
Post a Comment