I work in academia and am used to these sorts of issues of primacy, attribution, intellectual honesty, etc. While there are many examples of research dishonesty or sloppiness in higher ed at large, there is also an expectation that people who take leadership positions lead by example. Faculty led institutions expect that their leaders can walk the walk. I don’t think it is unfair to expect the president of the top rated university in the world to not have engaged in this sort of sloppiness. I also think it is fair that leaders are able to “rise to the moment” commensurate with the prominence of their role. She wasn’t the president of a local community college (nothing against them, but you have different expectations).
The politically motivated and racist attacks against Dr. Gay are abhorrent. It is only unfortunate that they ended up finding purchase in very real issues of attribution, and in a leadership failing to navigate and control the narrative around their testimony and comments.
Dr. Gay was hired after the shortest search for a Harvard president in recent memory, and already had a slight publication record compared to past leaders. That there are multiple elements of sloppiness in her work just further errodes her ability to lead the worlds top university.
Additionally, it is true that Harvard is currently ranked at the very bottom of the campus free speech index, with the university of Pennsylvania second to last. At least MITs lawyerly answers were somewhat backed by the history of their institution trying to balance speech. That two ousted university presidents only felt the need to go to bat for first amendment rights now, of all times, and without addressing the potential hypocrisy of the position given their universities track record, as them leading a new change of direction, was shockingly bad judgement.
So Dr. Gay doesn’t deserve the hate and attacks that have come her way. But she failed to deliver on the promise of any president of a top, R1 university. If you can’t publish to the highest standards, and navigate the most difficult of public relations situations, you shouldn’t be in the top leadership role of these universities.
What you describe is important, and you give your argument persuasively, but would it not be more important to ensure that far-right foreign groups like AIPAC not have such an influence on our academic institutions?
I can’t say that ethics considerations should be overlooked, but this effort was very clearly made as part of a strategy for silencing criticisms of Israel, not as part of a serious concern about academic ethics.
I think this is a way in which ethics are used by the right as a cudgel to exploit the left and center, we see this trap set again and again by the right and people walk right into it every time.
At a certain point people need to use their reason to make a judgement about whether more real damage is done by these issues that the right disingenuously raises or by letting them achieve their goals so unscrupulously.
I do agree with you, to an extent. I think much of the support, or at least lack of criticism from within higher ed was precisely because they/we/I didn’t want to be lumped in with the right wing attacks or give them an inch. At the same time, that is like the stereotype of the abusive couple who form a united front against a third party.
I also know that people saying that no one really cares about the research issues also isn’t true. People in higher ed care about these things. The president of Stanford resigned recently over these sorts of issues (though the data issues there were more troubling). There were also Harvard academics recording malcontent with Dr. Gay; they just didn’t go and put it in the paper.
Ultimately, it sounds like what ultimately tipped things over for her was two fold: the latest round of accusations, coupled with submitting a plan to the board that apparently didn’t convince them all that she was responding with appropriate urgency to the widening media pr issue. Which is a very common failing in higher ed leaders who are used to going slow and resisting calls to move faster. Unfortunately, university presidents need to control the narrative by at least creating the impression of frenetic energy to fix something, even if it is intractable in the short term.
You might find this NYT article interesting (gift link).
How Harvard’s Board Broke Up With Claudine Gay https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/06/business/claudine-gay-harvard-corporation-board.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ME0.srWq.9lxOxV9UwF1g&smid=nytcore-android-share
Ultimately, I think the board and the community wanted to help her hold out against the right wing attacks, but something about her internal plan or communications and follow up led the board to wilt in the face of persuasion from those around them.
How many of those attacking Mrs. Gay on the issue of intellectually honesty are Trump supporters? The vast majority. They couldn’t give a flying fuck about honesty. Yes, leaders in academia should lead by example, but this doesn’t deserve the attention it has been getting. This is another over inflated fake culture war talking point. Put it on the list next to the war on Christmas.
Pushed by conservatives and gleefully carried by the New York Times. They weren’t duped, they were willing partners.
Are there any political science academics who can vouch for this claim?
[T]here is the reality that Gay’s field, political science, is a data-driven discipline in which abstracts from one paper are not-infrequently copied as parts of a literature review in another, and that the borrowed phrases and summaries that account for Gay’s “plagiarism” are not crimes of theft but of sloppiness, with little bearing on the originality of her work.
If this is true, then this article is a fascinating read which I recommend.
This thing seems to be a mess with huge rightwing dicks trying to find something that sticks, with people from the other side coming up to defend her.
I think as a scientist - and especially someone in her role - sloppiness is not a valid excuse, her stepping down was correct, and nobody should make excuses for that. It also is not OK how the rightwing nutjobs are behaving here, but I’ve lost my faith a long time ago that there are still people who can look at both issues, so that will just be a mud slinging competition from both camps until it is forgotten.
I can’t speak to political science, but my background is computational maths. I’ve published papers in what I view as a very data driven field.
I cited every direct quote from prior work, and listed additional resources that I didn’t explicitly reference but consulted.
So it seems sloppy to me.
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But recounting all of this is tedious, and cedes the terms of the debate to the authors of this false controversy–fighting on their territory, arguing the questions they pose, giving good-faith rebuttals to allegations they do not pretend to believe even as they make them.
The media followed all this as if any of it was real, as if any of it mattered, proving themselves willing to serve as outlets for a rightwing propaganda effort that is wildly cynical, demonstrably sadistic, and avowedly indifferent to the truth.
They manipulate Title IX to make universities hostile to women and deferential to rapists; they impose bizarre, invasive and lascivious rules that would compel period tracking and genital inspections for student athletes.
In reality, the American university is weakened – low on public funding, reliant on underpaid, contingent and dissatisfied academic labor, and subject to the whims of very wealthy donors.
But at their worst, they are sites of vampiric labor exploitation, of malign incentives for scholars, and, increasingly, of meddling by ambitious Republican operatives or politically appointed trustees.
Many news outlets – much like universities – have been weakened by declines in revenue, and have largely failed to adapt to the rise of an anti-intellectual and anti-democratic right wing that is indifferent to the truth.
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