No Israeli Science Boycott

In the latest example of resurgent European anti-Semitism, administrators at the University of Paris 6 (which specializes in natural sciences) voted in December to curtail cooperation with Israeli academics. The vote, which has since been reversed, is a grave attack on the universality of science and academic freedom, and has raised deep questions about whether academic boycotts can ever be justified.

Why is Israel singled out for such action? Academic collaboration with Russia and China is rarely, if ever, questioned, even though both of those states have far worse human rights records than Israel. Moreover, Israel is a very small nation, and its contributions to science and other areas of academic inquiry are exceptional for its size.

The most likely explanation for the vote in Paris and the continued calls to single out Israeli scientists is old-fashioned anti-Semitism. The calls for boycott attack the most basic principles of open academic exchange cannot be explained by Israel’s poor treatment of Palestinians.

For example, British academic Mona Baker dismissed two Israeli academics from the editorial boards of her journals last summer. Her only reason was their nationality. In another instance, the journal Science editorialized over the summer on the unacceptability of researchers refusing to share scientific materials with Israeli colleagues. By convention, scientists must honor requests for materials to allow others to reproduce their work. Science editor Donald Kennedy wrote that his journal would “continue to insist that authors have an obligation to share material.” The editorial was prompted by a researcher refusing to share materials with an Israeli scientist.

Similarly, Baker’s action prompted a fierce attack from Cogan University Professor Stephen J. Greenblatt, who argued against boycotting academics over political differences. Greenblatt, who is also the president of the Modern Language Association, denounced Baker’s action as “particularly grotesque” because the journals from which the Israelis were dismissed deal with intercultural communication.

The strong reactions of both Kennedy and Greenblatt to the boycotts are heartening, and show that most academics still have a sense of proportion when it comes to the proper reasons for an academic boycott.

The case against academic boycotts has recently gained even more momentum. A group of four academics from Oxford University wrote a commentary in the journal Nature last month arguing that scientific boycotts should be undertaken only in the most extreme circumstances. Indeed, the International Council for Science forbids scientists from participating in boycotts because science is supposed to be an apolitical activity. (This is a hopeful, if slightly naïve view. Saddam’s germ warfare scientists might prove an exception.)

In the essay in Nature, titled “Is a scientific boycott ever justified?” the authors set out four conditions that must be satisfied before a scientific boycott can be permissable. Among the requirements are nearly-universal agreement on the need for action against a regime, a clear view of what actions could be prevented by such a boycott, and an explicit acknowledgement that a boycott would be an abandonment of one of the most cherished principles of science, its universality.

During a question and answer session at Harvard Hillel last Friday night, University President Lawrence H. Summers called the idea of an academic boycott against Israel an “absolute outrage.”Although Summers and other academic leaders have been outspoken in their condemnation of the anti-Semitic double standard applied to Israel, there is still some support for action to punish the Jewish state.

Israel is a scientific powerhouse, despite its small size. It is part of Europe’s scientific system; its scientists are at the forefront of areas such as stem cell research which have been bogged down in many European nations and America.

The boycotts of Israeli academics fulfill none of the goals laid out by the authors of the recent Nature essay. Indeed, the sharp disagreement on the war against terrorism that Israel is fighting belies the ulterior motives of those who wish to take the most extreme measures against it. Having been burned in the past by submitting to political pressures, most scientists see the recent boycott campaigns for what they are: crude anti-Semitic double standards that will only hurt scientific inquiry and academic freedom.

Jonathan H. Esensten ’04 is a biochemical sciences concentrator in Lowell House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.