[iwar] [fc:MIT.Panel.Rejects.Limits.On.Classified.Research]

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Date: 2002-06-14 13:55:29


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Date: Fri, 14 Jun 2002 13:55:29 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [iwar] [fc:MIT.Panel.Rejects.Limits.On.Classified.Research]
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Boston Globe
June 13, 2002
Pg. 1
MIT Panel Rejects Limits On Classified Research
By Mary Leonard, Globe Staff
WASHINGTON - The Massachusetts Institute of Technology yesterday became the
first leading research university to recommend post-Sept. 11 policies on
handling classified research, and the first to challenge new federal laws
and initiatives designed to limit access, disclosure, and dissemination of
federally funded basic research during the war on terrorism. 
A report written by a blue-ribbon faculty committee said there should be no
change in MIT's longstanding ban on on-campus classified research, and
warned the institution to resist growing pressure from government to
restrict the publishing of contracted research and the hiring of foreign
scientists. The panel cited ''a new landscape'' of national security
anxieties.
''Restrictions on access to select biological agents, the application of
export-control provisions to university researchers, and growing pressure to
treat research results as sensitive create a new landscape for faculty,
students, and MIT as an institution,'' said the report, which called on the
university to adopt policies to protect academic freedom and an open
educational environment.
Since Sept. 11, the report said, government contractors increasingly have
been labeling results of unclassified research as sensitive and requesting a
national-security review before publication. Such pre-publication reviews on
non-secret science run counter to the policies of research institutions, and
MIT should not agree to such requests, the faculty committee said.
''The well-being of our nation will ultimately be damaged if education,
science, and technology suffer as a result of any practices that
indiscriminately discourage or limit the open exchange of ideas,'' said the
report.
The five-member faculty committee was formed in February to respond to what
many scientists and university officials say has become the most serious
threat to academic freedom and the flow of information since the Cold War.
Faced with fierce opposition from universities and professional science
societies, the Defense Department last month withdrew a draft proposal that
would have made it a crime for scientists to publish or discuss certain
basic research without prior Pentagon approval. Dr. John Hopps, deputy
director of defense research and engineering at the Pentagon, would not
comment on the substance of the MIT report, but said he would make it part
of the department's review of rules to protect sensitive technologies from
terrorists.
The Pentagon is not the only federal institution reexamining its rules on
basic research. Since Sept. 11, Congress has passed two antiterrorism
measures that restrict which laboratories and researchers can handle
biological agents; one was the bioterrorism bill President Bush signed
yesterday. The MIT report warned that because the administration can expand
the restricted list and tighten the regulations at any time, the university
''may rightfully decide that on-campus research'' in some areas cannot be
continued.
In April, the Department of Agriculture said it would no longer obtain visas
for foreign scientists and students to work in its research laboratories.
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice has indicated that the
administration would review existing export-control laws, which now largely
exempt scientists from obtaining a license to share their research. A March
memorandum from White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card instructed all
federal agencies and departments to review their publications and Web sites
and reclassify public information as secret, if necessary.
MIT and many other research universities have policies that largely prohibit
classified, applied research requiring security clearances and controlled
access to facilities on their main campuses. Many universities say they
would refuse federal contracts for basic research if the government required
that scientists obtain permission to publish their results or limit
scholarly contacts.
''The landscape is changing very rapidly, it's somewhat confusing, and all
sorts of questions are being asked about regulations on basic research,''
said former Air Force Secretary Sheila Widnall, an MIT aeronautics professor
who chaired the committee. Widnall said the report was expected to be used
as a framework by other universities trying to balance heightened security
concerns against traditions of openness in teaching and scholarship.
The committee said MIT could meet its public-service obligation and any
national-security needs by doing more classified research at Lincoln
Laboratory, the Department of Defense facility in Lexington that MIT
manages. MIT also could consider opening a center for classified
biological-science research in the Boston area, the faculty committee said.
But the report said that at MIT, which received $639.5 million in government
research contracts in fiscal year 2001, there should be no ambiguity about
banning classified research on its Cambridge campus. No students should be
required to have security clearances to do thesis research, and no
classified documents should be stored on campus, said the report, which also
cited the risk of making foreign students and faculty a ''separate class''
of individuals on campus.
''Openness enables MIT to attract, educate, and benefit from the best
students, faculty, and staff from around the world,'' the report said. ''No
foreign national granted a visa by the US government should be denied access
to courses, research, or publications generally available on campus.''
Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academy of Sciences, called the MIT
report ''an important first step'' and a guide to other universities in
identifying policies to protect faculty and students in a security-conscious
environment.
''If we don't set our own rules and standards on how researchers operate,
others may come in and do it for us,'' Alberts said.

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