Politicization of science

The politicization of science occurs when government, business or interest groups use legal or economic pressure to influence the findings of scientific research, or influence the way the research is disseminated, reported or interpreted.

In July 2006 the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released survey results that demonstrate pervasive political influence of science at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). [1] Of the 997 FDA scientists who responded to the survey, nearly one fifth (18.4 percent) said that they "have been asked, for non-scientific reasons, to inappropriately exclude or alter technical information or their conclusions in a FDA scientific document." This is the third survey Union of Concerned Scientists has conducted to examine inappropriate interference with science at federal agencies. The Department of Health and Human Services also conducted a survey addressing the same topic which generated similar findings. [2]

Overview

A common allegation of the politicization of science has been the appointment by politicians of non-scientists, scientists with conflicts of interest or otherwise unqualified individuals to positions that influence public policy in regard to science. Concerns over conflicts of interest arise when political appointees who were once attorneys, spokespeople or lobbyists for the industries they now oversee are placed in positions making or overseeing profound changes affecting drug laws, food policies, land use, clean-air regulations and other key issues for the industries they were employed by or ideologically beholden to.

In 2004 The Denver Post reported that that George W. Bush administration "has installed more than 100 top officials who were once lobbyists, attorneys or spokespeople for the industries they oversee." Of these 100 high-level officials appointed by Bush who helped govern industries they once represented as lobbyists, lawyers or company advocates, in at least 20 cases, those former industry advocates have helped their agencies write, shape or push for policy shifts that benefit their former industries. "They knew which changes to make because they had pushed for them as industry advocates" the Denver Post article reported.

Also in 2004 the Union of Concerned Scientists issued a report,Scientific Integrity in Policymaking: An Investigation into the Bush Administration's Misuse of Science which formally made the charge that the Bush administration was putting political ideology over science when writing policy or when determining who sits on advisory panels set up to provide expert input into decision making, saying:

"A growing number of scientists, policy makers, and technical specialists both inside and outside the government allege that the current Bush administration has suppressed or distorted the scientific analyses of federal agencies to bring these results in line with administration policy. In addition, these experts contend that irregularities in the appointment of scientific advisors and advisory panels are threatening to upset the legally mandated balance of these bodies."

The report resulted in a petition, Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policymaking, signed by more than 9,000 scientists, including 49 Nobel laureates and 63 National Medal of Science recipients. which said:

"When scientific knowledge has been found to be in conflict with its political goals, the administration has often manipulated the process through which science enters into its decisions. This has been done by placing people who are professionally unqualified or who have clear conflicts of interest in official posts and on scientific advisory committees; by disbanding existing advisory committees; by censoring and suppressing reports by the government’s own scientists; and by simply not seeking independent scientific advice. Other administrations have, on occasion, engaged in such practices, but not so systematically nor on so wide a front. Furthermore, in advocating policies that are not scientifically sound, the administration has sometimes misrepresented scientific knowledge and misled the public about the implications of its policies."

In response to such criticisms in 2006 President Bush unveiled a campaign in his State of the Union Address to promote scientific research and education to ensure American competitiveness in the world, vowing to "double the federal commitment to the most critical basic research programs in the physical sciences over the next 10 years." Later the same year Francesca Grifo, the executive director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' Scientific Integrity Program, reiterated their initial criticism, "We have reports that stay in draft form and don't get out to the public. We have reports that are changed. We have reports that are ignored and overwritten."

Politicians are not the only group responsible for the politicization of science. Special interest groups, industry adovcates, and religious organizations have all conducted various campaigns to promote their narrow interests by politicizing a particular scientific issue or topic in defiance of scientific consensus. A current example is the intelligent design movement originating with the Discovery Institute, which seeks to "defeat [the] materialist world view" represented by the theory of evolution in favor of "a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions". In contrast to scientific consensus the Discovery Institute portrays evolution as a "theory in crisis" with scientists criticizing evolution and that "fairness" and "equal time" requires educating students about the controversy. The scientific community and science education organizations have replied that any controversial aspects of evolution are a matter of religion and politics, not science.

Examples

Eugenics

Physician Michael Crichton included a fact-based section in his novel State of Fear entitled, "Why Politicized Science is Dangerous", explaining:

Imagine that there is a new scientific theory that warns of an impending crisis, and points to a way out.

This theory quickly draws support from leading scientists, politicians and celebrities around the world. Research is funded by distinguished philanthropies, and carried out at prestigious universities. The crisis is reported frequently in the media. The science is taught in college and high school classrooms.

I don't mean global warming. I'm talking about another theory, which rose to prominence a century ago.

Its supporters included Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Winston Churchill. It was approved by Supreme Court justices Oliver Wendell Holmes and Louis Brandeis, who ruled in its favor. The famous names who supported it included Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone; activist Margaret Sanger; botanist Luther Burbank; Leland Stanford, founder of Stanford University; the novelist H. G. Wells; the playwright George Bernard Shaw; and hundreds of others. Nobel Prize winners gave support. Research was backed by the Carnegie and Rockefeller Foundations. The Cold Springs Harbor Institute was built to carry out this research, but important work was also done at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford and Johns Hopkins. Legislation to address the crisis was passed in states from New York to California.

These efforts had the support of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Medical Association, and the National Research Council. It was said that if Jesus were alive, he would have supported this effort.

All in all, the research, legislation and molding of public opinion surrounding the theory went on for almost half a century. Those who opposed the theory were shouted down and called reactionary, blind to reality, or just plain ignorant. But in hindsight, what is surprising is that so few people objected.

Today, we know that this famous theory that gained so much support was actually pseudoscience. The crisis it claimed was nonexistent. And the actions taken in the name of theory were morally and criminally wrong. Ultimately, they led to the deaths of millions of people.

The theory was eugenics, and its history is so dreadful --- and, to those who were caught up in it, so embarrassing --- that it is now rarely discussed. But it is a story that should be well know to every citizen, so that its horrors are not repeated.

— Michael Crichton, State of Fear

Some environmentalstis say that what Crichton wrote about eugenics is merely an attempt to cast doubt on global environment change by using innuendo suggesting guilt by association.

Global warming and ozone depletion

Ozone depletion is now considered by many a settled issue; by contrast, what to do about global warming remains an issue of strong political debate, which has lead to charges of politisation on both sides.

In 1991, a US corporate coalition including the National Coal Association, the Western Fuels Association and Edison Electrical Institute created a public relations front called the "Information Council on the Environment" (ICE). ICE launched a $500,000 advertising and PR blitz to, in ICE's own words, "reposition global warming as theory (not fact)." Burton and Rampton [3] charge that the claims about the "politicization of science" regarding global warming are part of a deliberately engineered public relations campaign to reduce the impact any international treaty, such as the Kyoto Protocol, might have on the business interests sponsoring the campaigns. Conversely, skeptics of global warming have decried alarmism.

Waxman report

In the United States, Democratic Congressman Henry A. Waxman and the minority staff of the Government Reform Committee released a report in August 2003 which concluded that the administration of George W. Bush has politicized science in many areas and appointed key decision makers who shared the administration position on major issues. The issues analyzed in the report include sex education based on sexual abstinence. The report concludes that the administration modified performance measures for abstinence-based programs to make them look effective. In so doing, the Waxman report articulates positions long held by the California politician. It also finds that the Bush administration appointed a prominent advocate of abstinence-only programs, Dr. Joe McIlhaney, to the Advisory Committee to the CDC’s Director. It claims that information about comprehensive sex education was removed from the website of the Center for Disease Control. Other issues considered include agricultural pollution, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and breast cancer. The report finds that a National Cancer Institute website has been changed to reflect the administration view that there may be a risk of breast cancer associated with abortions. The website was updated after protests and now holds that no such risk has been found in recent, well-designed studies.

See also

• Spin (public relations)
• Framing (communication theory)
• Kansas evolution hearings

External links

• Politics & Science: Investigating the Bush Administration's Promotion of Ideology Over Science. Website by US Congressman Henry Waxman and the Government Reform Committee.
• Examples of abuse, Scientific Integrity at Risk: The Food and Drug Administration The Union of Concerned Scientists (PDF file)
• Union of Concerned Scientists website

References

• The Republican War on Science Chris Mooney (2005).
• Scientific Integrity in Policy Making: Investigation of the Bush administration's abuse of science Union of Concerned Scientists (2004).