Combat Ethical Pollution in the Chemical Community

At the IUPAC General Assembly in the middle of August this year, the Council decided to form a new standing committee, the Committee on Ethics, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (CEDEI), with the mission to work for the ethical values stated in the Union’s strategic plan. This is a significant move because it underlines that international statements and recommendations, outlining ethical guidelines and principles for scientists, are not enough to guarantee that the scientific community “[strives] for diversity and inclusiveness in all forms, [respects] each other and the Union, and [upholds] the highest standards of transparent, responsible and ethical behaviour”[1]. In fact, there are clear indications that the number and nature of violations of the 1979 Vancouver Convention [2], the 2010 Singapore Statement on Research Integrity [3], the 2012 San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) [4], the 2013 Montreal Statement on Research Integrity in Cross-Boundary Research Collaborations [5], and the 2016 ICSU Advisory Note on Science Communication [6], some of the relevant documents to abide to, have increased in recent years.

Unethical research practices and behaviour are nothing new. Publication of “results” based on outright fraud has been known for centuries and increasingly harmed the scientific enterprise in recent decades. But just as worrisome is the growing number of other dubious practises, which include plagiarism, gift authorships, unethical refereeing, improper evaluations, and use of defamatory and insulting language in science-related discussions and debates among scientists. The purpose with all these acts is the same: to improve the likelihood for success in competitions for prestigious positions or appointments, research funding, and all sorts of awards, honours, and prizes. Such activities do indeed contribute to undermine the credibility of science, and this calls for a broad-based action in the scientific community at large. International organizations like the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), International Council of Science (ICSU), which in 2018 became International Science Council (ISC) have worked with dedication to strengthen the research integrity globally and nourish science practices based on equity, diversity, and inclusion. However, many of the obstacles to achieve this are discipline specific, and therefore it is significant that IUPAC has formed CEDEI that hopefully aims at becoming clearly visible and contributing to combat and prevent the spreading of ethical pollution in the global chemical community.

To nurture free and responsible practice of science, the research community must promote equitable opportunities and oppose all sorts of discrimination. How to go about in practice to achieve that is discussed in this booklet, which can be downloaded from the ISC page https://council.science/publications/freedom-responsibility-and-universality-of-science-2014/ or directly council.science/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/CFRS-brochure-2014.pdf

I am sure CEDEI will be exposed to all sorts of challenges at many levels when the committee starts its work. At the global level, the first important task will be to raise the awareness of international guidelines and recommendations, both those mentioned above and many others, which is lacking in many countries. But knowledge about their existence is not enough; the documents and their collective spirit must be adopted so that research integrity and professional ethical behaviour become an integrated part of every chemist’s professional platform. In order to reach this goal, strong measures have to be taken at institutional levels throughout the world so that staff and, at universities, every student will reflect on research ethics, including diversity, equity, and inclusion, in their work and behave properly. Here CEDEI can play a vital role if working with dedication. A great start would be to establish a website at the IUPAC homepage to present relevant documents, such as declarations, recommendations, books, codes of conduct, and case studies, and to put in place a forum for discussion of relevant issues, good practice, and controversial cases. At www.iupac.org the material will be easily available, and if the quality reaches the high level one reasonably can expect, the website should aim at becoming the focal point regarding ethical issues for the chemical community.

From left to right: Guido Bertolaso, Ricardo Villalba, Tomáš Hudlický, and Priyamvada Gopal

Research integrity and research ethics of high standard can only become a reality and subsequently be maintained in open-minded and transparent communities where a free flow of information and a healthy and decent exchange of views based on facts are the norm. A lot of available technology can help us to uphold this level of professionalism: if accurate facts are missing, researchers, journals, libraries, and institutions can easily be contacted; if research results appear strange, dubious, or too good to be true for some reason, documentation can be requested; and if issues are argued based on misunderstanding of facts and opinions, clarification can be obtained by direct contact of people and institutions if there is a will to dialogue. The purpose of all this is to make sure that scientific results are reliable and correct, are understood and presented correctly, and are used correctly when applied to carry out projects in the real world. But this does not guarantee that science is practiced, communicated, and applied in this way. That is why it is so important that scientists are willing to be custodians of their disciplines and speak up when necessary.

But to speak up on scientific matters may indeed be risky. In recent years colleagues in many scientific disciplines, including chemistry, have been persecuted, prosecuted, and imprisoned for doing so to the public and authorities, even when done in an impeccable way following the ICSU Advisory Note on Science Communication [6]. A prominent example is the prosecution of Guido Bertolaso and six other scientists after the disastrous earthquake in L’Aquila, Italy, in 2009; they were put on trial and convicted to years in prison, but eventually acquitted by Italy’s Supreme Court at the end of 2016 [7]. Another example is the case against Ricardo Villalba, former director of the national Argentinian Institute of Snow, Ice and Environmental Research, who faced criminal charges because he applied science-based methods in a survey of Argentina’s glaciers [8]. To follow up such cases when chemists are the target should also be a task for the new committee, preferably in close collaboration with the ISC Committee for Freedom and Responsibility in Science (CFRS) [9].

Finally, speaking up or arguing among colleagues for an opinion that is not mainstream, can also be a very unpleasant experience and result in violation of recommended ethical guidelines. An infamous example of this sort in the chemical sciences is the Hudlicky case, which erupted in the beginning of June last year when the essay “Organic Synthesis—Where now?” is thirty years old. A reflection on the currents state of affairs” was published on the Angewandte-Chemie website [10, 11]. The article resulted immediately in an avalanche of personal attacks, defamatory condemnations, and insults that violated the standards debates among colleagues in science should abide to [11, 12, 13]. The reaction from Wiley and Angewandte Chemie has been dealt with previously [14, 15], but just as bad in my opinion is the reaction from Thieme Verlag that cancelled the publication of an issue of Synthesis in honour of Hudlicky’s outstanding achievements in organic synthesis just a few days after the essay appeared [16]. Such a coupling between research-irrelevant opinions and scientific performance and achievements is indeed objectionable and looks like censorship to me.

This lack of objectivity probably contributed to trigger the Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship (SAFS) [17] in Canada to look thoroughly into the Hudlicky case at its General Meeting in May this year where Professor Hudlicky gave the 3^rd Annual Chris and John Furedy Lecture entitled “Reflections on Diversity of Opinions, Inequity, and Exclusion—the New DIE Initiative”. In the lecture [18], his odyssey since June last year was put in perspective, and the audience was exposed to examples of lack of diversity and inclusiveness, lack of respect of each other, and lack of transparent, responsible and ethical behaviour. How encouraging then to learn about the Gopal case at Cambridge University, UK, where rallies to fire her were met by a strong university defence of its academics’ right to express lawful opinions which others might find controversial, followed by her promotion to full Professor Chair [19]. No doubt, therefore, that CEDEI will have an important role to play to combat pollution in the chemical community from the very beginning.