Thread by @caparsons

Stanford professors urge U.S. to end program looking for Chinese spies in academia reuters.com/world/us/stanf…

The FBI has a track record of laying charges against American faculty for inappropriately working with Chinese institutions. But it’s critical that observers recognize that a large number of these investigations are subsequently dismissed.

Canada is adopting American methods of scrutinizing academics, with an expected focus on Asian (and specifically Chinese) collaborators. We will likely see similar charging behaviour, harassment, and bias against scholars based on ‘national security’ concerns and investigations.

Having spoken with academics across the country, there are already many who are being forced to change their long-standing research because some universities are becoming *very* cautious. And, in other cases, because faculty refuse to subject themselves to perceived witch hunts.

To date, I have only heard from individuals of Asian heritage experiencing these problems (others may also be affected, my sample size is anecdotal). These faculty worry for their students: how can they be trained & will they, too, be subject to perceived inappropriate scrutiny?

If the Canadian government wants to add ‘national security’ into the mix of academic research, then they will have to *massively* stand up the funds that will be lost as academics are prevented from collaborating with international colleagues and businesses.

It will also need to—and should have already—undertake a *huge* training campaign to explain what should be looked for while also doing everything possible to ensure that review is as bias-free as possible.

Sadly there is no evidence the government has a real appetite to do so.

To be clear: economic espionage is a real issue. But how CSIS (vis-a-vis the funding councils) is pursuing this is problematic with researchers, students, & Canadian research capabilities suffering.

For more, see what I wrote on this issue this summer at christopher-parsons.com/canadian-natio…