http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/18/us/politics/house-proposal-would-require-think-tanks-to-disclose-foreign-funding.html?ref=us
It was resently discovered that many think tanks are receiving funding from foreign governments and entities. In a worried state, the House of Representatives is considering a bill which would force scholars to share if they have received any international support. This would include the case when the support is only linked to the scholar and not their recommendations.
The government is worried that foreign investors may try and push their own agendas onto the U.S. through the think tanks. There is already a similar law in place for any support received from domestic government sources and lawmakers feel that this would help provide transparency into the perspective behind the scholars ideas.
Do you believe that think tanks should have increased financial transparency to help lawmakers understand their motives or is this an invasion of privacy that may lead to the rejection of sound ideas simply on the basis that they were sponsored by an enemy of the U.S.? Do you feel that there may be any major change to the sponsorships of think tanks and further to the creation of technology if foreign governments know that they will no longer remain anonymous?
I agree with both rep. Nugent and rep. McGovern. The argument against the transparency seems to be futile, because, in contradiction with David Nassar's comment ("It implies that a witness is dishonest if their home institution receives support from a foreign donor"), it does not imply a single thing. Representative Nugent says it best “It just means from a financial standpoint, from a transparency point of view, what are their allegiances and are they pure, necessarily?"
ReplyDeleteFor example, say a Brookings scholar is advocating for a joint U.S. and Russia venture in the form of off-shore oil drilling around the Bering Strait, while the Brookings Institution is receiving payment from Russia. The scholar, in his analysis, finds this to be a very prosperous venture for both parties involved and testifies to that behalf. The scholar may now be questioned to the extent of which (if any) the payment influenced his analysis, giving lawmakers more of the crucial information to make their decision, and perhaps the prerogative to vet more thoroughly the scholar's analysis.
Conversely, say another scholar at a reputable think tank advises the United States to aid in the development of Syria's nuclear program, as a solution to combat ISIS (this would obviously be shot down as no world power would want Syria to gain anymore nukes, but it gets the point across). Meanwhile this think tank is taking payment Syria. Clearly, this would allow lawmakers to see the potential bias in a very serious issue.
While some think tanks aim for complete transparency, others look to maintain the current privacy they enjoy. They claim it's a violation of their privacy, while in practice allowing money to influence any sworn testimony is illegal and potentially harmful. Some think tanks are strongly opposed to this, yet if there's nothing to hide why hide it?