A powerful indictment of the IRB regime.
University researchers in the United States seeking to observe, survey,
or interview people are required first to complete ethical training
courses and to submit their proposals to an institutional review board
(IRB). Under current rules, IRBs have the power to deny funding,
degrees, or promotion if their recommended modifications to scholars'
proposals are not followed. This volume explains how this system of
regulation arose and discusses its chilling effects on research in the
social sciences and humanities.
Zachary M. Schrag draws on original research and interviews with the key
shapers of the institutional review board regime to raise important
points about the effect of the IRB process on scholarship. He explores
the origins and the application of these regulations and analyzes how
the rules--initially crafted to protect the health and privacy of the
human subjects of medical experiments--can limit even casual scholarly
interactions such as a humanist interviewing a poet about his or her
writing. In assessing the issue, Schrag argues that biomedical
researchers and bioethicists repeatedly excluded social scientists from
rule making and ignored the existing ethical traditions in nonmedical
fields. Ultimately, he contends, IRBs not only threaten to polarize
medical and social scientists, they also create an atmosphere wherein
certain types of academics can impede and even silence others.
The first work to document the troubled emergence of today's system of
regulating scholarly research, Ethical Imperialism illuminates the
problems caused by simple, universal rule making in academic and
professional research. This short, smart analysis will engage scholars
across academia.
