Science and Engineering Ethics (2003) 9, 49-57Science and .docx

Science and Engineering Ethics (2003) 9, 49-57
Science and Engineering Ethics, Volume 9, Issue 1, 2003 49
Keywords: knowledge economy, corporate funding of academic
research, commercial
confidentiality, Foresight Panels, scientific freedom
ABSTRACT: The belief that science is “a driver of growth in
the knowledge
economy” has led in recent decades to increasing
encouragement by government of the
involvement of industry and of commerce in the sponsorship
and direction of research
in universities, and to the increasing influence of industrial
representatives on advisory
panels associated with the publicly funded scientific research
councils. By extending
the doctrine of commercial confidentiality into university
laboratories, inconvenient
findings have been suppressed, and both free endeavour and free
speech undermined.
This has narrowed our scientific horizons and compromised
government advisors.
It is argued that scientific freedom is a guarantor of our wider
liberties. Science,
which tells us who we are and how we can live better, is being
distorted so twisting our
understanding of the ways in which we might progress, shutting
off alternatives to
existing models of development. Business now stands as a guard

dog at the gates of
perception. Only the inquiries which suit its needs are allowed
to pass.
Science, the government insists, is “a driver of growth in the
knowledge economy”.1 I
don’t think many people would dispute this. Much of our recent
economic growth is
the result of high-tech industry, emerging from scientific
innovation and discovery.
The conclusions the government draws from this are rather more
contestable. If
science is to continue to drive growth, it reasons, then the
funding of science must be
tailored to the needs of business. This may, in the short term, be
true. But it is surely
obvious that this approach leads to the narrowing of scientific
horizons, as researchers
pursue precise technological outcomes, rather than spending
decades on the speculative
* More information on the same theme can be found in the
author’s book Captive State: the
corporate takeover of Britain. September 2000, Macmillan,
London.
This paper was presented at the conference “Corruption of
Scientific Integrity?—The
Commercialisation of Academic Science”, The British
Academy, 2 May 2001.
Address for correspondence: George Monbiot, 82 Percy Street,
Oxford OX4 3AD, UK.
1353-3452 © 2002 Opragen Publications, POB 54, Guildford
GU1 2YF, UK. http://www.opragen.co.uk

Guard Dogs of Perception: The Corporate
Takeover of Science*
George Monbiot
G. Monbiot
50 Science and Engineering Ethics, Volume 9, Issue 1, 2003
quests which might lead to major scientific breakthroughs. In
the long-term, this
constriction could damage not only scientific success, but also
economic
competitiveness.
But for the past ten years, government science policy has
steadily de-prioritised
basic research and prioritised commercial imperatives. Many of
the profound changes
in the way science in Britain is funded were introduced by the
Conservative
Government’s 1993 White Paper on science, called Realizing
Our Potential.2 Its
purpose was “to produce a better match between publicly-
funded strategic research and
the needs of industry.”2 The research councils, which distribute
most of the money for
science, would be obliged to develop “more extensive and
deeper links … with
industry”.2 In 1994, the Government established its “Foresight
Panels”, teams of
business people and academics who would “identify …
emerging opportunities in

markets”3 and advise ministers and guide the allocation of
government money. In
1995, the Office of Science and Technology was moved from
the Government’s
Cabinet Office to the Department of Trade and Industry. “What
the change means,” the
science minister explained, “is that we in Government recognise
the vital need to bring
industry and academe closer together.”4
These reforms were extended by the Labour administration. Its
1998 White Paper
on competitiveness launched a “reach-out fund”, to encourage
universities to “work
more effectively with business”.5 In the same year the
Government resuscitated the
dormant Council for Science and Technology, its most
important source of scientific
advice. Appointed by the Prime Minister, this council contains
seven university
academics and six industrialists. The role of the higher
education funding councils,
which provide the core money for the universities, was
redefined “to ensure that higher
education is responsive to the needs of business and industry.”6
The July 2000 white paper on science and innovation policy
took this a step
further, announcing a “Higher Education Reach Out to Business
and the Community
fund” whose purpose is “to increase universities’ capabilities to
work with industry”,1 a
doubling of the number of new Faraday Partnerships, “to link
the science base to
business networks”1 and a further £15 million for Science
Enterprise Centres, “to bring

business skills into the science curriculum.”1 The government,
it revealed, would
“support 20 Business Fellows who will lead their academic
colleagues in working with
business.”1
All this has a profound effect on both academic freedom and
scientific integrity. In
December 1998, the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and
Principals announced that the
universities they ran would no longer take money for cancer
research from the tobacco
industry. The companies’ backing, they had decided, “is not
likely to be viewed as
disinterested and will consequently damage the university’s
standing and reputation.”7
It seems astonishing that they had been taking this money in the
first place. But while
this, the most controversial source of industrial funding, was
discontinued, the business
sponsorship of other areas of research has expanded. Why
funding from other
corporate sectors should “be viewed as disinterested” and not
likely to “damage the
university’s standing and reputation” has never been
satisfactorily explained by the
vice-chancellors. But I have been unable to find a university
anywhere in the United
Guard Dogs of Perception: The Corporate Takeover of Science

Kingdom which does not accept corporate money for research in
which the companies
involved have an immediate interest.
The University of Cambridge, for example, possesses a Shell
Chair in chemical
engineering, BP professorships in organic chemistry and
petroleum science, an ICI
chair in applied thermodynamics, a Glaxo chair of molecular
parisitology, a Unilever
chair of molecular science, a Price Waterhouse chair of
financial accounting, a Marks
and Spencer chair of farm animal health and food science and a
GKN Professor of
Manufacturing Engineering. It accepted a £1.6 million
endowment from BAT
Industries to establish the “Sir Patrick Sheehy Chair of
International Relations”. (Sir
Patrick Sheehy was British American Tobacco’s chairman).
Rolls-Royce, AT&T,
Microsoft and Zeneca have all set up laboratories in the
university.
In June 1999, BP gave the university £25 million, to fund work
across five
departments. In November 1999, Cambridge set up an £84
million joint venture,
funded largely by the British government, partly by industry,
with the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology. Its purpose is to “change the face of
business and wealth
creation in the UK”,8 by stimulating “research spin-offs” and
“training the business
leaders of the future”.9 Cambridge’s vice-chancellor explained,
“We may once have
been thought of as an ivory tower—today we are a tower of hi-

technology and business
prowess.”8
The independent researchers Greg Muttitt and Chris Grimshaw
have examined the
influence of oil companies on British science.10 They identified
nearly 1000 research
projects being conducted for oil and gas firms. Some university
faculties, they
discovered, had become largely dependent upon industrial
money. Aberdeen’s Geology
Department for example, boasts that “Industrial contracts and
sponsorship now account
for more than two thirds of our research income, support over
one third of our lecturing
staff, fund nearly all our postgraduates, and even provide
appropriate components of
our undergraduate training.”11 There are BP professorships,
fellowships or lectureships
at seven British universities, including both Oxford and
Cambridge. A director of BP
sits on the Council for Science and Technology. Until 1998, the
Director General of the
UK’s Research Councils was Sir John Cadogan, formerly BP’s
research director. The
chairman and chief executive of Esso UK sits on the Higher
Education Funding
Council for England.
One result of such corporate involvement, Muttitt and
Grimshaw found, was a
significant distortion of the research agenda. Five times as
much money is spent in
British universities on research into oil and gas than on research
into renewable sources
of energy. This establishes an inverse relationship between

research needs and research
funds.10 Renewable energy, which is an emerging industry,
requires a great deal of
research as it approaches its take-off phase. Oil and gas
extraction, a mature industry,
could be expected to need far less.
David Whyte of Liverpool John Moores University recorded a
conversation with a
health and safety researcher at a university department partly
funded by oil companies.
The researcher had discovered that one of the companies had
been falsifying its own
accident figures. “When I ask these guys [the senior managers
of oil companies] about
why the accident rates are changed for their own records,” the
researcher revealed,
G. Monbiot
“they tell me to shut up. Of course I do. Because you can’t
challenge what they say if
you want to keep credibility.”12
Some government funding bodies appear to share this belief.
After exposing the
way in which university departments funded by the oil industry
have adapted their
work to suit the needs of their patrons, David Whyte was called
into the office of a
senior manager at the Health and Safety Executive, a
government body which funds

university research into safety on the oil rigs. He accused Dr.
Whyte of
“misrepresenting the truth” and lectured him on the importance
of the North Sea oil
industry to the British economy. “We have a large pool of
research funds,” he revealed.
“Six million pounds is a lot of money, you know. … It would be
very difficult to win
this money for Merseyside.” “Obviously,” he warned, “you
would have to be very
careful about the way you put things.”12
Money buys influence throughout the scientific community. In
1998, a team of
Canadian researchers studied a series of contributions to
academic journals on the
subject of a class of drugs called “calcium channel blockers”.13
The drugs, which are
used to treat high blood pressure and heart disease, are
controversial: some doctors
believe that at least one of them is dangerous, increasing the
risk of heart attacks. The
researchers examined 70 articles in medical journals by
scientists studying these drugs.
They found that 96 percent of those who supported their use had
financial relationships
with the manufacturers, as opposed to just 37 percent of those
who criticised them.
Disturbingly, only two of the authors of these papers divulged
their connections.13
A survey conducted by the Institute of Professionals, Managers
and Specialists in
2000 found that 30 percent of the scientists working for
Government agencies or newly
privatised laboratories reported that they have been asked to

adjust their conclusions to
suit the sponsors of their research.14 Seventeen percent said
they had been asked to
change their conclusions to suit the customer’s preferred
outcome. Ten percent said
they had been asked to do so to obtain further contracts. Three
percent had been asked
to change their conclusions in order to “discourage publication
of their results”.14
It’s not hard to see how such distortions affect the public as
well as the integrity of
science. One of the most disgraceful recent examples was the
British Dental
Association’s endorsement of a drink called Ribena Tooth Kind,
produced by
SmithKline Beecham. The manufacturer used the BDA’s
accreditation to claim in its
£10 million advertising campaign that Ribena Tooth Kind “does
not encourage tooth
decay” and is “scientifically proven not to promote tooth
erosion.”15 Hundreds of
thousands of parents bought it for that reason.
In the High Court in January, a judicial review found that these
claims were not
justified by expert evidence. Independent tests at the University
of Zurich should that
Ribena Tooth Kind has “cariogenic potential”.16 Tests at the
University of Glasgow
showed that the erosion caused by the drink as “virtually
identical” to that of ordinary
Ribena.15
So why on earth had the British Dental Association endorsed it?
Well it might have

something to do with the fact that two of the four members of
its food and drink
accreditation panel had been paid by SmithKline Beecham to
conduct research on
Ribena Tooth Kind.15
But while the acceptance of corporate money might encourage
researchers to
change the way they view the world, the acceptance of public
money is now scarcely
less hazardous.
The main source of public funds for the biologists working in
Britain’s universities
is the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council,
or BBSRC. When I
conducted a survey of its membership eighteen months ago, its
chairman was Peter
Doyle, who was also an executive director of the biotechnology
company Zeneca.
Among the members of its council were the chief executive of a
pharmaceutical firm; a
former director of the controversial food company Nestlé; the
President of the Food
and Drink Federation; a consultant to the biochemical industry
and the general manager
of Britain’s biggest farming business. The BBSRC’s strategy
board contained
executives from SmithKline Beecham, Merck Sharpe and
Dohme and AgrEvo UK, the

company hoping to be the first to commercialise genetically
engineered crops in
Britain. The research council had seven specialist committees,
overseeing the dispersal
of money to different branches of biology. Employees of
Zeneca, according to the
council’s website, sat on all of them.17
The BBSRC’s purpose, according to its mission statement, “is
to sustain a broad
base of interdisciplinary research and training to help industry,
commerce and
Government create wealth and improve the quality of life.”17
Public statements by the
research council’s chief executive, Professor Ray Baker,
suggest that he is taking this
mandate seriously. The council’s press releases fall into three
categories: news about
the research grants it allocates; news about the findings
resulting from those grants; and
fierce attacks on the critics of genetic engineering.
When, for example, Friends of the Earth and the BBC’s
Newsnight programme
released the results of research showing that pollen from
genetically modified rape was
being carried four and half kilometres by bees, Ray Baker used
a BBSRC press release
to claim that the finding was “a distraction from the key
issues”.18 When the trustees of
a farm carrying out a field trial of GM rape decided to stop the
experiment, Professor
Baker issued a statement insisting that there was “no risk of
cross-pollination” with
“organic oilseed rape, as it is not grown in the UK”.19
Unfortunately he forgot to add

that there was a near certainty that the GM rape would cross-
pollinate with non-
organic, unmodified, rape plants, as well as a clear possibility
that it would exchange
genetic material with its wild relatives. Professor Baker, in
other words, has been using
a government research body as a platform for contentious and in
some cases
misleading political statements, which appear to favour the
interests of the
biotechnology companies. It is worth noting that one of the
tasks of the chief executive
of the BBSRC is to provide impartial scientific advice to the
Government.
Unlike Professor Baker, the scientists working in university
departments receiving
BBSRC grants are formally gagged to prevent them becoming
“involved in political
controversy in matters affecting research in biotechnology and
biological sciences.”20
In practice the gagging order is used only against scientists who
rock the corporate
boat. This became clear when Dr. Arpad Puzstai, a geneticist
working at an institute
funded by the research council, challenged the safety of
genetically engineered foods.
His claims may not have been supportable, but nor were some of
those made by the
G. Monbiot

scientists from BBSRC-funded laboratories who spoke out
against him. Unlike Dr.
Puzstai, none of them was suspended for speaking to the media.
“Political controversy”
appears to mean positions with which the BBSRC council
members disagree.
Far more disturbing than the infiltration of the research
councils, however, are the
priorities of the Office of Science and Technology’s 16
Foresight Panels.
The Foresight Panels scarcely pretend to promote either
academic objectivity or the
wider public interest. Though they are official sources of
scientific advice to both
central Government and to the research councils, they are
largely controlled not by
scientists but by business people.
The Food and Drink Foresight Panel, for example, is composed
of eight
representatives of food companies and trade bodies, and three
members of university
departments, as well as members of the BBSRC and the Medical
Research Council,
which are expected to respond to its demands. It has several
sub-committees, whose
purpose is to identify “research priorities”. One is called the
Alcoholic Drinks panel.
The report it produced was drawn up in consultation with five
trade associations, three
industry-sponsored research institutes, fifteen drinks companies
and no one else. Its
report called for “a sophisticated understanding of individuals’

eating and drinking
behaviour” to assist “product development”.21 It called for
research which would help
drinks companies to resist “unnecessary barriers to innovation
and burdens on the
industry” caused by regulation.21
The report of the Fruit and Vegetables sub-committee suggested
that “Irradiation
may be re-examined for extending shelf life.”22 The Meat sub-
committee complained
bitterly that “criticisms of meat production from an animal
welfare and environmental
impact perspective, and of high levels of red meat consumption
as potentially
damaging to human health, gained credence from some
scientific work”.23
Until the day before he became minister for science and
technology, another sub-
committee, called “The Food Chain Group”, was chaired by
Lord Sainsbury. His
report, published by the Government’s Department of Trade and
Industry, hoped that
in the future “the expensive precautionary principle is
abandoned”.24 Lord Sainsbury
attended a “Food Chain Group Summit” in March 1998, which
concluded that this
Government-funded research programme should involve
“Influencing and anticipating
future behaviour of consumers.”25 Interestingly, the summit
went on to lament the
“falling consumer confidence in science”.25 It wouldn’t have
had to look far to see why
this might be happening.

The Food and Drink Foresight Panel’s recommendations are
already bearing fruit.
“The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food,” the panel
notes, “has undertaken a
comprehensive review of its programmes in the light of the
panel’s report. Much of the
research it supports is closely aligned with the panel’s
recommendations.”26 It has also,
it claims, been able to influence the agenda of several of the
research councils. The
BBSRC, for example, now has “a much more explicit emphasis
on consumer science, a
priority topic identified by the panel.”26
The Retail and Consumer Services Foresight Panel has made a
similarly selfless
contribution to scientific inquiry. Chaired by Sir John Banham,
the head of Tarmac, it
warns of the “potentially dire” impact of growing concerns
about the environment.27
The consequences of these concerns, such as “increasing
difficulty in carrying out
green field developments coupled with attempts to restrict
traffic and reduce
congestion” would result, inexplicably, in “fewer women …
working”, “cuts in state
pensions” and a collapse in living standards.27 It has drawn up
an “Agenda for Social
Science Research”: the taxpayer was asked to finance studies

into “the patterns of
choice and behaviour which affect the consumption of certain
goods.”27
Since 1998, the Government has doubled its financial support
for the Foresight
Panels. Last year’s white paper announced a further £15 million
for a new Foresight
Fund. At the same time, government research programmes
looking at wider and
arguably more important questions than how best to rip off the
consumer are being
closed down. Last year the government announced the
dissolution of the Centre for
Coastal and Marine Sciences (CCMS), which was responsible
for the long term
monitoring of climate change, pollution and the impact of other
human activities on the
marine environment. The centre had to be closed, the
government announced, because
“a continuing decline in external funding has made the financial
position of CCMS
unsustainable in the long term.”28
There’s no government money for the centre, in other words,
because there’s no
corporate money. But no one in government has explained why
it should expect to find
corporate money for the long term monitoring of problems
caused by corporations. The
signal from government is clear: if the business community
doesn’t like what you’re
doing, don’t bother applying for public funds.
As big business infiltrates the research agenda, ever wider
zones of inquiry are

placed off-limits. In 1999, the Government published a white
paper on public health
called Saving Lives: Our Healthier Nation.29 The only
atmospheric pollutant named in
the report is radon. It also happens to be one of the only
pollutants in Britain which
does not result from the activities of large corporations: it is
naturally occurring. The
report warns us about the dangers of cancer resulting from
“exposure to radon gas in
certain homes or excessive sunlight”,29 but nuclear power
stations are not mentioned,
and nor are any other chemicals. The white paper informs us
that the Government
hosted “the largest ever Ministerial conference on environment
and health” in 1999.29
It fails to tell us that the links between cancer and industrial
pollution were dropped
from the agenda soon before the meeting began.
Over the past few years, there has been no shortage of claims
that environmental
and consumer campaigners distort science. There’s no question
that some people have
made exaggerated statements. But these distortions are both
occasional and contestable.
The corporate distortion of science, by comparison, is
systematic and mostly invisible.
By extending the doctrine of commercial confidentiality into
our laboratories, it
suppresses inconvenient findings. It undermines both free
endeavour and free speech.
Scientific freedom is a guarantor of our wider liberties. Science
tells us who we are

and how we can live better. It is the glass through which we
perceive the world. If
distorted, it twists our understanding of the ways in which we
might progress, of the
alternatives to existing models of development.
But our scientific horizons have narrowed. The government’s
advisors are
compromised, the ministers who listen to them are biased.
Business now stands as a
G. Monbiot
guard dog at the gates of perception. Only the inquiries which
suit its needs are allowed
to pass.
Some people have suggested that my attacks on science policy
mean that I am
antagonistic to scientists, even anti-science. But, as I hope this
presentation has made
clear, the primary victims of the corporate takeover of science
are science and the
scientists themselves.
Tragically, many scientists have responded to criticism not by
siding with the
public against the prostitution of their profession, but by siding
with their corporate
backers against the public. With the help of a little imagination
we should surely be
working together, to ensure that the scientists get their freedom,

while the public gets
research which helps us rather than harming us. We need a
revolution in our
laboratories, to overthrow the corrupt new lords of learning.
REFERENCES
1. Department of Trade and Industry (July 2000) White Paper.
Excellence and Opportunity: a
science and innovation policy for the 21st Century. Stationery
Office, London
2. Office of Science and Technology (1993) White Paper.
Realising Our Potential, a strategy for
science, engineering and technology. Stationery Office, London.
3. http://www.foresight.gov.uk/about.html
4. Taylor, I. (1995) A change for the better? Science & Public
Affairs, Autumn.
5. Department of Trade and Industry, London (1998) White
Paper, Our Competitive Future:
building the knowledge driven economy.
http://www.dti.gov.uk/comp/competitive/wh_int1.htm
6. e.g. Department of Trade and Industry
http://dtiinfo1.dti.gov.uk/ost/forwardlook99/states/hefcdeni/text
.htm. May 2000.
7. The Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals of the
Universities of the UK, quoted in The
Times, 15th December 1998.
8. Professor Sir Alec Broers, Vice-Chancellor, Cambridge
University, 8th November 1999. Quoted
in Cambridge University Press Release. Cambridge and MIT:

Torchbearers to UK’s Enterprise
Future – World’s Top Two Research and Business Giants Join
Forces for an International
Enterprise Partnership.
9. Cambridge University, 8th November 1999. Press Release.
Cambridge and MIT: Torchbearers
to UK’s Enterprise Future – World’s Top Two Research and
Business Giants Join Forces for an
International Enterprise Partnership.
10. Greg Muttitt and Chris Grimshaw, 2000. Degrees of
Involvement: An examination of the
relationship between the upstream oil and gas industry and UK
higher education institutions.
Published by CorporateWatch.
11. The Geology and Petroleum Geology Department University
of Aberdeen, Department of
Geology & Petroleum Geology, ‘Staff directory’, on worldwide
website
http://www/abdn.ac.uk/geology/staff/staffdir.htm, cited in Greg
Muttitt and Chris Grimshaw, as
reference 10.
12. David Whyte, 30th May 1998. Power, Corruption and Lies:
the World According to the UK Oil
and Gas Industry. Paper presented to the OILC National
Conference, Patio Hotel, Aberdeen.
13. Stelfox, H. et al (8 January 1998) Conflict of Interest in the
Debate over Calcium-Channel
Antagonists. New England Journal of Medicine 338 (2): 101-
106.
14. Reported in the Daily Telegraph, 14th February 2000.

15. Action and Information on Sugars, 12th July 2000. Press
release: Ribena Tooth Kind Dental
Safety Claims “Misleading”.
16. Action and Information on Sugars,19th January 2001. Press
release: Ribena Misled Customers –
Final.
17. http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk, 21st January 2000.
18. Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council,
30 September 1999. Press Release.
GM pollen findings are “not new”.
19. Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, 7
June 1999. Press Release. BBSRC
regrets destruction of GM crop.
20. BBSRC staff contract, leaked to GeneWatch and quoted by
Norfolk Genetic Information
Network, 18 February 1999. Press Release: Scientists gagged on
GM foods by public funding
body with big links to industry.
21. Department of Trade and Industry. Foresight for Food and
Drink: Alcoholic Drinks
http://193.82.159.123/documents/fsze00004/fsze0000410.html.
January 2000.

Drink: Fruit and Vegetables.
http://193.82.159.123/documents/fsze00007/fsze000075.html,
January 2000.
Drink: Meat.
http://www.foresight.gov.uk. January 2000.
24. Foresight Programme, Department of Trade and Industry
(March 1998) Food Chain Group
Report.
25. Department of Trade and Industry. The Food Chain Group –
Shaping the Future of the Food
Industry. http://www.foresight.gov.uk.
http://poynter.indiana.edu/sas/lb.
26. Department of Trade and Industry, Winning through
Foresight: Action for Food & Drink.
http://193.82.159.123/documents/fsze00002/fsze000023.html.
27. Department of Trade and Industry (January 2000) Progress
Through Partnership: 15 - Retail &
Distribution. http://193.82.159.123/retail/retail2005.html.
28. Natural Environment Research Council, 3rd July 2000. Press
release: Research Centre To Be
Disbanded.
29. Department of Health (July 1999) White Paper. Saving
Lives: Our Healthier Nation. Stationery
Office, London.

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