"Woke waste" and diversity of thought

From time to time, a piece of publicly funded research gets accused of being a bad use of taxpayers’ money. This is particularly likely when the research can be characterised as “woke”.

Since I took up the role of Executive Chair of ESRC, I’ve been asked several times by science ministers and other politicians about specific research projects they had read about in the paper or on Twitter and found weird, silly or preposterous. What follows is more or less what I’ve said to each of them about what I think is right to worry about, and what it isn’t.

Our starting point is that social science will often, by its nature, address politically charged topics. Because good funders value originality and diversity of thought among researchers, their research will sometimes reach conclusions people disagree with – including positions I disagree with. I defend this without apology. My job title is Executive Chair, not Commissar.

However, it is absolutely legitimate to hold us (or any funders) to account when it comes to two things.

The first is the rigour and quality of the research that gets funded with public money. We aspire to have a high bar for quality, and we are well aware that our funding calls are highly competitive. It is incumbent on us to make sure our processes maintain these high standards. (This is why we are investing in metascience, in methodological innovation such as applications of AI in social science, and on the future of peer review.) Researchers may have a range of motivations, but as a public funder of research, our core principle should be the pursuit of truth.

The second thing it is right to hold us to account on is diversity of thought. If the research projects in a particular field cluster overwhelmingly on one side of an important argument that is genuinely contested, that seems like a problem to me. Again, if this happens, it is right for people to call us out on it, and for us to examine our own processes for allocating funding to see if they are wanting.

At this point, the reader might say, “hang on, what does ‘genuinely contested’ mean? Some people think the earth is flat or that the MMR vaccine causes autism!” Clearly what counts as settled science is itself a nuanced question. Public bodies should not be funding junk research on subjects where there is an overwhelming burden of evidence in the name of diversity of thought; that runs contrary to the pursuit of truth.

But at the same time, I am sure we can all think of issues where research agendas and common priors in particular academic disciplines differ from the views of other experts in the field, sometimes significantly. (I’m not going to provide my own list here, but Noah Smith’s posts on the literatures on missile defence and degrowth are examples of claims in this vein.) In general, we should demand a high burden of proof for claims that the science of a given issue is settled, and we should be mindful of the tendency of committed believers to seek to shut down debates in which considerable uncertainty still remains. Sometimes arguments and positions that are temporarily thought to be ‘on the right side of history’ turn out not to be so.

The final thing I would say is that as research funders, we should be transparent in what we fund, and welcome debate and challenge. This is why we publish everything we fund in Gateway to Research. Investing public money is a duty of trust, and a central part of that trust is the right of the public - including non-experts - to question and to debate the decisions resulting from our work. At the same time, we shouldn’t be afraid to defend the principle of curiosity-driven research, even when its object of inquiry might seem obscure.

As I prepare to hit ‘send’, I have a sinking feeling that 49% of the people who read this will be appalled that I am being too soft on ‘woke waste’, and another 49% will think I’m being a naive reactionary. I suspect this goes with the territory. If you happen to be in the remaining two per cent, thank you for reading!