Is it okay for an Indian scientist to have taken Jeffrey Epstein’s money? Premium

Exploring the ethical dilemmas of accepting funding from controversial sources for scientific research in resource-constrained environments.

A decade ago, I heard a talk by an environmental activist in Chennai. This person almost always worked in settings with significant resource constraints and on activities that society had a tendency to overlook. Jeffrey Epstein had not been the well-known name it has become in India, and around the world, today. But the activist raised a point that later seemed very relevant when Epstein’s ties to George Church, Joi Ito, and other scientists became clear. The activist said he does not think twice about taking money from people with tarnished reputations because, for his work, having any money at all was more important than the money being ‘clean’ by some arbitrary moral standard.

However, the activist was also clear he was aware that accepting donations in this way could ‘whitewash’ the donors’ reputation and launder their money. He said the problem was not that he was providing this “service”, so to speak, but that his work and his priorities had rendered his situation only somewhat better than that of a beggar.

It could be objectionable that Church and Ito took Epstein’s money because their employers — Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) — are already vastly wealthy and can afford to be more careful about whose money they allow to enter the research ecosystem. 

In India, the CSIR Guidelines say donations and grants are only to be accepted after “adequate screening”. This policy stipulates that a corpus of funds shouldn’t harm the reputation of the institution or its stakeholders, the donation shouldn’t be treated as influencing government-related studies or certifications, and the respective lab director is empowered to exercise their judgment after vetting the donor’s profile. More pertinently, the University Grants Commission uses the ‘Good Academic Research Practices’ framework, which emphasises “distributive justice” to ensure research benefits the community. So a scientist might argue that taking tainted money for a project that solves a local crisis would fulfil this mandate, even if the source is problematic. 

In 2003, the magazine CERN Courier reported that Epstein “gave string theorists associated with the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai a cheque for $100,000”, to be managed by Harvard University”. The “gift” had been “facilitated” by theoretical physicist Andrew Strominger.

After a new release from the Epstein files revealed the same thing recently, at least one social media commentator interpreted the donation as warranting an audit of research funding in India. Again, while $100,000 is a considerable sum of money even today, and setting aside the fact that in 2003 Epstein had not yet been in the crosshairs of law enforcement, that Harvard University brought the funds from Epstein rather than from other sources speaks more to its own fiscal priorities at the time than anything else. Equally, Strominger’s and Harvard president Larry Summers’s gratitude to Epstein in 2018 for the donation, after his racket had come to light, is fishy.