AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program

Current Issue | Past Issues | About the Report

Report on Science and Human Rights

Fall/Winter 2004 Vol XXIV, No. 2

Scientific Society Profile: American Chemical Society’s Subcommittee on Scientific Freedom and Human Rights

Victoria Baxter

The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a membership organization representing more than 159,000 individuals in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876, ACS directs a range of activities and programs to support and promote chemistry and foster professional development of its members.

The ACS Subcommittee on Scientific Freedom and Human Rights was formed in 1987 in response to a growing interest by the ACS membership in international freedom and rights issues. Individual members of the ACS actively followed cases throughout the 1970’s of scientist refuseniks in the former Soviet Union who faced Soviet government persecution for attempting to emigrate to Israel and often were terminated from their jobs. Until the ACS Subcommittee was established individual members of ACS concerned about their colleagues in chemistry and other scientific fields coordinated their advocacy work through other existing scientific freedom groups, such as the American Physical Society.

The Subcommittee is a small group of eight dedicated individuals. Three of the current members have been on the subcommittee since its creation. Two members are former ACS Presidents and as well as former Chairs of the ACS Board of Directors. Despite its small size, the ACS Subcommittee has been extraordinarily active in a full range of human rights and scientific freedom issues around the world.
The chair of the Subcommittee is Zafra Lerman, a position she has held since the committee was formed in 1987. She is a Distinguished Professor of Science and Public Policy and Head of the Institute for Science Education and Science Communication at Columbia College, Chicago, which she founded in 1991. She received her Ph.D. in chemistry from the Weizmann Institute of Science, in Rehovot, Israel. SHR spoke with Dr. Lerman during the AAAS Annual Meeting.

SHR: What kind of arguments do you make to the chemistry community about why one should care about human rights?

ZL: Chemists are one family dedicated to improving life through chemistry. If we have members of our community wrongly accused for their beliefs, ethics or activities, then we should stand up for them. The rest of the community should help.

SHR: What do you think are some of the most important human rights issues or cases for ACS?

ZL: Our Subcommittee has been doing an outstanding job with issues beyond those dealing with just chemists. For example, in the case of Alexandr Nikitin, ACS was the “captain of the ship” in raising attention about the case and advocating on his behalf. [Alexandr Nikitin is a Russian engineer charged in 1996 with high treason and divulging state secrets for co-authoring a report for the Norwegian-based Bellona Foundation that documented the environmental dangers posed by the abandoned nuclear submarines of the Russian Northern Fleet in the Kola Peninsula.] We championed his case and went to Russia during his trial to meet with him.
We see chemistry as the central science, affecting all aspects of life including the environment. We want to extend our definition of chemist and chemistry to deal with a wide range of scientific issues. ACS dealt with the issue of reporters who report on environmental issues, such as Russian reporter Gregory Pasko, who was persecuted after exposing that the Russian military was dumping radioactive waste in the Bay of Chazma and Sea of Japan.

SHR: How do you measure the impact or the success of your efforts?

ZL: Our measurements are easy. When there are people in prison, labor camps, in line to be executed and they walk away free people, then our committee and ACS has been successful.

Next issue: The Human Rights Committee of the American Political Science Association

[an error occurred while processing this directive]