That Nature published this long comment, written by eight indigenous authors from five countries, is a sure sign of its surrender to “progressive” views that aim to change science from an endeavor finding truth about nature to an endeavor that’s a lever for social justice. Surprisingly, though, Nature allowed the authors to use the “progressive” term of “decolonization,” arguing explicitly that the science is the result of colonization of knowledge by white men from the Global North—a situation that must be recitified, pronto.
The authors give eight ways to rectify the “colonization”, all of them involving sacrificing merit for ethnicity, replacing modern science with “other ways of knowing,” and demanding both professional, monetary, and territorial reparations, even from those who never oppressed anybody. There must be equity in everything, they say: all ethnic groups must be represented in science jobs and funding in exact proportion (indeed, sometimes in higher proportion) than their presence in the population. Further, the authors demand that indigenous science be taken on intellectual par with modern science (or, as they say, “Western science”), despite the local nature of indigenous knowledge and its lack of tools used by modern science (hypothesis testing, controls, and so on) that severely limits the ambit and value of indigenous knowledge.
The article also suffers from severe distortion of claims (e.g., pervasive “structural racism” in science), from a lack of documentation of those claims, and most of all from the failure to disentangle prejudice from other causes of inequity (preference, differential qualifications, etc.). Finally, it suffers from a pervasive flaw in these kind of studies: the attempt to remedy inequities by adjusting the proportion of grants and professors once people have already gotten their Ph.Ds and jobs. Such advice will only serve to infect science with the views of Ibram Kendi as expressed in his book How to Be an Antiracist:
The only remedy to racist discrimination is antiracist discrimination. The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination.
In other words, the article calls for pervasive and unapologetic discrimination in favor of indigenous people. But the only fair and lasting remedy for inequities that doesn’t erode science itself, as well as of inequities in general, is to give every group equal opportunity from birth. Yes, that’s a hard task, and will take years. In the meantimes, we should do outreach, see below, and also study to what extent present inequities may stem from past bigotry.
Click below to read the article, or find it archived here.
The first author of the paper, Tara McAlister, has largely abandoned science for activism; to see her true colors, read this article: “50 reasons there are no Māori in your science department.“, or this one, “Why isn’t my professor Māori?” (see my post here, too). She specializes in posting lists of inequities and saying that this is prima facie evidence for ongoing bigotry and structural racism. She is not doing real “research”, but misguided activism. More on this later.
I’ll start simply by giving the first four paragraphs of the paper, which encapsulate the indictment of both “Western” science, seen as unfriendly to indigenous knowledge and rife with structural racism, and also of non-Indigenous scientists, seen as bigoted and sworn to prevent indigenous scientists from advancing:
Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives intend to support Black, Indigenous and other marginalized scholars — but the pace of change has remained slow.
Too often, Indigenous people continue to be objects of research; they must be allowed to become research leaders. For this to happen, extractive research that is taken from Indigenous people without their meaningful involvement, benefit or consent must stop. Indigenous communities must be in charge of whether or not they participate in research, and what happens with any data collected. This is how universities and scientific institutions should uphold key principles of Indigenous self-determination, and ensure data sovereignty in education and research. Institutional power and expertise must serve Indigenous causes, too, and the research community must nurture Indigenous scholars.
We are Indigenous scientists who work and live in the settler-colonial countries of Aotearoa (New Zealand), Canada, Australia and the United States, with expertise spanning microbiology, astrophysics, behavioural ecology, hydrogeology, water science, Traditional Knowledge, Indigenous Research Methodologies and Indigenous geographies. Here, we outline eight steps that academic institutions can take to stop marginalizing Indigenous people.
Dominant science (sometimes referred to as Western science) is rooted in colonization, racism and white supremacy: it has been an active participant in the assimilation, marginalization and genocide of Indigenous people1,2. Black and Indigenous people have been exploited repeatedly by dominant science for monetary and educational gain3, and many institutions were funded by money acquired after stealing Indigenous lands.
Science has been an active participant in genocide? Really? Maybe “colonialists” have, but not science itself. And this sets the overheated and misguided tone for the paper. I’ll list the eight reforms that the authors demand of science, give a quote from the paper for each one, and make my own comment. Quotes from the paper are indented.
1.) Recognize science’s colonial legacy
. . .Colonialism remains deeply embedded in many facets of dominant science, leading to inequitable health and social outcomes. For example, Indigenous people globally have lower life expectancies and higher rates of maternal and infant mortalities than other population groups. And facial-recognition algorithms are often based on white facial features, meaning their results have high false-positive rates for Black and Indigenous people.
These practices (past and present) have caused harm and a distrust of scientific research in Indigenous communities. To begin to dismantle these legacies, all scientists must understand how their disciplines have enabled colonialism. Universities must ensure that students learn the history of their field as part of the curriculum. For example, at Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand, the bachelor of science degree includes a mandatory course about the relationship between science and Indigenous knowledges (both Māori and Pacific) in Aotearoa.
What the authors are trying to say is that science is largely a product of European efforts. To some extent that’s true, but science is now an international endeavor. And no, we don’t need to be propagandized about this. The bizarre course at the University of Auckland required for all first-year students in science has, I hear, gotten terrible reviews by students, because, as I’ve written, it’s largely a course meant to propagandize students.
2.) Fund Indigenous scientists
Indigenous scientists are chronically underfunded internationally: they often receive fewer academic fellowships and research grants than their white colleagues do4. For example, in the United States, between 1996 and 2019, white principal investigators were consistently funded by the National Science Foundation at higher rates than were principal investigators of colour4. In 2021, Māori were under-represented in both decision-making panels and in successful applications for the Endeavour Fund5 — one of New Zealand’s largest research funds, named after Cook’s ship. This under-representation, combined with the fact that Indigenous people occupy few research positions (statistics from settler-colonial countries such as Australia suggest that less than 1% of all PhD holders globally are Indigenous) means that these scientists are often locked out of opportunities to do meaningful research6.
For these changes to happen, the conventional metrics of research excellence must be expanded. Reports written for Indigenous communities should be considered equivalent to peer-reviewed manuscripts. The scientific community must acknowledge the value of research that is led by Indigenous communities, as well as research that centres Indigenous Knowledge systems.
Increasing Indigenous representation on decision-making panels would help to break the cycle of inequity in all these areas.
The first line of the second paragraph should be rewritten, “the conventional metrics of research excellence must be changed to include ethnicity as a mark of ‘excellence'”. Here the authors mistake inequity in funding with bigotry, and although they do document inequity of funding (the only real documentation in the article), they don’t mention that there are other causes of inequities.
For example, in America we know that the National Institutes of Health funds grant proposals from black investigators at a lower rate than proposals from white investigators. But a multivariate analysis of funding showed that this was not due to rife bigotry among granting agencies or reviwers, but to two factors: black investigators tended to apply more often for funding in areas that dispensed less funding, and, second, the qualifications of black investigators, as judged by their publication history (one of the most important metrics of investigator quality), were lower.
What the authors are asking for here is preferential funding based on ethnicity. In America this is illegal, though I’m not sure about places like Canada and New Zealand. My impression is that Canada does preferentially give grants and jobs to certain identified minorities.
3.) Hire, retain, promote
In the past decade, we have noticed an increase in academic positions targeted towards Indigenous peoples, particularly in settler-colonial states that have made appreciable moves towards reconciliation, such as Australia, Aotearoa and Canada. But it is not enough to simply hire Indigenous scholars. Institutions must work to ensure that they can thrive in academia.
. . . . Universities have started to turn to cluster hiring, in which several people are recruited at the same time to improve racial or gender diversity. For Indigenous scholars, this approach can prevent the isolation both of the individual who is hired and of the Indigenous values, contributions and ways of knowing. Although hiring in cohorts is not sufficient by itself to change organizational culture or shift power, it is crucial to help build a critical mass of Indigenous scientists who will enable enduring change.
This is illegal in America, and the University of Chicago has its own provision to ensure that hiring and promotion is based solely on academic merit (scholarship and teaching) and contribution to the scholarly community: the Shils report of 1970. It would be a travesty here to argue that we should preferentially hire and promote people based on their ethnicity, even if done under the well-meaning but misguided attempt to correct past bigotry that may have led to inequities. But before you rectify inequities, you need to figure out what caused them. As the NIH-funding issue above shows, it may not be existing bigotry or structural racism. Yes, if existing bigotry does discriminate against minorities, that has to be fixed. But I doubt that it does at present for hiring, promotion, or funding—especially given the Zeitgeist. This demand is one example of the Kendi-an dictum: “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination.” The real remedy is equal opportunities beginning at birth.
4.) Dismantle institutional racism
Institutional factors such as racism, burnout, isolation, excess labour and inequitable funding, as well as unsafe and unwelcoming environments, all contribute to greater turnover of Black and Indigenous faculty members than of white colleagues7,8. Universities must work to dismantle the structures, practices, policies and processes that have led to this situation. They must facilitate connections, collaborations and mentorships among Indigenous academics.
Evaluation and promotion processes should be redesigned9 in consultation with key Indigenous people on and off campus. This consultation should not force Indigenous community members to make hasty decisions, but instead take into account the lived experiences of Indigenous academics as well as the community members they work with.
Both the references in the first paragraph are based on self-report, and the finding that those who self-reported feeling marginalized left universities more often. But there is no evidence that the universities are “unwelcoming” or actually engage in “institutional racism.” We’ve also dealt with inequitable funding, which has many explanations that have to be untangled. And lack of funding can contribute to a higher dropout rate of some groups.
The remedy suggested in the paper is a bad one: ask indigenous people how to design evaluation and hiring processes to allow more of them to be retained. That is self-aggrandizing and unwarranted favoritism. And you are not supposed to take for granted how people say they have been treated, as there is a tendency among all groups to assume a “victim” stance—a tendency that goes for every group I can think of. The questions that need to be asked are two: “Is there at present general discrimination against minorities in science?” and, if so, “What aspects of the university are structurally racist?” Of course there will be some bigots in any group, but the assertion involves its intensity and whether it affects academic performance.
5.) Recognize indigenous knowledge
For thousands of years, Indigenous Peoples have accumulated and developed place-based knowledge about our local environments, through systems built on each community’s philosophies, methodologies, criteria and world view. Indigenous Knowledge is increasingly being sought in both basic and applied sciences10, particularly in fields such as fire management, sustainability and conservation. But the superficial inclusion of some fragments of Indigenous Knowledge in science is not decolonization.
Notice that the knowledge is “place based” and not really based on systems beyond “do what is needed to ensure well being and survival”. I’ve discussed in detail the content of and problems with indigenous “ways of knowing.” Yes, there is scientific content to nearly all of them, but the reason that the inclusion might be “superficial” is not because of bigotry, but because indigenous knowledge—Māori ways of knowing are those I’m most familiar with— is local, limited to what enables a local tribe or group to survive in its environment, and are more or less anecdotal, without hypothesis testing or the toolkit of modern science that could allow indigenous “knowledge” to be applied more than in just one location. Indigenous knowledge in New Zealand, for example, doesn’t hold in Canada.
6.) Create safe spaces in science
Research institutions in the global north are often predominantly white, and at times hostile, places. Indigenous scientists need safe spiritual, physical and emotional spaces where we can be our full selves. For instance, a doctoral support programme for Māori and Indigenous scholars improved the well-being of students and academics by providing access to Indigenous mentors and a regular connection to other Indigenous people12.
Such spaces could include societies and conferences for Indigenous scholars. And in many cases, individual Indigenous scientists have created inclusive, safe and Indigenous-centred spaces in universities, such as the Civic Laboratory for Environmental Action Research (CLEAR) at the Memorial University of Newfoundland in St John’s, Canada. CLEAR involves Indigenous communities as active collaborators not only in all of its research, but also in how projects are shared with broader audiences.
This smacks of both discrimination, a victim complex, and the old (and largely discredited) call of college students to have “safe spaces” where they are free from intellectual challenge. These “safe spaces” are a recipe for divisiveness science; and they are a tactic that impedes minority scientists from integrating into the larger scientific community. Sure, if, Māori scientists want to organize their own conferences from which non-Māori are excluded (the only way this could work), by all means go ahead. But universities and scientific societies and institutions should not be in the business of organizing, funding, or touting such things.
7. ) Foster Indigenous sovereignty
Indigenous sovereignty is constantly contested in universities. Issues can range from failure to recognize the value of Indigenous Knowledge systems to undermining the right of Indigenous Peoples to control how our own data, artefacts and tissues are collected, accessed and used13.
The argument that the Indigenous right to oversight is a hindrance to science14 positions Indigenous Knowledge as not being as objective or rigorous as dominant science. But implying that Indigenous people cannot oversee research and knowledge production in our communities and lands is a paternalistic, outdated mentality. Including Indigenous community members and researchers early on in research projects can ensure that they are designed, implemented and reported with Indigenous Peoples’ sovereignty and well-being in mind.
This one I largely agree with: indigenous people should not be exploited by others, and if they participate in a study, it must be with full understanding and with their permission and, if warranted, authorship. Two caveats, though. First, once data are published, anybody can do whatever they want with them scientifically. Publication means that your data can no longer be controlled and manipulated by only you.
Second, artifacts, bones, and so on, cannot be immune from study simply because indigenous people claim to have a tenuous connection with them. If they can prove that the artifacts really do come from their tribes, or the bones from their people, fine. But too often, as Elizabeth Weiss has documented, artifacts that could be of immense scientific value are rendered off limits to study by indigenous people who claim ownership. Such claims must be strongly documented, for they have the ability to prevent all of us from knowing about our history. And even so, I wish that indigenous people didn’t prevent scientists from studying their own artifacts. They can get them back, but they’d also learn something of their history.
8.) Move towards Land Back
In this demand, the authors want universities and other educational institutions to return “stolen” land to indigenous people, and give them other stuff, too, like money:
Universities in Aotearoa, Canada, Australia and the United States have started giving ‘land acknowledgements’ on their websites and in other material — but this is not enough.
The Land Back movement advocates instead for the transfer of power and resources back to Indigenous people. Land restitution is one way to do this. We also support giving free university tuition and research opportunities for Indigenous students at universities that are located on stolen lands (see also go.nature.com/3h8wdwj). Although this doesn’t entirely redress past wrongs, such a step can substantially increase the inclusion of Indigenous students and scholars.
While I’ve often said that universities that practice land acknowledgment should put their money where their mouths are, and give back university land to tribes, I knew they would never do it. And that’s for many reasons. The history of land transfer among groups is complex and often undocumented, and it’s nearly impossible to find the original occupants of land. Further, some indigenous people didn’t even have the concept of “owning” land, but roamed widely, and often occupied land after displacing other tribes.
In sum, the paper is deeply problematic, rife with undocumented claims, and deeply imbued with calls for discrimination among groups. That said, it’s absolutely true that present inequities do stem, at least in part, from historical discrimination and bigotry, even if those factors no longer operate. What can we do? I suggest three solutions:
a. As I’ve said before, create programs to give people of all groups opportunities to enter and make their way in academia. This is hard, but is the only true solution to inequities that stem from lack of opportunity.
b. Conduct studies to see what inequities are due to bigotry and racism as opposed to other factors, like those mentioned above for NIH grants. Only when we determine the cause of inequities can we address them properly.
c. We can begin this effort with greater outreach towards minority communities: letting young people know what careers there are out there and what opportunities to actually participate in science. While this is going on to some extent, we need a lot more of it. This is not unfair discrimination, but an attempt to rectify the residuals of history without eroding science. But in the end, this requires a wholesale restructuring of government to foster these opportunities, and that is something for the far distant future. But I am in favor of it.
As one of my colleagues said after reading this paper, “The authors’ decolonization/indigenization ideology is not only antithetical to science, it’s also anti-Enlightenment, and as such challenges the whole idea of universities as places where ideas are tested on the basis of reason and evidence without the imposition of cultural authority.”
If you ever see the words “decolonize” and “science” in the same sentence, you know you’re in for some bad arguments. And Nature should not be publishing this type of ideological propaganda and unwarranted accusations.
