Originally published on May 30, 2019
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For years, U.S. research universities have benefited
enormously from an open research environment that welcomed international
students and scholars. The benefits are now overshadowed by the fear of foreign
nationals stealing intellectual property and compromising national security.
And China is the primary target[i].
China has made no secret out of its aspiration to become a
global technology leader with its “Made in China 2025” plan, a 10-year plan to
modernize China’s manufacturing industries. After decades of sending hundreds
of thousands of Chinese science and engineering graduate students abroad and
China’s success in repatriating Chinese scholars[ii], China now has the
workforce skilled in smart manufacturing to undertake this transformation and
step out of its role as a low-cost manufacturer for consumer goods.
The U.S. cannot lose its reputation as a magnet for
international talent. About 39% of the more than 620,000 graduate students and
56% of the more than 45,000 postdocs in the sciences and engineering were
foreign nationals in 2016. In some fields, like electrical engineering, these
figures are even higher: 72% of graduate students and 74% of postdocs are
foreign nationals.[iii]
The open exchange of ideas is an academic principle.
Universities rarely allow restrictions on participation and dissemination of
research. This openness accelerates discovery, invites scrutiny, and builds
trust with society when experts are called to advise policy makers and
legislators on controversial topics.
How do we balance national security and economic interests
with our need to feed the science and engineering workforce pipelines and the
academic principle of open exchange of ideas? This has to be a partnership
between the federal government and universities.
First, universities need to raise the level of awareness and
educate their research community on the current regulations, in particular,
export controls, that prevent foreign nationals from accessing technologies
that are important to our national security. The academic research community
has become desensitized to the dangers of academic espionage after decades of
free exchange of ideas and international collaborations that have built a level
of trust among researchers across the globe.
Second, universities must become more willing to accept
restrictions on participation in and dissemination of research. The federal
government can serve as a model with its layers of classification that could
provide both a more nuanced approach to protecting research relevant to
national security and guidance to researchers when they need to exercise more
caution.
Third, to ensure U.S. technological superiority in areas of
national security, we need large and targeted investments for universities to
engage in research relevant to national security. Events in the 20th century
brought together government, industry, universities and other research
organizations to aid the government in national security and defense. This
needs to continue in this century.
Fourth, we need to increase the number of federally funded
fellowships for domestic students to make it attractive to continue their
education in M.S. and Ph.D. programs in the sciences and engineering instead of
finding more lucrative career paths in finance and business. And we need to be
able to offer competitive salaries and academic research career paths to those
who complete their PhDs and not have them spend years as postdocs on low
salaries.
Lastly, we must be mindful of unintended consequences. For
instance, Senator Kennedy’s (R) recently introduced a bill[iv] to protect
national security by requiring U.S. universities “to obtain a deemed export
license before allowing a foreign national […] access to technology controlled
under the Export Administration Regulations.”
If passed, this bill could paralyze the U.S. global dominance in
research and development by making it impractical for universities to have
foreign nationals conduct research in technology areas, and may end up harming
rather than helping the U.S. lead the world in technological innovation. To the
detriment of the U.S., other countries will welcome those highly-skilled
researchers with open arms.
[i] MD Anderson ousts 3 scientists over concerns about
Chines conflicts of interest. Todd Ackerman. April 19, 2019. Houston Chronicle.
[ii] How China is Winning Back More Graduates From Foreign
Universities Than Ever Before. Luke Kelly. Jan 25, 2018. Forbes.
(https://www.forbes.com/sites/ljkelly/2018/01/25/how-china-is-winning-back-more-graduates-from-foreign-universities-than-ever-before/#138eb0965c1e;
accessed on April 15, 2019)
[iii] Survey of Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in
Science and Engineering Fall 2016. NCSES Survey. Tables 13 and 34.
(https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/gradpostdoc/2016/index.html; accessed on April 30,
2019)
[iv] S.937 – Protecting American Technologies Act of 2019.
(https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/937; accessed on
April 16, 2019)