Article

Science, Technology, & Human Values

38(1) 67-93
The Author(s) 2011
Climategate and Reprints and permission:
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The Scientific Ethos DOI: 10.1177/0162243911432318
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Reiner Grundmann1

Abstract
In late 2009, e-mails from a server at the Climate Research Unit at the
University of East Anglia were released that showed some climate scien-
tists in an unfavorable light. Soon this scandal was known as Climategate
and a highly charged debate started to rage on blogs and in the mass
media. Much of the debate has been about the question whether anthro-
pogenic global warming was undermined by the revelations. But ethical
issues, too, became part and parcel of the debate. This article aims to con-
tribute to this debate, assessing the e-mail affair in the light of two norma-
tive analyses of science, one proposed by Robert Merton (and developed
further by some of his followers), the second by a recent suggestion to use
the concept of honest brokering in science policy interactions. On the
basis of these analyses, different aspects of malpractice will be discussed
and possible solutions will be suggested.

Keywords
ethics, engagement, intervention, politics, power, governance

1
University of Nottingham, United Kingdom

Corresponding Author:
Reiner Grundmann, University of Nottingham, School of Sociology and Social Policy, Uni-
versity Park, Nottingham, NG7 2RD.
Email: Reiner.Grundmann@nottingham.ac.uk

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68 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

According to many commentators, climate change was a field of research in

which, over time, the controversies have died down and the uncertainties
decreased. The science had been settled, as a famous phrase puts it.1 This
all changed when in November 2009 e-mails from one of the leading cli-
mate research centers, the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University
of East Anglia (UEA), were released to the public. The content of the e-
mails made for scandal and revealed some questionable behavior by leading
climate scientists. All of a sudden, it seemed that the consensus that had
been in the making was actually being orchestrated through the manipula-
tion of data and the peer review process.2 The scandal caused outrage and
posed the question whether the scientists at the center of the scandal had
been acting improperly. Improper behavior can have many meanings,
including illegal, unethical, or unprofessional behavior. Such differences
in meaning are salient in the whole story. The aim of this article is to assess
this scandal in the light of two normative analyses of science, one proposed
more than half a century ago by Robert Mertonthe normative structure of
science which has been developed further by some of his followers (Merton
1942/1973). A second has been proposed more recently by Roger Pielke Jr.
using the term honest broker (Pielke 2007). I will discuss important issues
that arise from the e-mail affair and the resulting public debate, and evaluate
them in the light of these approaches.
The article has the following structure. After a brief description of the
CRU affair its relevance for science as an institution in modern society will
be examined. This is followed by a discussion of the scientific Ethos, as
identified by Merton, criticized by others, and modified by his supporters.
Another normative framework, the honest broker will be discussed in sec-
tion three. The fourth section will examine the notion of malpractice,
including legal aspects. The article concludes by asking how science policy
interactions could be designed to ensure trust and reliability.3

Climategate
The Case
In November 2009, e-mail correspondence from the CRU at the UEA was
uploaded to various Web sites posing the immediate question whether these
mails had been obtained by illegal hackers or by whistleblowers from
within. There was suspicion that this was a political maneuver to derail the
Copenhagen summit which was three weeks away. On a deeper level, com-
mentators posed the question whether the exposed behavior was within

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Grundmann 69

bounds of normal scientific behavior or not, whether it documented ille-

gal acts, and whether it undermined the scientific consensus about global
warming. While some observers and participants of the debate saw the
release of the e-mails as unethical, others perceived the e-mail content
reflecting unethical behavior. The term Climategate, invented by a Daily
Telegraph journalist, suggests wrongdoing. It was initially rejected by
defenders of CRU and other incriminated scientists but has now become
part of the vocabulary. Many debates ensued in the mass media and scien-
tific journals, but the majority in the blogosphere (Nerlich 2010). Outrage
was the common element, on both sides of the divide, and in civil society
at large. The publicized material from CRU contains over 1000 e-mails and
several documents.4 The vast majority of these related to three CRU
researchers: director Phil Jones; Keith Briffa, a specialist in tree ring anal-
ysis; Tim Osborn, a climate modeller; and to Mike Hulme, director of the
Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research. They were either recipients
or senders of e-mail messages. These had been filtered using keywords such
as Yamal, tree rings, and Phil Jones, so that these terms appear in
many of the documents (Arthur 2010). This explains the focus on the United
Kingdom, although much of the debate centers on work published by
Michael Mann, a professor of Earth System Science at Pennsylvania State
University (Flam 2009). Mann was the main author of a historical tempera-
ture reconstruction (dating back to AD 1000 and known as the hockey
stick), which had become highly influential among climate scientists, pol-
icy makers, and the media. The hockey stick graph showed an essentially
flat temperature curve from AD 1000 until the late twentieth century when
temperatures shoot up (the blade on the flat handle; Mann et al. 1998,
1999). Mann et al. critically revisit the issue of the so-called Medieval
Warm Period, which is assumed to have existed, at least in the Northern
Hemisphere, from ca. AD 1000-1200 (Lamb 1965). Manns temperature
record relativized this phenomenon, claiming unrivalled warming in the
late twentieth century. The political implications of this claim are evident: if
record warming occurs after industrialization, this may be due to anthropo-
genic influences. Before the hockey-stick model and its adjustment of the
Medieval Warm Period, skeptics could point to warmer periods in recent his-
tory that occurred despite large-scale burning of fossil fuels as a rationale for
doing nothing with regard to greenhouse gas emissions. To them the e-mails
proved that the temperature record in the hockey stick had been manipulated.
Such political dynamite was bound to create high levels of attention. It was of
little wonder that from the outset commentators focused on a handful of juicy
e-mails. In one e-mail message, Phil Jones spoke of a trick to hide the

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70 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

decline of a specific proxy temperature record (e-mail, November 16,

1999). This referred to a solution to the problem of representing diverging
temperature curves based on different data sets, one from paleoclimate recon-
structions obtained through tree rings (some of which became less well cor-
related with thermometer records), the other from thermometer readings. Just
when the thermometer curve showed a steep rise, one specific tree ring curve
showed a decline. These data had been combined in a way that concealed the
obvious divergence between them.
In another e-mail, Jones said he would prevent research articles by
competitors from being published, even if he had to redefine what peer
review means (e-mail, 8 July 2004). Anxiety about freedom of informa-
tion requests led him to suggest to his collaborators to delete e-mails. It
has been claimed that there is evidence of keeping unwelcome papers out

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Grundmann 71

of the peer reviewed literature while at the same time fast tracking papers
from within the circle of likeminded (Douglass and Christy 2009). The
same differential treatment has been suspected in the process of compil-
ing assessment reports for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report published in 2007 (AR4; see
McKitrick 2010). The IPCC had come under fire after several errors in
AR4 were publicized, among them the claim that Himalayan glaciers
would be gone by 2035. As a result of these developments several inves-
tigations were launched, on both sides of the Atlantic, examining the
practices of Michael Mann, CRU, and the IPCC (see timeline box).

The Aftermath
In the meantime, six investigations have been completed5; none put the
square blame on Jones (or any other climate researcher).6 Perhaps the
most important inquiries were the Muir Russell review in the United
Kingdom, which looked at CRUs practices, and the Inter Academy
Council (IAC) which looked at the procedures of the IPCC. The Muir
Russell review (published in July 2010) emphasized the changed nature
of science communication in the electronic age and points out that CRU
did not realize the role of public debate in which rhetoric and credibility
are crucial but instead relied on traditional ways of publishing research
results (Muir Russell 2010). What is more, CRU seems to have dismissed
critical enquiries all too quickly, which was problematic and counterpro-
ductive. The review states that the emergence of the blogosphere has
changed the nature of such scientific debates. Before, scientific debate
largely took place in journals and conferences that effectively excluded
the public from active engagement (Muir Russell 2010, 41-42). But this
has now changed and has led to an increased demand of openness on the
part of scientists:

Without such openness, the credibility of their work will suffer because it will
always be at risk of allegations of concealment and hence malpractice. . . .
Therefore, the Review would urge all scientists to learn to communicate their
work in ways that the public can access and understand; and to be open in
providing the information that will enable the debate, wherever it occurs,
to be conducted objectively. (Muir Russell 2010, 41-42)

In a similar way, the IAC found that the IPCC needs more transparency
and a better management structure: The IPCC should complete and

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72 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

implement a communications strategy that emphasizes transparency, rapid

and thoughtful responses, and relevance to stakeholders, and which includes
guidelines about who can speak on behalf of IPCC and how to represent the
organization appropriately (IAC 2010). Both reviews largely refrain from
commenting on the content of the science (despite claiming that much of the
science remains intact) and focus on procedures. Both also do not pose the
explicit question as to whether there was unethical behavior. Only the Oxburgh
review dedicates a few lines to this question. It states We saw no evidence of
any deliberate scientific malpractice in any of the work of the Climatic
Research Unit and had it been there we believe that it is likely that we would
have detected it. Rather we found a small group of dedicated if slightly disor-
ganised researchers who were ill-prepared for being the focus of public atten-
tion. As with many small research groups their internal procedures were rather
informal (Oxburgh 2010, 5). We note the use of the term malpractice and a
largely sympathetic evaluation of the CRU researchers.

The Scientific Ethos

Mertons Normative Structure of Science
Robert Merton formulated his views on the scientific ethos in the Second
World War, at a time when totalitarian regimes had a large influence in the
operating of science, especially in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Con-
fronted with examples of problematic instances of state intervention into
research practices, Merton faced a dilemma. On one hand, he could have
acknowledged that science at times proceeds in all-too-human, proble-
matic, or unpleasant ways, with regard to research topics, research methodol-
ogy, or political and economic interest. On the other hand, he could have ruled
out such problematic instances as unscientific. As we know, Merton chose the
second option and defined science as a social institution which is governed by
special social norms. According to Merton, science is marked by an

ethos [or an] affectively toned complex of values and norms which are held to
be binding on scientists. The norms are expressed in the form of prescriptions,
proscriptions, preferences, and permissions. They are legitimized in terms of
institutional values [ . . . ] and internalized by the scientist [ . . . ] Although the
ethos of science has not been codified, it can be inferred from the moral con-
sensus of scientists as expressed in use and wont, in countless writings on the
scientific spirit and in moral indignation toward contraventions of the ethos
(Merton 1942/1973, 268-9).

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Grundmann 73

Merton identifies four scientific norms: universalism, communism, dis-

interestedness and organized skepticism. Universalism means that truth
claims are to be subjected to preestablished impersonal criteria. Commun-
ism means that there is an imperative for communication of data and
research findings. Disinterestedness means that institutional checks are
in place that prevent scientists from pursuing their career goals ruthlessly.
Organized Skepticism means that all research is checked by rigorous,
structured scrutiny of peers.

Criticisms and Further Development

A special ethos in science? Schmaus (1983, 13) challenged Mertons view
that scientists norms are different from others. Discussing cases of scien-
tific fraud, he claims these involve the violation not of a special moral
rule proscribing self-interested behavior on the part of the scientists, but
rather a general moral rule requiring that ones job or role-related responsi-
bilities be fulfilled honestly, whatever they may be. In the case of scientists,
this general moral rule entails that they fulfil their obligations as scientists.
The responsibilities of scientists, in turn, consist largely in maintaining the
highest standards of intellectual rigor. In other words, there are no special
moral norms operating in science. But from the fact that scientists are not
different or better than other citizens it does not follow that they are
exempt from general moral codes. Hiding data and giving preferential treat-
ment to allies (if true) would violate such general norms and explain why so
much media furore could develop after Climategate.

Empirical challenges. Following on from authors operating in the New

Sociology of Science, after their empirical turn, Mertons ethos was sub-
ject to several criticisms. Some argued that only cognitive, not social norms
really count in science (Barnes and Dolby 1970; Mulkay 1976). Others said
that scientists act out of self-interest: They assess the work of others since
they depend on their recognition. They invest and accumulate credibility
capital which is convertible into other resources (Bourdieu 1975; Latour
and Woolgar 1986). In addition, the point has been made that normative
statements are ideological facades for the defense of the autonomy of
science (Mulkay 1976).

The role of controversies. Such criticism provoked Mertonian sociologists

to come to the fore, most notably Joseph Ben-David and Harriet Zuckerman.
Ben-David (1982/1991) argued that empirical studies of scientific

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74 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

judgment and the allocation of rewards have shown, there is little doubt
[ . . . ] that scientists observe the rules of their professional ethic in the allo-
cation of rewards and punishment of fraud and other kinds of deviance.
Yet he admits that there are some empirical studies on scientists attitudes
that paint a different picture: The outcome of these is inconclusive:
answers to some questions show acceptance of norms, while others sug-
gest rejection.
He solves this divergence by indicating a special role for scientific con-
troversies. When scientists are embroiled in controversies, evidence may
seem to support the view that ethical norms are unimportant [ . . . ] In these
situations, scientists are indeed willing to transgress practically all the
norms enumerated by Merton [ . . . ]: they may withhold findings in order
to prevent advantage from competitors, they make judgments on the basis
of personal prejudice, interpret results arbitrarily in order to fit theories, and
so forth. However, Ben-David holds, scientific controversies are an excep-
tion: They deal with an entirely different situation [ . . . ]: the scientists at
this stage act like litigants concerned more with putting together a convin-
cing case than with ultimate truth. They are not, and are not expected to be,
dispassionate (Ben-David 1982/ 1991, 479-480). This indicates that the
e-mail scandal could be seen as within the scientific ethos, as defined by
Ben-David. In controversies, passionate scientists use various tactics to
further their goals, like litigants putting together a convincing case.

Intellectual property rights. Metlay (2006, 566) argues that since the
creation of national competitiveness policies in the early to mid-1970s,
the academic world has been experiencing a period of renormalization.
In particular, the norm of communism is being or has been replaced by the
norm of private intellectual property.
Metlay quotes Zuckerman to the effect that this is evidently a time of
exceedingly rapid and possibly fundamental change in the social organization
of scientific research and in the normative structure of science (Zuckerman
1988b, 11). Already in the early 1970s, it was observed (e.g. by Sklair 1973,
113) that much, if not most, contemporary science is carried out under con-
ditions of formal or informal secrecynecessitated by national security mat-
ters and matters of economic interest. And Etzkowitz and Webster (1994,
488) hold that science is being transformed from a relatively minor institu-
tion encapsulated from social influence to a major institution that influences
and is influenced by other social spheres. Other authors have added that sci-
ence since the 1960s has become more attuned to social concerns (mode 2 of
knowledge production, Gibbons et al. 1994) and is operating in a context

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Grundmann 75

where decisions are urgent, facts are uncertain, and values under dispute (also
known as post-normal science, Funtowicz and Ravetz 1993).

Core groups and outsiders. Sociologists and historians of science have

analyzed many examples of insider/outsider constellations in the past.
Collins (1985) uses the term core set to characterize the small network
of research groups, generally located at prestigious labs and universities,
that are the heart of a research area or speciality.7 Leadership personalities
in these groups control the access to key resources of research such as labs,
publication opportunities, and finance (cf. also Traweek 1988). They also
decide in which direction the field will move, and where the boundary
between science and nonscience has to be drawn (Gieryn 1999; Jasanoff
1990). They define who counts as scientist and who does not, who should
get data and who should be prevented from getting access. This social
process of status attribution, recognition, and gatekeeping has been oper-
ating throughout the history of scienceit is a universal social mechan-
ism. The criteria for inclusion/exclusion are social, not cognitive (truth
does not reveal itself but is the outcome of a social process). Once an
insider/outsider demarcation has stabilized, the odds of gaining cognitive
authority shift in decisive ways.
This section has revealed that Mertons claim about a special scientific
ethos has been subject to many criticisms. It has hardly achieved the status
of shared consensus. Critics and supporters of Merton concur that it is unrea-
listic to expect scientists to behave in disinterested ways when engaged in
controversies. If this is the case, what yardstick remains to identify malprac-
tice? This question will be addressed in the following two sections.

Honest Brokers?
Let us look at a contemporary attempt to define the roles of scientists in
society, taking explicitly into account the existence of scientific controver-
sies and the politicization of science. As we have seen, Neo-Mertonians
have granted an exception from the scientific ethos under conditions of sci-
entific controversy. This seems to leave the door wide open to many ques-
tionable practices. It is in this context that the contribution of Roger Pielke
Jr. is relevant.8 It should be noted that Mertons norms focus on scientific
practice, while Pielkes Honest Broker focuses on the practice of science
in a political context, in a manner similar to the notion of post-normal
science (Funtowicz and Ravetz 1993). Pielke Jr. has introduced a fourfold
distinction between different types of policy relevant research. He writes:

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76 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

[S]cientists have choices in what roles they play. Pure Scientist, Science
Arbiter, Issue Advocate, or Honest Broker of Policy Alternatives? All four
roles are critically important and necessary in a functioning democracy. But
scientists do have to choose. Whether a scientist admits, accepts, or is aware
of it, a choice must be made on how they relate to the decision-making pro-
cess. (Pielke 2007, 7).

This is a useful typology as it identifies some of the key roles played by

scientists in the advisory process, like Ben-Davids litigants putting
together a convincing case. However, given the individualist terminology
(scientists making choices), there may be some doubt about the prospect
of individual scientists performing the role of Honest Broker. This doubt
relates to the problem Merton confronted when he denied that scientists are
essentially altruistic:

A passion for knowledge, idle curiosity, altruistic concern with the benefit of
humanity, and a host of other special motives have been attributed to the scien-
tist. The quest for distinctive motives appears to have been misdirected. It is
rather a distinctive pattern of institutional control of a wide range of motives
which characterizes the behavior of scientists. (Merton 1942/1973, 276)

Pielke (2007, 151) recognizes this problem when pointing out that such
Honest Brokers could be individuals, but more likely will be the result of
institutional commitments to expanding or clarifying the scope of choice
available to decision makers. Institutions can bring together people with
diverse perspectives to provide a spectrum of options for decision makers.
It will be much more difficult for any one individual to serve in such a role.

Stealth Advocacy
If scientists are driven by self-interest and guided by values, it seems to be
unrealistic to expect that they will spontaneously adopt the role of honest
brokers. As Pielke (2007, 7) points out, there is the temptation to act as pol-
icy advocate, albeit in a concealed manner:

So when a scientist claims to focus only on the science, in many cases the
scientist risks serving instead as a Stealth Issue Advocate. For some scientists
stealth issue advocacy is politically desirable because it allows for a simulta-
neous claim of being above the fray, invoking the historical authority of

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Grundmann 77

science, while working to restrict the scope of choice. The stealth issue advo-
cate seeks to swim without getting wet.

This relates to practices where science is used as a means for achieving

political goals. Such practices occur on the individual and collective level
but are more pernicious on the collective level. Nothing more than a per-
sonal reputation is at stake where one researcher claims to be guided by the
science and nothing but the sciencewhere there are indications that his
public appearances are motivated by political goals. It is far more proble-
matic if science advisory boards engage in stealth advocacy. Such commit-
tees should always point out the limits of knowledge and the range of
political options. It is another matter if decision makers then present their
chosen course of action as based on irrefutable science or not. In this
reading, Pielke alerts us to the ethical problem of stealth advocacy in sci-
ence policy which is a new and interesting issue (it has received some atten-
tion in publications on the politics of knowledge, see Beck 1992;
Grundmann and Stehr 2003; 2012).
Someone who has built her career on a specific scientific hypothesis is
unlikely to reverse gear after having made a name in that field and disco-
vering some uncomfortable data. The same applies to someone having
gained a public reputation in favor of a specific course of policy action.
The former acts out of self-interest, the latter out of ideological convic-
tion. Sometimes both combine; and both have to be seen as motivations
that drive the research enterprise and the advisory process. However, both
are not enough to devise an advisory structure for democratic societies
that enables policy makers to make informed decisions. They are not
enough because the scientists self-interest and ideological orientation
make it possible (perhaps even likely) that they misrepresent the state
of knowledge.

Individual and Collective Action

Merton distinguishes between individual and social action and expects a dis-
tinctive pattern of institutional control to lead to the desired outcomes. This
would mean with regard to the honest broker, that we need to establish insti-
tutional structures that enable honest brokering to take place. It is too much to
expect from individual scientists to go against their career strategies and nor-
mative commitments. Only in rare cases should we expect individual scientists
performing such roles. As we have seen, even Mertonians have admitted that
the scientific ethos does not apply in situations of scientific controversy.

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78 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

Analyzing the roles of advocates and honest brokers through the lens of
individual and collective (institutional) action, one can distinguish between
individual and collective advocacy, and individual and collective honest bro-
kering. While there are many examples of individual advocacy (see F.S. Row-
land, Paul Crutzen in the CFC controversy, Jim Hansen in the climate change
debate, or E.O. Wilson advocating biodiversity) and collective brokering (see
many advisory committees), collective advocacy and individual brokering are
far less established. There are exceptional circumstances where scientific orga-
nizations have engaged in advocacy (such as the National Academies of
Sciences calling for action on climate change c. 2007, see Grundmann and
Stehr 2012, chap. 4). And individual scientists are less convincing in the role
of honest brokers as they are normally not bound by specific rules or policies.
They can switch from advocate to honest broker at any time.
From this it follows that honest brokering in Pielkes sense requires insti-
tutional arrangements that explicitly foster and encourage a diversity of
viewpoints and practical options for decision making. Only by confronting
the different viewpoints in an open manner can transparency for the deci-
sion maker emerge. If we grant one group too much power, it will dominate
the research process and the decision-making process. It will ultimately
define what science is and what a good policy decision is without our ability
to check and without an opportunity to revise decisions, should they turn out
to be flawed.

Climategate and Malpractice

The six reviews and investigations did not make reference to Mertons or
Pielkes concepts but used the term malpractice, albeit little specified.
In what follows some specific meanings of malpractice will be identified
(especially fraud and illegal behavior) and discussed with reference to the
CRU affair.

Definitions
The terms malpractice, fraud and misrepresentation are sometimes used
interchangeably. Scientific fraud seems the accepted term for identifying
the most unacceptable behavior. A common definition of fraud in science
distinguishes between forging (or data fabrication), trimming (editing or
suppressing data to eliminate inconsistent findings, through omitting out-
liers or data dropping), and cooking (adjusting data to match expected out-
come).9 The question arises if the core set climatologists are guilty of this

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Grundmann 79

accusation. In order to discuss this question, I use Zuckermans distinction

between reputable and disreputable errors. The former occur when investi-
gators follow appropriate scientific practice, that is when they follow cog-
nitive (and technical) norms. Disreputable errors are those that occur when
cognitive norms are neglected, for example when no proper experimental
controls are used, when samples are not protected from contamination,
when double-blind designs are not arranged (cf. Zuckerman 1988a, 521).
Not all forms of data manipulation constitute scientific fraud.

Example: The Hockey Stick

In order to get a sense of the accusations levelled against the climate scien-
tists it is useful to look at The Hockey Stick Illusion, by Andrew Montford
(2010). He traces the controversy about the paleoclimate reconstructions by
Mann et al. to his earliest papers, and then focuses on events after others had
started inquiring about data and methods used by Mann et al. in 2003. Mont-
ford, who is not a climate scientist, runs the skeptical climate science blog
Bishop Hill. This book provides a partial account in which Steve McIntyre
challenges the hockey stick. According to Montford, there is evidence that
Mann et al.s papers, published in Nature and Geophysical Research Letters
did not conform to the standards of scientific publication. Essential infor-
mation was missing both from the published article and the supplementary
information. Peer review was not particularly useful or effective in this
case. The referees have overlooked basic shortcomings. They did not check
the completeness of information provided and the editor did not involve
reviewers who were too critical. Around 2003 outsiders made inquiries
about the hockey stick, its data, and methods. Prominent among them
was Steve McIntyre, a semi-retired mining consultant and founder of the
skeptical blog Climate Audit. Together with economist Ross McKitrick,
he developed a critique of the controversial hockey stick graph. According
to Montford, the weakness of Manns early papers became apparent when
McIntyre started requesting information from Mann. McIntyre tried to
replicate the paleoclimate temperature reconstruction but could not find the
data or program code in order to do so (this looks very much like Collins
(1985) experimenters regress, with the added difficulty that the debate has
been heavily politicized). When he requested these, Mann was very reluc-
tant to comply and became increasingly edgy and evasive. Montfords
account suggests that Mann knew that there was a problem with his papers
and did not want to admit it. Furthermore, he was eager to prevent others
from getting access to the relevant information. It looks like a cover-up

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80 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

in order to preserve scientific reputations. This seems to have been facili-

tated by the politicized nature of the climate debate, and Mann could easily
point to the devious or evil intentions by the detractors or skeptics.
Pearce (2010) has given an account which is also highly critical of the cli-
mate scientists, albeit more careful and impartial.
Was this malpractice? According to Zuckerman, all depends if we
think Mann et al. committed disreputable errors or not. If some of the
most prestigious scientific journals had accepted their papers after peer
review, nothing untoward should have happened. But maybe the
reviewers were lazy, or sloppy, or both, and the errors escaped their
attention? They certainly did not try to replicate the findings them-
selveswhich is not expected in peer review anyway. But what about
the alleged cover-up and the refusal to share data and code with the crit-
ics? While Mann may have shared the dataset he did not share the tech-
niques for using it. Perhaps this is not a universal norm in science, but
this does not make it unproblematic. Neither is Jones reply to a critic
who demanded data unproblemtaic (Why should I make the data avail-
able to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with
it?). This is not a violation of a cognitive norm but rather of a social
norm. Mann tried to give the impression that he was cooperating by tell-
ing McIntyre where the data were to be found, and by giving (by what-
ever brief or token explanations) a description of how the data analysis
was to be done. But McIntyre could not replicate Manns findings and
he contacted Mann repeatedly about problems with the correct applica-
tion of his method and data set. Mann seems to have become fed up and
ultimately terminated the communication. Again, it would appear diffi-
cult to come to the conclusion that this behavior was unethical. The
story so far tells us that the main problem was the peer review process
which failed to spot the weakness of Mann et al.s paper and gave Mann
the confidence that he was in the right and his critics were in the wrong.
There has been some debate on blogs about the ethical problems
associated with the hockey stick graph and its use in the IPCC Third
Assessment Report (TAR). Many commentators were outraged about
that, including Steve McIntyre who told the story on his blog Climate
Audit. At an IPCC meeting in Tanzania in September 1999, the tem-
perature decline in Briffas tree ring reconstruction was perceived by
IPCC as diluting the message, as a problem, as a potential dis-
traction/detraction. McIntyre quotes an e-mail from Michael Mann
which shows that he wanted to use his work as the basis for the overall
IPCC consensus.

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Grundmann 81

Mann says, But . . . Keiths [Briffa] series . . . differs in large part in

exactly the opposite direction that Phils [Jones] does from ours. This is the
problem we all picked up on (everyone in the room at IPCC was in
agreement that this was a problem and a potential distraction/detraction
from the reasonably concensus [sic] viewpoint wed like to show w/ the
Jones et al and Mann et al series (Mann, September 22, 1999
0938018124.txt). So what is wrong with the disagreement among the scien-
tific experts? Mann explains, So, if we show Keiths series in this plot, we
have to comment that something else is responsible for the discrepancies
in this case. . . . Otherwise, the skeptics have an field day casting doubt on
our ability to understand the factors that influence these estimates and, thus,
can undermine faith in the paleoestimates. I dont think that doubt is scien-
tifically justified, and Id hate to be the one to have to give it fodder!
(Mann, September 22, 0938018124.txt).
On his blog Roger Pielke Jr. (2009) discussed the question whether this
amounts to scientific fraud and answers the question in the negative:

Here is why. First, the IPCC is not engaged in research. It apparently violated
its own terms of reference when it allowed scientists to re-process data from
the peer reviewed literature. So the IPCC clearly violated its own norms.
However, even in violating its own norms, because it is not a research orga-
nization, it is very hard to say that it engaged in scientific fraud. But even if
the IPCC was a research organization, the selective omission of data might be
a questionable practice but hardly rises to any level of misconduct, which
generally refers to fabrication, falsification or plagiarism. There is no evi-
dence of that here. Just cherrypicking, perhaps egregious leading ultimately
to misrepresentation, but nonetheless cherrypicking. It can appear unseemly
when revealed (which is why it is not a good idea to do so in the first place),
but misconduct? No.

If we use the above definition of scientific fraud, according to which it is

forging, trimming, or cooking of data, we could arrive at a different con-
clusion. The handling of the divergence problem seems to be a clear
instance of trimming (editing or suppressing data), maybe even of
cooking (adjusting data by aligning paleo data with thermometer data
through splicing). Pielke continues:

Did it engage in any other kind of "fraud"? [ . . . ] [T]he authors of the IPCC
TAR chapter under discussion clearly wanted to present information that (a)
best positioned their work for inclusion in the SPM [Summary for Policy

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82 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

Makers], and (b) avoided giving "skeptics" ammunition. So they stage man-
aged the process to present a picture that they thought best conveyed the
storyline that they wanted. Was this fraud? I see no evidence for such a claim.
Again, misrepresentation but not fraud.

Based on the conceptual trio of forging, trimming, or cooking the data,

one may well come to the conclusion that what Pielke calls misrepresen-
tation is an instance of scientific misconduct. Be that as it may, it is again
the review process that has led to the problem we are discussing. This time it
was the review process under the umbrella of the IPCC. It deserves special
attention that Mann was involved in a crucial IPCC meeting where the fate
of his hockey stick was to be determined. The outcome is well known:
after 2001 the hockey stick became the icon for the IPCC and global anthro-
pogenic climate change. By the end of 2009, it had unraveled and become
contested. At present, the epistemic status of the hockey stick is uncertain,
especially as regards the medieval warm period. It will be interesting to see
if the next IPCC report endorses it. The strong warming trend in the twen-
tieth century seems to get confirmation by an independent reconstruction of
the temperature record (the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Analysis,
not yet published at the time of completing this article).
To come back to the problem of malpractice, it can be stated that
there might be a legitimate interpretation which sees the hockey stick team
engaged in questionable practices. Secrecy about data in an attempt to
avoid providing arguments for their political opponents (climate skeptics)
is likely to have repercussions on the integrity of their science. As we saw
above, some interpreters are less harsh in their judgment and prefer to use
the term misrepresentation instead of fraud. Furthermore, the practices
were not deemed problematic by several inquires and it is interesting to
note that Mertons norms did not enter the discussion at all. We have
argued that one reason is that Mertons analysis reflected a different pro-
blematique and that it has been superseded in the meantime, allowing for a
suspension of the norms of science in scientific controversies.

Was there Unethical Behavior?

Nearly four weeks after the scandal broke, IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri
said that in the field of climatology there might be a few black sheep who
deviate from ethical practices (Gulf News, December 13, 2009). This seems
to be in line with a Mertonian view which assumes a shared ethos among
researchers. In an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Dan Sarewitz and Samuel

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Grundmann 83

Thernstrom (2009) took a different approach, making the point (against Mer-
ton) that scientists do not have special normative standards:

Central to this disaster has been scientists insistence that they are unsullied
providers of truth in an otherwise corrupt and indecipherable world. It was
never so. . . . [I]n practice, science is competitive, backbiting, venal, imper-
fect and, indeed, political. Science, in other words, is replete with the same
human failings that mark all other social activities.

The British Times Higher Education quoted Sarewitz as saying that the
e-mails showed normal science politics. He said It is on the extreme end,
but still within bounds (Times Higher Education, December 17, 2009, p. 4).
There has been initial reluctance on the part of most climatologists and other
observers of Climategate to condemn the exposed behavior. A Nature com-
mentary put it this way:

What the e-mails do not show, however, is a grand conspiracy to concoct

global warming. Instead, they show sincere researchers struggling to do good
work in a highly politicized environment and sometimes losing their tem-
pers. (Kleiner 2010).
Others pointed out that the researchers unfortunately do not appear as nice
people but that they have, nevertheless, performed top science. As NASA
climatologist Gavin Schmidt puts it, Science doesnt work because were all
nice. Newton may have been an ass, but the theory of gravity still works
(cited in Kleiner 2010). Schmidt claims that the scientists were perhaps ruth-
less in their relation to other scientists but despite this ruthlessness (or because
of it?) were able to make great discoveries that stand up to scrutiny.
There are many anecdotes of how peer review has been corrupted in
other fields of research, across the academic spectrum. Given the nature
of the process (anonymity and confidentiality), we lack systematic studies.
Some people will claim that their field or journals are innocent in compar-
ison with the East Anglia e-mails, whereas others will say that their field is
quite similar (or even worse). But in the case of climate science the stakes
are far higher: the IPCC is supposed to inform governments around the
world with the best scientific knowledge. This advisory system was set
up by the UN in 1988 and comprises scientists and government representa-
tives from around the globe. The IPCC advises governments and the Con-
ference of the Parties of the UNFCCC in a unique way (for historical
accounts, see Agrawala 1998; Edwards and Schneider 2001; Grundmann
and Stehr 2012; Haas 2004; Siebenhuner 2003; Skodvin 2000). The process

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84 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

used for this aim should be as robust as possible and withstand any amount
of scrutiny. Sooner or later it will be put under the microscope.
The question of what exactly constitutes unethical behavior can be
illustrated by the following example. The coordinating lead authors for the
Fourth Assessment Report, Working Group 1, Chapter 3: Observations: Sur-
face and Atmospheric Climate Change arguably had a conflict of interest when
assessing research results during the review process. It appears that these lead
authors actively (Trenberth and Jones) sought to suppress other research find-
ings.9 And Trenberth gave the following advice to the director of CRU who
was the second coordinating lead author, of how to deal with the skeptics:

The response should try to somehow label these guys and [sic] lazy and
incompetent and unable to do the huge amount of work it takes to construct
such a database. . . . So my feeble suggestion is to indeed cast aspersions on
their motives and throw in some counter rhetoric. (Kevin Trenberth to Phil
Jones, 21 Apr 2007)

Phil Jones informed the main author of an important paper as follows:

Recently rejected two papers (one for JGR and for GRL) from people saying
CRU has it wrong over Siberia. Went to town in both reviews, hopefully suc-
cessfully. If either appears I will be very surprised, but you never know with
GRL. (Jones to Mann, March 31, 2004)

According to Pearce (2010:128) the paper was written by Swedish

astrophysicist Lars Kamel and could certainly be criticized for being
slight, and for not revealing details about its methods. However, he goes
on to point out that one approach for a reviewer would have been to press
for further information rather than to reject the paper out of hand. Pearce
thus claims that Jones had a conflict of interest when reviewing the Kamel
paper.
One could conclude that these e-mails demonstrate that among the IPCC
coordinating lead authors double standards were practiced.10 What is more,
it appears that there existed the possibility that members of the core set
could get their papers published without proper peer review since they were
sending their papers round in their inner circle.10 It is of little wonder that
such claims have been made vociferously by outsiders (McKitrick 2010).
Especially with regard to Manns original paper of 1998, this concern was
raised by several commentators. The paper is said to be opaque and lack-
ing detail of method and data (e.g. Montford 2010, chap.1).

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Grundmann 85

Redefining Peer Review: Legal Problems

Much of the criticism directed at the CRU researchers concerns their
attempt to evade requests to release data according to the Freedom of
Information Act.11 Not complying with law could amount to illegal beha-
vior, but the legal advice provided was inconsistent, as Jones wrote to Mann
(January 29, 2004):

One other thing about the Climatic Change paperjust found another
e-mailis that McKittrick [sic] says it is standard practice in Econometrics
journals to provide all the data and computer programs!! According to legal
advice, Intellectual Property Rights overrides this.

It has been claimed that the e-mails show attempts at influencing the
peer review process in order to prevent uncomfortable papers to be
accepted.10 Such attempts were not always successful. When they were
not, the team would ponder extreme tactics, such as calling for a boy-
cott of the publishing journals. This was considered for Climatic Research
and Geophysical Research Letters.14 When requests for data release under
the new Freedom of Information Act came in, Phil Jones convinced his
senior managers at East Anglia University to ignore them: I think Ive
managed to persuade the UEA to ignore all further Freedom of Informa-
tion Act requests if the people have anything to do with Climate Audit
(June 19, 2007). Commentators have interpreted Jones and his
universitys refusal as highly problematic, if not illegal under section 77
of the Freedom of Information Act (Pearce 2010: 147).
Most commentators have focused on Mikes trick of creating long-
term temperature records and redefining peer review in order to keep
unwelcome skeptics out of the discussion. In addition, data were some-
times not released to skeptical scientists who requested them. Have the
researchers been justified in denying access to their data? In their defense,
they raised issues about intellectual property rights (which required
permissions from many national weather services and their stations) and
the suspicious nature of those requesting data (people associated with
Climate Audit). But the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) concern was
no hindrance to pass data on to friendly scientists, as the following
e-mail reveals:

Just sent loads of station data to Scott. Make sure he documents everything
better this time! And dont leave stuff lying around on ftp sitesyou never
know who is trawling them.15

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86 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

As Muir Russell and Lord Oxburghs reviews concluded, CRUs han-

dling of requests for data under FOI requests was problematic. What is
more, the UK deputy information commissioner stated in January 2010 that
some of the actions of CRU researchers/UEA officials would have been
punishable (unlimited fines under FOI) but were outside the six-month limit
for prosecution (Randerson 2010).

Conclusion
Do the practices highlighted by the e-mails exemplify any of the four
norms suggested by Merton? Recall his definition which stipulates (1) the
existence of a special scientific ethos (prescriptions, proscriptions, prefer-
ences, and permissions) which are (2) legitimized in terms of institutional
values and (3) internalized by individual scientists. (4) The ethos can be
inferred from (among other things) moral indignation toward contraven-
tions of the ethos.
The exposed climate scientists did not adhere to the norm of universal-
ism as they gave preferential treatment to close allies. They did not share
their data as would be required under the norm of communism. They did
not act in a disinterested way as the whole e-mail communication reveals.
On the contrary, they acted strategically, showing self-interest and zeal.16
Above all, they wanted to communicate the political message of their
research (that the Northern Hemisphere has never been as warm in the past
millennium as it is at present) and boost their own careers. Finally, they did
not foster organized skepticism but tried to stifle skeptical voices. It is inter-
esting that the Climategate investigations describe this as bunker mental-
ity but do not see unethical behavior.
However, sociologists close to Merton have suggested that scientists do
not conform to the Ethos when engaging in scientific controversies. Here,
different norms apply, above all the cognitive norm of adhering to technical
standards in data gathering and analysis. Still, the hockey-stick controversy
and the dealing with the divergence problem could be seen as an instance
of violating a cognitive norm. But only skeptical scientists and bloggers
seem to put forward such a case.
This leads to the conclusion that the Mertonian ethos of science is not
operating in practice, and that it has been irrelevant for defining proper
behavior in the CRU e-mail scandal. This may be due to the fact that today
there are many more scientific debates and controversies, and that they are
increasingly politicized. Neo-Mertonians were ready to grant an exemption
for the scientific ethos under these circumstances. What must have seemed

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Grundmann 87

an anomaly to Merton, Ben-David, and Zuckerman, namely that science

proceeds through controversies (which often overlap with a policy debate)
has become much more common.
The second normative framework considered here, Pielke Jr.s Honest
Broker, recognizes the politicized nature of scientific controversies. Given
the title of his book, it may lead to the impression that Honest Brokering
depends strongly on individual choices, that is which role they can play.
While it is true that scientists must choose between such roles, this would
overlook the crucial difference between advocacy and honest brokering.
Advocacy can be carried out very effectively on an individual basis, honest
brokering much less so. But Pielke is aware of the institutional aspect of
honest brokering. Above all, his point about stealth advocacy is well taken
and should inform our endeavors to devise institutions for effective science
policy interactions that are trustworthy.
Merton is ambivalent when it comes to personal virtues but surely puts
emphasis on institutional design which matters when assessing scientific
practice.17 He emphasizes the institutional integrity and the policing of the
science community. From this perspective, it would seem a moot question
to discuss the question whether there was individual failure exposed by
Climategate. High-profile reviews have focused on the procedural and insti-
tutional aspects, leaving aside the issue of research ethos. In so doing, they
concur with Merton in emphasizing institutional procedures above personal
virtues. We have to establish processes that are open, transparent, and
robust enough to avoid conflicts of interest to arise in the first place. And
this should be the major focus for an institutional redesign of the scientific
advisory process on climate change, post CRU scandal. The IPCC proce-
dures were not robust enough to prevent these abuses, as the IAC review
found. Likewise, the peer review process proved to be weak in many
instances. It needs to be complemented by communication tools that pro-
vide more transparency. Science policy makers would be well advised to
study the hockey-stick controversy in order to learn crucial lessons to make
science policy interactions more robust in the future. No matter what offi-
cial policies will be drawn up (if any), there will be a lesson learnt by many
researchers. The use of electronic forms of communication, especially
through blogs and Internet forums means that all communication is stored
somewhere (forever); it means that it is potentially public at the push of a
button, especially as more and more lay persons are following such
debates. This lesson has been learnt the hard way by the authors and reci-
pients of the CRU e-mails. It should serve as a cautionary tale for all other
researchers.

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88 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

There are examples where powerful people in the review process have
not abused their position. But it would be problematic to rely on human vir-
tues alone. Honest brokering can only be achieved on a routine basis
through institutions, not through individuals. This does not deny the fact
that sometimes exceptional individuals will play a decisive role in politi-
cized science controversies. However, it would be naive to take such inter-
ventions for granted. One should rather design institutions of knowledge
provision and advisory systems that do not fall prey to such vagaries.
Moving from the individual level to the collective level brings the risk of
group think, nepotism, and deference to authority. To forestall these, one
needs to include viewpoints that go against the grain of the views of estab-
lished elites of expertise and policy making. As we have seen in the case of
the e-mail scandal, we cannot rely on individuals research ethos but need
institutions that foster such aims.

Acknowledgment
I would like to thank the editors of ST&HV and two anonymous reviewers for very
helpful comments and suggestions on an earlier version of this paper.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or
publication of this article.

Notes
1. This phrase, which from 1997 was used in a rather polemical manner by climate
change skeptics such as Fred Singer, has been famously embraced by Al Gore in
a statement to the US House Energy committee and the Senate Environment
committee in March 2007. Since then it was repeated many times by proponents
of anthropogenic global warming (AGW).
2. Back in 1995, Aant Elzinga already used the term orchestration of consensus.
3. The story presented here does not attempt to provide an in-depth account of the
climategate affair. It is based on a limited number of textual sources (such as
Montford 2010; Pearce 2010, blog content, commentary, reports from official
inquiries, and a subset of released climate emails). These limitations in the data
need to be noted. The paper raises the question of how to assess knowledge pro-
duction in a highly politicized context. Sources were selected on accessibility

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Grundmann 89

criteria with a special emphasis on critical accounts. The aim of the paper is not
to adjudicate who was right and who was wrong about the science, but to dis-
cuss norms of scientific practice in the light of two theoretical frameworks.
4. The e-mails were put into searchable format at http://foia2011.org/.
5. Six committees investigated the allegations and published reports, finding
no evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct. However, the reports criticized
climate scientists for their disorganized methods, bunker mentality, and
lack of transparency. (Wikipedia entry on Climatic Research Unit E-mail
Controversy).
6. One of the skeptical protagonists thus puts little faith in these inquiries:
The Muir Russell inquiry was particularly frustrating in the way it kept
restating and shuffling the allegations until they were rendered into either
innocuous or irrelevant terms, at which point any findings they did offer were
largely beside the point. The world still awaits a proper inquiry into climate-
gate: one that is not stacked with global warming advocates, and one that is
prepared to cross-examine evidence, interview critics as well as supporters
of the CRU and other IPCC players, and follow the evidence where it leads
(McKitrick 2010, 50).
7. Various terms have been used by climate bloggers to describe Mann, Trenberth,
Jones et al.: clan, tribe, the Hockey Team (or simply the team);
clique; cabal; or gang. Sociologists of science in the past (e.g., Crane
1972; Price 1963) have used labels such as invisible college taking up a
notion which Robert Boyle had coined in the seventeenth century.
8. Collins and Evans (2002) and Jasanoff (1990) also write on science policy inter-
actions. However, in the context of this paper special emphasis is given to the
problem of advocacy and its institutional context.
9. Charles Babbage introduced these three elements of scientific misconduct. See
Kimmel (1996) for a more detailed exposition.
10. Commenting on some skeptical papers, CRU director Jones wrote, I cant
see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin [Trenberth] and
I will keep them out somehoweven if we have to redefine what the peer-
review literature is! (e-mail Jones to Mann, July 8, 2004, marked HIGHLY
CONFIDENTIAL!).
11. See Pearce (2010) for a discussion of the question of how justified and success-
ful Jones and Trenberth were keeping out the dissenting papers.
12. Only a full investigation of all communication between researchers could assess
such a claim. This is, of course, what excites the skeptics around the globe, that
Global Warming Theory is based on the cooking of data by a small group of
scientists who abused their power and perpetrated the greatest hoax on man-
dkind, as US Republican Senator Inhofe famously puts it.

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90 Science, Technology, & Human Values 38(1)

13. To be sure, FOI did not exist at the time of Mertons writing and it may be doubt-
ful to simply equate FOI with his norm communismFOI has introduced a
different dynamic into science by formalizing a moral norm into a legal norm.
14. Michael Mann wrote, Im not sure that [Geophysical Research Letters] can be
seen as an honest broker in these debates any more, and it is probably best to do
an end run around GRL now where possible. They have published far too
many deeply flawed contrarian papers in the past year or so. There is no possible
excuse for them publishing all three Douglass papers and the Soon and cowor-
kers paper. These were all pure crap (e-mail Jan 21, 2005).
15. Scott appears to be Scott Rutherford, a close associate of Michael Mann.
16. It is perhaps no coincidence that CRU scientists refused to share data and code
invoking proprietary arrangements between different weather stations. As we
have seen above, this re-normalization of science which led to the emphasis
of intellectual property rights has become so entrenched now that in this case it
became the first line of defence.
17. Note there is a tension between this emphasis on institutional control of
motives and the moral consensus and internalized institutional values
in the quotes above.

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Author Biography
Reiner Grundmanns current recent research focuses on the discourse of climate
change, using a comparative approach across nations. He has published several
influential papers on the Kyoto Process and the IPCC. He is a co-author of The Hart-
well Paper. His book publications include Marxism and Ecology (Oxford University
Press, 1991), Transnational Environmental Policy (Routledge 2001), Experts: The
Knowledge and Power of Expertise (Routledge 2011, with Nico Stehr) and The
Power of Scientific Knowledge (with Nico Stehr, Cambridge University
Press, 2012).

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