Such ties supposedly withered during the 1970s, in the aftermath of Vietnam and hearings by the U.S. Senate select committee on intelligence, which revealed extensive CIA misdeeds, including fomenting coups against democratically elected governments, plotting assassinations of foreign leaders and disseminating propaganda. After these revelations, it seemed that no self-respecting academic would go anywhere near the agency. The article quotes esteemed academics, including Columbia's Robert Jervis, former president-elect of the American Political Science Assn., and Harvard's Joseph S. Nye. What is interesting about the above quote is that it is offered so casually, as if no reasonable person could find fault with the activity. Something is seriously wrong here.
Scholarship is supposed to favor objective analysis and open discussion.
The close relationship between intelligence agencies and scholars thus poses a conflict of interest. After all, the CIA has been a key party to many of the international conflicts that academics must study. This problem of objectivity is essentially the same one that scientists are addressing with regard to biomedical research funded by drug companies. Biomedical scientists increasingly are expected to reveal financial support that might bias their findings. It is regrettable that political science, which has no expectation of full disclosure relating to work for the CIA, holds itself to a lower standard.