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A version of this essay was published in The Harvard Crimson.
Harvard has apparently concluded its review of its relationship to the convicted child sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. In September 2019, after expressing “profound[] regret” for Harvard’s association with Epstein, President Bacow promised “to review how we prevent these situations in the future.” In May 2020, the university released a report completing the first steps of that review. The report found Harvard had taken no money from Epstein after his conviction, though there were further questions that merited study. Last week, after completing that study, Harvard determined to shutter the research center Epstein’s money had founded, and “discipline” its academic director.
Yet in these steps, Harvard has still not given us a fair accounting of our past. And worse, in this latest step, it hides that account behind a scapegoat.
There are three chapters in the relationships between research and academic institutions and Jeffrey Epstein. In the first, before his conviction in 2008, everyone loves Epstein. In the third, after the 2018 article in the Miami Herald detailing his depravity, everyone hates Epstein. But in the second, there is an ambiguous dance between this generous funder and universities that recognize complexity in taking his money.
In 2008, Drew Faust resolved that complexity with clarity, but incompletely. Unlike others, such as MIT, Faust determined…
