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![\"Making](\"http:\/\/www.nysba.org\/store\/ATS.Controls.Handlers.Thumbnail.axd?Path=%2fuploadedImages%2fNYSBA%2fStore%2fimages%2fCLE_Pubs%2fMaking-A-Modern-Constitution.jpg&MaxWidth=160&MaxHeight=245\")
Making a Modern Constitution, published by the New York State Bar Association<\/p><\/div>\n
We all take for granted that business people and politicians don\u2019t usually attribute their competitors\u2019 ideas. Moreover, we understand that it would be foolish for them to act any differently.<\/p>\n
Less so with public policy and legal experts, who are much more likely to make a pretense of scholarly attribution. Take the new book, <\/em>Making a Modern Constitution<\/em>, published by the New York State Bar Association.<\/p>\n Here, I\u2019ll speak from personal experience.<\/p>\n I am listed as a co-author in this book\u2019s print edition, and in both the print and online editions I\u2019m listed as the second co-author of one of the book\u2019s sections.<\/p>\n First off, this attribution was striking because I wasn\u2019t told about it until after<\/em> the book was published. That included not being asked how or what I wanted to contribute to the book.<\/p>\n Specifically, I wasn\u2019t asked whether I wanted to:<\/p>\n Now it gets weird. The online promotional materials for the print edition<\/a> drops my name from the list of co-authors.\u00a0 And since that\u2019s also the promotion for the online (e-book) edition, presumably removes my co-authorship attribution from the masthead (again, without any communications from or to me) but keeps the author bios section (the second to last page of the book) while, remarkably, excluding from my bio any mention of my affiliation with the source of the book\u2019s verbatim copying from my website, The New York State Constitutional Convention Clearinghouse<\/a>.<\/p>\n What\u2019s going on here?\u00a0 It appears that whoever started down the path of using my work without credit continued down that path as the book evolved. \u00a0Most remarkable is that they continued down that path even after the book\u2019s print version was published.<\/p>\n Don\u2019t get me wrong.\u00a0 This book is a very useful resource, including identifying many parts of New York\u2019s Constitution in need of reform.\u00a0 And thanks in part to it, my guess is that New York, come November 7, 2017, will have a better informed electorate on this type of referendum than any other state since the early 1980s.\u00a0 Even if I wasn\u2019t asked, I\u2019m pleased to have my name attached to this book; pleased that my research may have contributed to it in some small way; and pleased that the featured home page photo from my website, which I found at the New York Public Library (special thanks go to the New York Public Library for making this photo available), was also used as the cover photo for this book. Despite this, I also feel I have legitimate reason to feel ill-used. Moreover, other authors should also feel ill-used. Chapter 4, notably, is a masterpiece of the citeless cite.<\/p>\n Should the authors be held to high standards of academic research integrity? Probably not, as one wouldn\u2019t expect high standards from a trade association publication. Some might even argue that the low standard of a commercial lawyer publishing a brief on behalf of a client is adequate. But because of the book\u2019s chosen authors and their many scholarly references and affiliations, there is an implicit claim of high standards. More surprising is that this book\u2019s companion<\/a> book<\/a>, published by<\/a> SUNY Press<\/a><\/span>, has a similar ethical lapse, albeit executed with more finesse.<\/p>\n What explains the foul scholarly stench this book emits, admittedly by only a small fraction of its authors? I\u2019d suggest the primary culprit is the culture of mutual backscratching among the Albany set that championed it. Academic affiliations or not, such mutual backscratching is a professional hazard for trade associations, think tanks, advocacy groups, and academics that thrive in Albany, partly because of the degree to which their success in the public policy arena depends on absorbing Albany\u2019s mores centered on power and self-promotion rather than truth.<\/p>\n Of course, as these savvy mutual backscratchers know, general readers could care less about the fine details of scholarly attribution, even if such attribution is essential to the long-term progress of science and public policy. All such readers will care about is that this book is indeed a very useful resource\u2014and one I highly recommend\u2014for those interested in context to understand the upcoming convention referendum.<\/p>\n However, when an academic association such as the New York State Political Science Association thoughtlessly but also very conveniently endorses academics and institutions that demonstrate the worst of this mutual backscratching research ethics, an important line is crossed.<\/p>\n I do have one major substantive criticism of the book: its lack of fresh reform ideas (see my op-ed series<\/a> published in the Gotham Gazette<\/em> on New York\u2019s mandarin constitutional convention culture). Too many of its ideas have become stale since they were first proposed decades ago, which is ironic for a book titled \u201cMaking a Modern Constitution.\u201d \u00a0The insularity and me-tooism generated from a mutual backscratching culture may partly explain this failure.<\/p>\n Making a Modern Constitution<\/em> (456 pages), copyrighted by the New York State Bar Association, costs $30 in print or online<\/a>; $20 if you\u2019re a member of the New York State Bar Association.\u00a0 The print order form is here<\/a>; the online one here<\/a>. \u00a0The companion book published by SUNY Press,\u00a0New York’s Broken Constitution<\/em> (340 pages), lists<\/a> for\u00a0$29.95.<\/p>\n #<\/p>\n –J.H. Snider, the editor of the New York State Constitutional Convention Clearinghouse, is a former fellow at Harvard University\u2019s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, which \u201cseeks to advance teaching and research on ethical issues in public life.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Published in \u201cIt\u2019s a long road to constitutional Valhalla,\u201d April 20, 2017<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-post"],"yoast_head":"\n\n
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