I agree with this (and the above by everyone generally). I would also like to speak to some additional concerns about the impact of "transparency" on elite interview subjects, non-interviewed individuals identified in transcripts, and the researchers themselves. Sorry that this is long...
The Northern Ireland/Boston College fiasco (noted above, and well-described here:
http://www.chronicle.com/interactives/belfast ) shows the unforseen dangers that arise for many parties when transcripts are released in full. The release of transcripts (even to an archive) undermines any promise of anonymity or confidentiality that we make to any individual. As Boston College researchers discovered, a country with extradition treaties can request the US government to subpoena interview materials and render them to the government of the foreign state. In the Boston College example, it was the publication of extensive interview transcripts (Ed Moloney's "Voices from the Grave") which led to UK/US subpoenas of Boston College.
The subpoena of interview materials (full transcripts and audio tapes) led to the arrest of at least two ex-conflict participants, neither of whom had any involvement in the interviews -- or any opportunity to offer "consent" to the release of materials implicating them in murders. Northern Ireland residents will generally attest to the destabilizing impact of the Boston College fiasco on the peace process, since one of the arrestees (Gerry Adams) is himself a major figure in the peace deal of 1998. (Zachariah's question related to our effect on conflict outcomes seems very relevant in the NI setting.)
The failures of research ethics in the Boston College case are partly the researchers' -- for over-promising confidentiality while placing the full interview materials in a third-party archive. In another sense, the failures are those of a "liberal" government that is gradually rolling back first amendment protections. The Supreme Court ruled that we, as academic researchers, have no immunity to resist subpoena of interview materials -- even if the requests are being made at the request of foreign governments, for their own purposes.
Making transcripts available exposes those we interview AND any other individuals identified in our interviews (even elites). I believe that these non-interviewed individuals should also be part of our ethics concerns.
Lastly, I think that we need to give some thought to our own vulnerability (in the research location and in our "home" locations, considering the web of extradition/cooperation treaties that currently exist). The information in interview transcripts may provide legal grounds to subpoena research materials that we are NOT required to submit for replication.
In the Boston College case, UK/US authorities subpoenaed interview tapes not quoted in the book that sparked the controversy. UK police realized that a trove of interviews existed, with contents unknown, at a US location that could be subpoenaed. All Boston College-held materials became fair game. Consider the potential vulnerability of your own materials: computers, hard drives, recording equipment, smart phones, and passwords used for Dropbox and email accounts used to contact interview subjects.
One can imagine a case where researchers interviewing "terrorists" (by any government's definition) are subject to seizure of personal materials and passwords because their computers were used at some point in the interview process and there may contain additional information relevant to "terrorism" investigations. This is a serious concern for me, having interviewed "terrorists" in Ireland, Sri Lanka, Spain, Peru, and the United States. The more information I have to submit under DA-RT, the more vulnerable I get, and the more vulnerable my subjects, on several continents, get, if any one of the countries involved thinks there might be actionable information in my possession, physical, cloud-based, or email-based. You can try to delete any relevant materials as quickly as possible as you go along, but some trace always remains, even if it's just the records of who you've been emailing.
I would really prefer not to get dragged into anything like the Boston College case, which started out as an apparently innocuous transcript release, like DA-RT. It's dangerous in ways you may not realize until something goes wrong.
akuperman wrote:At least two people I interviewed – one in Rwanda, and one in Kosovo – were subsequently killed in apparent political violence.
Although I do not believe that my interviews, or publications based on those interviews, contributed to their demise, these deaths underscore the potential vulnerability of interviewees in research on political violence, and our responsibility not to gratuitously publicize information that could endanger them simply to satisfy questionable demands by certain methodologists.
My interview research has been mainly with elites in recent or ongoing internal conflicts – i.e., the political and military elites of rebel/revolutionary/liberation movements and of the states they oppose. These are senior officials who should understand the potential risks and benefits of giving interviews, so this aspect of my research method is akin to journalism, and I leave it to the interviewee to choose on or off the record. That being said, it is possible that publishing a statement made on the record by an interviewee could provoke retaliation against the interviewee. I accept that responsibility because I believe it is justified by my research endeavor – whose ultimate goal is to facilitate reduction of violence against non-combatants. But I believe that publishing the remainder of interview transcripts or notes would gratuitously endanger interviewees since there is no comparable research justification. I am unwilling to accept that responsibility.
akuperman wrote:At least two people I interviewed – one in Rwanda, and one in Kosovo – were subsequently killed in apparent political violence.
Although I do not believe that my interviews, or publications based on those interviews, contributed to their demise, these deaths underscore the potential vulnerability of interviewees in research on political violence, and our responsibility not to gratuitously publicize information that could endanger them simply to satisfy questionable demands by certain methodologists.
My interview research has been mainly with elites in recent or ongoing internal conflicts – i.e., the political and military elites of rebel/revolutionary/liberation movements and of the states they oppose. These are senior officials who should understand the potential risks and benefits of giving interviews, so this aspect of my research method is akin to journalism, and I leave it to the interviewee to choose on or off the record. That being said, it is possible that publishing a statement made on the record by an interviewee could provoke retaliation against the interviewee. I accept that responsibility because I believe it is justified by my research endeavor – whose ultimate goal is to facilitate reduction of violence against non-combatants. But I believe that publishing the remainder of interview transcripts or notes would gratuitously endanger interviewees since there is no comparable research justification. I am unwilling to accept that responsibility.