Google-funded thinktank fired scholar over criticism of tech firm
Source: The Guardian
Google-funded thinktank fired scholar over criticism of tech firm
New America Foundation, which has received $21m from Google, dropped Open Markets initiative after senior fellow wrote blogpost praising EU fine
Dominic Rushe
Wednesday 30 August 2017 17.56 BST
An influential Washington thinktank that has received more than $21m in funding from Google and its chairman Eric Schmidt dropped a team of scholars after its leader wrote an article praising the European Union’s decision to fine the tech giant.
The New America Foundation is one of the leading left-leaning policy groups in the US and is led by Anne-Marie Slaughter, an author, foreign policy analyst and political scientist. In June, Barry Lynn, a senior fellow who led the thinktank’s Open Markets initiative, wrote a blogpost praising the EU’s decision to levy a record €2.42bn ($2.7bn) fine on Google for breaching antitrust rules and abusing its market dominance. “Google’s market power is one of the most critical challenges for competition policymakers in the world today,” Lynn wrote.
According to the New York Times, shortly after the post was published Schmidt, who chaired New America until 2016, contacted Slaughter to communicate his displeasure.
The blogpost was temporarily removed from New America’s website before being reposted. Days later, Slaughter told Lynn that “the time has come for Open Markets and New America to part ways”, according to an email from Slaughter to Lynn obtained by the Times.
Slaughter said the decision was “in no way based on the content of your work” although she she accused Lynn of “imperiling the institution as a whole”.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/aug/30/new-america-foundation-google-funding-firings
