A Political 'Dress' and Test

Was Dr. Yoel Inbar denied a job at UCLA over his presumed political views?

In January of this year, Dr. Yoel Inbar, a tenured professor at University of Toronto, interviewed for but did not receive a job offer at UCLA. Recently, two different UCLA graduate student letters written around the time of the case have appeared online. Additionally, Dr. Inbar has been interviewed in a podcast and an article has appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education. There has been a fair bit of misinformation online and assumptions made about the impact of the initial student letter that opposed Dr. Inbar’s hiring. In this post, I want to try to clarify a bit of what happened as well as shift the focus from the graduate student letters, to the way faculty appear to have applied a political test that runs afoul of the UCLA policy on Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. Additionally, there was no formal faculty discussion or vote held on Dr. Inbar’s appointment and given that a group of faculty requested both, this may violate another UCLA bylaw. I believe the matter requires a reopening Dr. Inbar’s case with a new ad hoc committee assigned. The views expressed in this post are my own and should not be taken as representing UCLA’s views in any way. Much of what I will say here is what I would have said, had we had a faculty discussion on the case.

There are numerous UCLA faculty that have similar concerns about how things unfolded in this case. I have struggled for weeks with whether to post this because of the fallout I have observed in other similar cases. I have consulted several legal scholars, administrators, and academic senate committee chairs within UCLA to ensure that I myself am not violating any confidentiality rules and on their recommendations studied up on UCLA’s Academic Personnel Manual (e.g. APM10, APM15, & APM160) that gives explicit guidance. I worry most about my lab that cares passionately about diversity and whether my speaking up will lead them to draw negative conclusions about my commitment to diversity. Ultimately, this post is not about Dr. Inbar’s commitment to diversity or my own – it’s about academic freedom and the dangers associated with choosing colleagues based on their ideological beliefs rather than their research and actions.

Let me start by saying I have no qualms with the students writing a letter about their opposition to hiring Dr. Inbar largely based on his opinions expressed in the podcasts. I disagree with many of their assessments, but disagreement is a healthy part of groups trying to process information and make collective decisions. I continue to support and encourage the students to organize and express their opinions even if I disagree with this particular one. The larger issue is not them writing such a letter, but whether UCLA’s policy was violated in the decision-making that subsequently appears to have incorporated these and other similar statements from faculty. This conclusion is not based on any confidential report, but rather that such sentiments were the only factor that could have led to the decision not to make a job offer to Dr. Inbar. Dr. Inbar was easily ‘above threshold’ on all other standard metrics for a partner hire.

In my personal view, Dr. Inbar’s podcasts from years ago on UCLA diversity statements and why organizations like the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) should not make broad political announcements are a large part of the reason Dr. Inbar did not receive a job offer from UCLA. Many of the people at UCLA who opposed Dr. Inbar’s hire over these podcasts had not listened to them and instead appear to have taken at face value what a handful of people who did listen to them said about them. This is disappointing as I believe this cost someone a job offer, the ability to live and work in the same city with their partner, and it cost UCLA the chance to have someone who does quality research on moral psychology (not to mention Dr. Inbar’s partner whose hire at UCLA was universally supported).

I recommend that you listen to the relevant episodes (#15 and #92) of Dr. Inbar’s podcast “Two Psychologists and Four Beers”. I know several faculty who were actually more impressed with Dr. Inbar after listening to his extemporaneous comments on these podcasts. Others were obviously very bothered by these podcasts. These podcasts feel like a political version of ‘The Dress’. People on both sides are shocked that others could see it a different way. As a scientist, I am kind of obsessed with these different ways of seeing (Lieberman, 2022), but as a member of this community it was very frustrating to watch.

The Timeline of the Case

On to the facts of what happened as far as I can share them. Dr. Inbar's partner was offered a faculty position at UCLA as the result of an open search. The Social area of the Psychology Department was then asked how we would feel about considering her partner, Dr. Yoel Inbar, for a position in the Social area. There was immediate and unanimous enthusiasm for bringing Dr. Inbar in for an interview. Dr. Inbar is a well-known and well-regarded moral psychologist at a top university, that on paper would have been an exciting addition to a Social area whose numbers are down significantly from their peak.

Here is the timeline of the key events, given that there has been misinformation spread online about this. Dr. Inbar interviewed on a Monday (1/23) and Tuesday (1/24). The student letter, signed at that time by 57 graduate students, was sent to all the faculty on Wednesday afternoon (1/25), a day later. The ad hoc committee met on Thursday morning (1/26) and Dr. Inbar was either informed that day or the next morning that he was no longer being considered for a position. A few days later, on Monday (1/30), a reply to the original student letter from a different set of 12 graduate students was distributed to the faculty. On Tuesday (1/31), a letter signed by 27 faculty members, including myself, was sent to the ad hoc committee and Department Chair indicating that whether one agreed or disagreed with comments made years earlier in Dr. Inbar’s podcast, it would be wrong to make a hiring decision at a public university based on those comments. In this letter, we wrote:

• “We seek full transparency, including an ad hoc committee report, a full hour-long faculty meeting devoted to discussing this case and issues surrounding it, and a faculty vote on the case.”

While an ad hoc report was eventually written (after Dr. Inbar was notified he was no longer a candidate for the job), this case was never discussed by or voted on by a meeting of the full faculty. In 23 years at UCLA, I have never seen a case that had the support of dozens of faculty given this kind of treatment. Critically, given that a specific request was made for a vote by UCLA faculty, I believe this violates UCLA Bylaw 55.B.1 which states “All tenured faculty in a department have the right to vote on all new departmental appointments that confer membership in the Academic Senate. Prior to such a vote, all the non-emeritae/departmental members of the Academic Senate must be afforded an opportunity to make their opinions known to the voters” and goes on to say in section 7 “In none of the instances specified…may the right to vote be delegated to a committee.”

Student Letter

I do not know the impact that the student letter had on the ultimate decision in Dr. Inbar’s case, but it has been the focus of all the media attention. It is absolutely the students’ right and responsibility to express their concerns about a potential hire. However, all feedback (invited from faculty and students) was requested to be sent confidentially to a staff member who passed it on to the ad hoc committee. Many of those who supported the student perspective still felt that it was a violation of standard practice to send the letter to all faculty in the department. A fair process requires that all feedback be handled in the same way.

It is also clear that many students felt significant social pressure to sign the initial student letter even if they had not listened to the podcasts that the letter was largely focused on. In fact, I have only been able to identify a small handful of the 57 students who signed the letter and had actually listened to the podcasts prior to signing. Several have acknowledged that they signed without listening. Here is what was written about how student signatures were gathered in the student reply to the original letter (which has already been shared online by one of the authors of that letter):

• “The letter, for example, was disseminated to graduate students at 1 am seeking signatures against Dr. Inbar. Many of us woke up hours later to discover we had until 4 pm of that same day to make our public decision either supporting the contents of the letter or abstaining. Given that many of us have hours of teaching, research, and mentoring responsibilities throughout our day, we did not have the time to properly assess the claims made against him. However, because this was deemed a serious issue of diversity and inclusion, fellow students were passionate about the cause, and our decision was to be publicly disseminated to our entire department, many felt pressured to continue to support our fellow graduate students by signing this initiative. As developing psychologists, we must recognize that due to the above factors, this style of direct action disproportionately applies pressure to conform upon our fellow graduate students and stifles open discussion of the issues that we face.”

Thus, while I support the students’ right to write this letter, I do wish it had been handled in a different manner – both in terms of how signatures were secured and how it was communicated.

Diversity Statements

Ultimately, I think Dr. Inbar was not offered the UCLA faculty position in large part because he publicly (4 years prior) questioned UCLA’s then new policy requiring diversity statements of all job applicants. To be clear, Dr. Inbar has repeatedly stated publicly that he supports diversity efforts and his own mentoring history supports this. But in the podcast, he suggests that diversity statements may not actually accomplish diversity goals. Rather, he argues, they may primarily serve as a public signal that the university cares about the ‘right things’ rather than ensuring that applicants can support the training and teaching of a diverse student body. In other words, Dr. Inbar was saying that requiring diversity statements is problematic because they might serve as window dressing that does not necessarily help to foster diversity.

In various discussions, when individuals in the department were asked how they would have felt if, for example, a Latino applicant had publicly questioned diversity statements because they don’t necessarily do enough to actually promote diversity, several said ‘I probably would have been supportive of that person’, with some saying ‘That’s interesting…I hadn’t thought of it that way.’ It is troubling if the race of the applicant making this statement could affect whether the applicant is seen as a bold advocate of diversity or someone who is anti-diversity, but this is consistent with the old psychology finding that people feel very differently about the statement “A little rebellion now and then is a good thing” when it was attributed to Thomas Jefferson or Vladimir Lenin (Lorge & Curtis, 1936). The stereotypes and beliefs we hold about the author of a statement influence what we take the true meaning of the statement to be.

I had some of the same concerns about diversity statements that Dr. Inbar expressed in his podcast until I carefully read the FAQ from the UCLA Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion that goes to every applicant about the diversity statements (https://ucla.app.box.com/v/edi-statement-faqs). (Note that this FAQ was written in 2022, whereas Yoel’s podcast expressing his concern was recorded 4 years earlier in 2018 and may have been responding to the earlier language around diversity statements like this document from 2018 -https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/reports/rm-mb-divchairs-use-of-dei-statements.pdf). The 2022 FAQ explains how to complete the diversity statement, but also what it is and is not about. I absolutely support promoting diversity in our department and our field. While I think it is one of many things that a university should value, I do think it is problematic to make it a requirement that everyone considered for a faculty position should have to express a strong devotion to this goal.

All faculty should support the university’s mission which is stated as follows:

• UCLA’s primary purpose as a public research university is the creation, dissemination, preservation and application of knowledge for the betterment of our global society. (https://www.ucla.edu/about/mission-and-values)

Thus, while promoting diversity is one important way one can support this mission, one can support this mission in other ways without promoting diversity. I personally do things to promote diversity at UCLA, but I can easily imagine someone who is a substantial contributor to the university’s mission without doing so. A university is made up of many people who contribute in distinct ways to the overall mission. Some might make essential contributions to basic science without making major contributions in public service. By hiring a broad spectrum of faculty, the university ensures that all aspects of its mission are being promoted, but this does not require that each faculty member promote all aspects.

While my initial concern was that diversity statements seemed to prioritize a universal commitment to one value over all other things explicitly stated in the university’s mission, after reading the current FAQ, from which I will quote parts below, I am now completely supportive of the UCLA diversity statement requirement. This FAQ is quite clear that the diversity statement is meant to be a place for a person to present their current and potential contributions to diversity that might otherwise be overlooked. This is an eminently reasonable goal of the diversity statement.

To see how the EDI office wants diversity statements to be used, let’s imagine a case where a potential hire has made no contributions to diversity and has no particular plans to. They aren’t pro-diversity or anti-diversity. It's just not something they focus on. (Again, Dr. Inbar has repeatedly expressed that he is pro-diversity, so this is less about him and perhaps more about the view some assumed he has). Should this hypothetical person be penalized in the hiring process for not being “pro-diversity”? The diversity statement FAQ from the UCLA EDI office is unequivocal about this, stating:

• “To be clear, it is not about penalizing faculty who do not promote EDI but rather providing a mechanism by which those who do such work can be credited”

The diversity statement can be used to positively credit someone for their contributions, but cannot be used to penalize someone who has not made the same contributions. If someone is the only candidate being considered and is clearly above threshold with respect to research, teaching, and service and has not made contributions to diversity, to deny them the position would be penalizing them. Diversity contributions are only meant to add to one’s score, not to subtract.

The way UCLA has thoughtfully constructed their current policy around diversity statements makes them completely reasonable. The way diversity issues were discussed surrounding Dr. Inbar’s case is a different story.

A Political Test?

What counts as a contribution to diversity at UCLA? Is it about engaging in behaviors that promote diversity or it is about having the ‘right’ beliefs about diversity? The FAQ’s description strongly implies that it is about actions, not beliefs. The FAQ provides four examples of what would count as a contribution to diversity (“efforts to advance equitable access to education”, “public service that addresses the needs of California’s diverse population”, “research in a scholar’s area of expertise that highlights inequalities”, and “mentoring and advising of students and faculty members, particularly from underrepresented and underserved populations”). These seem to be carefully chosen as they appear in multiple campus documents. Critically, these are all action-based, rather than belief-based.

The obvious reason why the FAQ focuses on actions rather than beliefs about diversity is that the latter would violate UC Regents Bylaw 40.3 which states:

• “No political test shall ever be considered in the appointment and promotion of any faculty member or employee”. (See also APM015.II.C.5)

The diversity statement FAQ specifically references this bylaw, and thus recognizes how it could, but should not, be violated as part of diversity considerations. In light of this, consideration of Dr. Inbar’s diversity-related actions (i.e. the fact that he has mentored a diverse lab) is allowable during the hiring decision process. Considering his beliefs expressed during a podcast about the value of diversity statements is not. There is no world in which hiring someone or not based on their diversity beliefs is not a political test. The Supreme Court recently ruled that affirmative action cannot be used as a basis for admission to college. Just imagine that a university took this a step further and said ‘We will no longer hire faculty members who have pro-affirmative action beliefs.’ This would be an outrage and a complete violation of academic freedom. It is not ok to hire (or not) on the basis of ideological beliefs, whether we agree or disagree with those beliefs.

I am not an administrator or lawyer, but I have significant concerns regarding whether the psychology department ran afoul of this UC policy in concluding that Dr. Inbar should not be hired. One of the people identified by the Chronicle of Higher Education article as a member of the ad hoc search committee had on multiple occasions, to multiple individuals, characterized the beliefs expressed in Dr. Inbar’s podcasts as unacceptable. At least once, this occurred prior to Dr. Inbar being considered for a position and once after the hiring decision was completed. How can someone expressing such views be a fair judge of Dr. Inbar’s record? Even if this faculty member made a good faith attempt to separate his personal views about Dr. Inbar’s beliefs from the case, we know from work on motivated reasoning that it is difficult to avoid being biased in this type of situation (Kunda, 1990).

The Diversity Issues Committee’s role in Dr. Inbar’s case is also troubling with respect to this UCLA policy against political tests. In addition to the diversity statement which is required of all applicants to UCLA in any department, the psychology department chose to implement a pilot program last year to have all job candidates complete an interview with two members of our standing Diversity Issues Committee.

The diversity interview occupies a nebulous position in the search process and one that absolutely must be clarified going forward. While the search committee was not allowed to ask about things like Dr. Inbar’s podcast, because they were not part of his submitted application materials, those conducting the diversity interview were free to ask about the podcast because they were not an official part of the search process. And yet, in all ways but in name, the diversity interview appeared to be an official part of the search process. Every applicant to UCLA psychology for each faculty position last year had three constants during their interview: give a job talk, meet with the search committee, and have the diversity interview. Regardless of who is or is not allowed to ask Dr. Inbar about these podcasts, the UCLA policy on diversity statements would suggest that only Dr. Inbar’s diversity-promoting actions are fair game to be considered in the hiring decision. His beliefs about diversity, whether pro-, neutral, or anti- are not.

Based on how the diversity interviews were assessed, there appears to be a clear focus on beliefs (in addition to actions). The interviewers give each candidate a 'diversity score' on a 1-5 point scale which is shared along with a short report to the search committee (that the faculty are not allowed to see because it is treated like faculty feedback rather than an official part of the interview process). And yet all of this comes across as pretty official to me - no one else was asked to generate a scoring rubric for each job candidate. Within the scoring rubric, there is a clear focus on beliefs and knowledge. Specifically, to get the highest score one would need a "deep understanding of EDI" and to get the average score a candidate could show "evidence of awareness falling short of deep knowledge or interest". Given that this is an ideological issue, whether one is seen as understanding EDI issues is a function of the congruence between the applicant's beliefs and the beliefs of those conducting the interview, unlike, say understanding biology whole basic facts are agreed upon by nearly all scientists.

Without giving additional specifics, I can say that the discussion around Dr. Inbar’s potential hiring focused almost exclusively on whether his diversity views, often misrepresented in my view, were a good fit for UCLA’s diversity values and how students and faculty might feel uncomfortable to have a new faculty member that holds the beliefs that they claimed Dr. Inbar holds. To the extent that these concerns played any part in the final decision not to offer a position to Dr. Inbar, this would seem to be a violation of UC Regents Bylaw 40.3 that prohibits political tests.

What else could have driven the decision? Dr. Inbar’s research record was unquestionably above threshold compared with past hiring standards in the Social area, and all those on campus who do research at all related to Dr. Inbar (e.g. decision-making, social cognition) were supportive of his hiring. Dr. Inbar is an able communicator, as demonstrated by his job talk and his popular podcast, and would be able to teach our students effectively in an important area of psychology (i.e. moral psychology) where we currently have no coverage. Dr. Inbar’s diversity-related actions are certainly a positive, albeit a modest positive, as he has successfully mentored a diverse lab at the University of Toronto.

Between the ad hoc committee member expressing negative views about Dr. Inbar’s diversity-related beliefs, a student letter focused on Dr. Inbar’s diversity-related beliefs, a diversity interview that is scored in part based on the candidate’s beliefs about diversity, numerous faculty discussions about whether Dr. Inbar’s beliefs make him a good fit with UCLA’s values, and the highly irregular decision not to have a faculty discussion or vote on a candidate who had the support of dozens of faculty, it strains credulity to imagine that Dr. Inbar’s supposed beliefs did not factor into the decision to deny him a position at UCLA.

Postscript

Not that it really matters, but Dr. Inbar is a confirmed liberal who supports diversity. As he put it in a recent interview, 65% of the US is probably to his right, ideologically. In the abstract, it would be very troubling if our university is sending the message that 65% of the population is ineligible to join our faculty because of their ideological beliefs regardless of their research record. Dr. Inbar’s treatment sends a chilling message to those beyond the ivory tower about who will and won’t be granted access to jobs in academia. Any institution that loses the trust of half of America has two choices – fade away into irrelevance or embrace being a truly ideological institution. I am not a fan of either of those options.

These are contentious times both in our country and within our field. I think we could all do with more grace when drawing conclusions about the hidden character, beliefs, and motives of others we hardly know, particularly when those conclusions run counter to what the person has actually said and done. While I am frustrated at how Dr. Inbar was treated, I have made numerous efforts to try to understand how others could have reasonably reached what I believe to be inaccurate and unfortunate conclusions about Dr. Inbar’s beliefs. I do believe most parties involved have made good faith efforts to understand the situation, while probably being misinformed about the views Dr. Inbar actually expressed in the podcast and uninformed about UCLA campus policy. But such institutional actions as occurred in Dr. Inbar’s case, even when predicated on mostly good faith efforts to ‘get it right’, cannot go uncorrected if they violate university policy. My hope, perhaps naively, is that after all relevant information comes to light, Dr. Inbar's case will be restarted with an entirely new ad hoc committee that will write a new report that will be discussed and voted on by the faculty. At the very least, action should be taken to investigate these events, in order to guard against this happening again in the future.