Tobacco funding for academics

摘要

Most people would agree that Cambridge University would be ill advised to launder money for a Colombian cocaine cartel. While the £1.5 million that the university proposes to accept from BAT (British American Tobacco) Industries to fund a new chair in international relations may be legal, it is hard to make a moral distinction between the tobacco industry and the drug cartels. Both supply and promote an addictive substance with the intention of maximising their profits, in spite of the resultant human suffering. Selling tobacco is certainly profitable: BAT Industries' profits went up 56% to a record £1.56 billion in 1995. Most of this growth came from selling 100 billion more cigarettes to people in developing countries than it had in 1994. This success means that the company is awash with money, and it has seemed fitting—and no doubt tax efficient—to the company's board to honour its recently retired chairman by establishing the Sir Patrick Sheehy professorship of international relations. Sir Patrick's early successes were as Nigerian regional sales manager of British American Tobacco —where rising cigarette sales through the 1950s and 60s led to his promotion to chairman of its tobacco division and eventually to chairman of the board in 1982.