MOTION (As AMENDED): 

"that Senate review the Eastern Indonesia University 

Development Project following the final CIDA evaluation 

of the project. The purpose of the review is three-fold: 

1.

To determine what academic benefits SFU has accrued 

as a result of the EIUDP. 

2.

To see 

the Simon Fraser University Policy on 

International Activities has been adhered to by the 

EIUDP. 

3.

To see 

the stated goals 

the EIUDP have been met 

with respect to SFU's interests." 

Motion: That Senate recommend to the Board of Governors that an 

external review of the EIUDP be undertaken and completed by March 1, 

1999. The purpose of the review is three-fold: 

1. To determine what academic benefits SFU has accrued as a result of 

the EIUDP. 

see if the Simon Fraser University Policy on International 

tivities has been adherred to by the EIUDP. 

3. To see if the stated goals of the EIUDP have been met. 

Rationale: 

- SFU has become increasingly active in pursuing international development 

projects, and now is an ideal time to see how its policy governing such 

projects is working. It is important that 

(i)

enough preliminary discussion takes place to ensure that university 

benefits will be sufficient to warrant involvement in any such projects, 

(ii) 

adequate information is provided to to the academic community 

demonstrating that indeed these benefits are being realized, and 

(ii) the necessary parameters are in place to ensure our general policy 

regarding academic standards and human rights issues is being satisfied. 

Why should a review of the Indonesia project be done now that the 

project is being phased out? 

At around $50,000,000, the EIUDP is apparently the second 

largest international development project ever undertaken by a 

single Canadian university, yet it was undertaken without general 

university discussion at Senate or elsewhere. After almost 10 years 

experience behind us with the EIUDP, now is a natural time for a 

review. The internal review at the end of Phase 1 acknowledged some 

oncerns about the project and recommended an emphasis on "development 

education". We should investigate whether or not these changes have 

been successfully incorporated. 

While the EIUDP is winding down, even with a drastic reduction in 

expenditures in 1999-2000 it will still be SFU's largest development 

project (source: the 1997 SCIA annual report to Senate and the EIUDP 

November 1996 Midterm Project Plan) . For its intellectual credibility, 

a university has a responsibility to see that projects in countries 

where human rights are not to internationally recognized standards 

have sufficient safeguards in place to guarantee that it is meeting its 

responsibilities. 

Why should there be an external review? 

While there was an internal review of the project by SCIA at the 

completion of Phase 1 in 1993, it was limited in several respects: 

(i)

Despite the fact that SFU has no real academic experts on Indonesia 

among its faculty, outside experts were not only not solicited but 

discouraged from providing input. 

(ii) 

The vast majority of positive input from people knowledgeable about 

the project was from groups and individuals who stood to gain from its 

continuance. This conflict of interest applied to members of the review 

committee as well. At issue is not the integrity of these individuals, 

but rather their ability to be objective. 

(iii) 

Members of the university community who were more critical of the 

roject were hampered in attempts to gather information about the project 

nd were naturally reluctant to speak out against a project in which their 

Colleagues were involved. 

It is important that reviewers be not only objective but be perceived 

to be so by the outside community. There may indeed be the need to carry 

out periodic external reviews of larger development projects as part of 

our policy. Such need can only be determined after an evaluation of the 

success of a project such as this one. Moreover, our approach would be 

consistent with that of Canadian corporations, which have increasingly 

recognized the need for such reviews and have built in the mechanism of 

periodic external reviews to determine how their corporate policies impact 

upon human rights issues in their countries of operation. 

Conclusion: 

A minimal standard of good university governance requires accountability 

to the outside community. A review of development projects in the context 

of our policy is consistent with and indeed closely tied to academic 

freedom itself. It is important to add that the issue is not one of 

development per se. International development projects should be strongly 

supported and valued. But it is incumbent upon the university to act with 

transparency in a way which is seen by the community to be consistent with 

the university's policies, ethical standards, and long term benefits. 