For me, the point of a boycott is not to damage the academic pursuits of specific individuals, but to send a message to a society that is not being told everything by their govenrment. Surely there is something the academic world can do to support democracy without acting against blameless academics?
A middle path in this debate could be for journals to print a message to the effect that they are NOT boycotting authors from Russia despite many readers' call for such a boycott in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Such a message could feature prominently in each issue of the journal until the end of the Ukraine war. Below is a suggested text. I would note that this is just a suggested text, although it should be noted that if a journal decides to print something like this, the situation in the Ukraine should always be described as a "war" or an "invasion" - not a "crisis" or "conflict", or other appeasing term, which would have the opposite effect.
If all journals carried such a text, the message would soon reach the entire aacademic community in Russia:
EDITORIAL NOTICE TO ALL READERS: As a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the editors have had many requests from readers to boycott papers from Russia. Despite their profound sympathies with the plight of the Ukrainian people, the editors have decided against such a boycott, in the interests of continuing to protect and promote the development of knowledge and academic work throughout the world. We will continue with this policy until the end of the Russian-Ukrainian war.
Chris Zielinski
chris@chriszielinski.com
Blogs: http://ziggytheblue.wordpress.com and http://ziggytheblue.tumblr.com
Research publications: http://www.researchgate.net
HIFA profile: Chris Zielinski: As a Visiting Fellow in the Centre for Global Health, Chris leads the Partnerships in Health Information (Phi) programme at the University of Winchester. Formerly an NGO, Phi supports knowledge development and brokers healthcare information exchanges of all kinds. Chris has held senior positions in publishing and knowledge management with WHO in Brazzaville, Geneva, Cairo and New Delhi, with FAO in Rome, ILO in Geneva, and UNIDO in Vienna. Chris also spent three years in London as Chief Executive of the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society. He was the founder of the ExtraMED project (Third World biomedical journals on CD-ROM), and managed the Gates Foundation-supported Health Information Resource Centres project. He served on WHO’s Ethical Review Committee, and was an originator of the African Health Observatory. Chris has been a director of the World Association of Medical Editors, UK Copyright Licensing Agency, Educational Recording Agency, and International Association of Audiovisual Writers and Directors. He has served on the boards of several NGOs and ethics groupings (information and computer ethics and bioethics). UK-based, he is also building houses in Zambia. chris AT chriszielinski.com
His publications are at www.ResearchGate.net and https://winchester.academia.edu/ChrisZielinski/ and his blogs are http://ziggytheblue.wordrpress.com and https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ziggytheblue
