The academics call Rama: Don't close the Academy of Sciences

Some of the academics at the Academy of Sciences have sent a letter to Prime Minister Edi Rama, where we ask them not to close this institution.

In their letter, academics give reasons why the Academy of Sciences should continue work as an institution.

Full letter:

Your Honor, Mr. Prime Minister,

We, signatories of this public letter, in the quality of honorary members of the Albanian Academy of Sciences, address you with this sincere appeal, in order that you do not proceed towards the dissolution of the institution in which we are proud to be part. Moreover

We invite you to become a promoter of the opening of a new phase of dialogue with the academic world, continuing in the final goal of proposing possible and rigorous reform of the delicate sector of higher education and scientific research.

We too, signatories, share the belief that much of the time available to undertake a radical reforming process of the Academy has gone inefficiently, and that today, perhaps, it is more than necessary and appropriate to transform it into a modern and competitive, exciting research centre.

Because of the sense of individual and collective responsibility, we think the movement towards eliminating the institution will lead to a point of no return, which could harm the future of scientific research in Albania. This is what we say, without fuelling the assumption that we possess final and effective solutions, and without claiming to replace the legitimate expectations of the new government programme you will make. Sometimes, though, the courage to endure and discuss may result in more fulfilling and perhaps even more useful, preventing us from falling into irreparable mistakes like those when we at the same time throw away the baby. The Academy of Sciences, like other Albanian public institutions, has experienced the long and endless transition from dictatorship to democracy, which has shaken Albanian society. You yourself have made it aware, when you emphasised the need to establish Albanian public structures, primarily universities, in a normal regime.

Your formula “made state” was more accepted, the more obvious were bureaucratic dysfunctions, social injustice, corrupt forms, which, in their complexity, plague Albanian society and scourge citizens in their daily lives. In the years when Albanians were denied the right to feel the European “citizenial” many of us have been active supporters of requests submitted at our universities by the students of Tuaj country who, discouraged by the conditions of Albanian universities, were aiming to study abroad. They were young people who left significant amounts like “deterrend” to adhere to standards that humiliated and humiliated. However, many of them were managed to graduate, some to continue their scientific training abroad, and in some cases to be recruited in our university. All of this happened in the synton and with the full support of our prominent colleagues from Albanian public universities and the Academy of Sciences. It has been a long transition period that has not yet ended, but that, thanks to your determined reformive intervention for several years, has been marked by a significant change in the country.

We find it at universities, which, while still complaining about the gap with European standards (but we assure them that this is not Albania's <x0). However, they cannot be said to be at the same level as the anarchy of the past 20 years, while there is a source of optimism on the path undertaken by Albanian universities to rebuild confidence in families and students, joining the sincere efforts of academic staff to implement increasingly competitive scientific training.

We do not hide that large pockets of passive resistance prevent a good outcome of the reforming process, but this argument is profitable only to those who do not have government culture and succumb to ordinary populism: “the worse it goes, the better”. Of course, this is not the most appropriate topic to address the issue that has broken out in media these days, assuming the forms of an Improvisation rather than a dramatic series of long-suffering institutional difficulties and that has not yet found the right solutions.

The Academy of Sciences has suffered political threats, undergoing unprecedented censorship, which, in our opinion, is involved in factors that have reduced and brought to its present condition.

By cutting down the nuclear power centers of life, the historical institutions, which constituted the real propulsive scientific research engine during the communist era, the Academy was reduced to a simple hororphic structure with limited and few human resources with little incentive, often accused of being in <x0 minuscox1> and sometimes “joint government history”; subjecting itself to the most serious accusations and slanders, without any voice, internal or external, to rise to remember that this is the same academy, that was the most important obcurist in Albania's history, and well-designed, and well-designed, and well-deserved foreign dialogue, without having ever denied the role in the conversation. What has been happening in more than two decades has been a serious attack on freedom of science and the sacred right of scientific research to be organised in line with procedures and standards adopted throughout the democratic world. The attempts to sabotage functionworkorism, discredit professional profile, painting as a cartoon of the past, abandoning to its destiny, and even to fear those who dare to propose shy attempts to adapt it to more acceptable levels; rather, these have been added inexplicable forms of invisibility, confusing strategies that were never consolidated into real and real projects, smoked by the hasty reading of the statutes viewed as appropriate to Albania, France, or entirely to other countries that boast in this sector. All of this happened without opening up a genuine and extended discussion of the current situation and the causes that brought it, on the hypothesis of possible reform appropriate for the potential of a developing country like Albania, and to meet the expectations of a high specialisation of new generations and an advanced assessment of goods and economic, environmental, cultural and industrial resources in the country. In a word, a real and appropriate project that looks to the future of the Academy without necessarily subjecting itself to unclear controversy and debate carried out these days by the cold-blooded young philosophers, of which Albania appears to be miraculously following the collapse of the old regime.

Mr. Prime Minister,

We do not hide from you that the final elimination of the Academy of Sciences from the institutional picture of higher education and scientific research shocks our consciences for another reason that we think it is necessary to raise: it creates a much more harmful option than the melting option itself, which is that of building alternative structures depending on politics, on its seasons and its composition. In today's highly globalized world, it is more necessary to ensure the autonomy of scientific research, making it free of the external conditioning of political interests, including industry. Nowhere is the service of science persecuted, except in countries under dictatorship.

The autonomy in science environments and scientific promotion is in fact a fundamental need to measure not only the degree of internal democratisation of a country but also to study their ability to identify and develop, in perfect and conscious autonomy, productive and sustainable co-operation with international academic and university institutions on the basis of joint research interests. Foreign interventions may be due to changing normal protocol procedures and often impact the sharing of projects of mutual interest to partners, due to the fact that science and politics often fail to meet and share the same basic grammar. By repeating this universal principle, we renew our willingness to participate in any discussion with our fellow academic Albanians to begin the new Academy of Sciences renaissance season. We are fully convinced that there is potential, resources and will to revive the fates of the prestigious institution that for years has given albanology splendor and orientation. The academy was built, not by buildings or salaries, but by generous men, passionate intellectuals, Erudita scholars respected by their colleagues in the world, such as Alex Buda, Eqrem Cabe, Mahir Domi, Shaban Demaj, Star Popa, Christo Froser, George Boulo, Stefanac Pollo, Dhur Shutteriqi, Selaudin Beekshi, Petrit Gache, Petra Pilika, and other first generation explorers, who know a day for their function <ohldo, offering them a model of life and passion for their colleagues with respect for life and passion. Their followers are obligated to do so, at this very difficult and never - repeated moment to imitate their generous example.

You, Mr. Prime Minister, it is up to you to launch the “rebirth of the Academy, our colleagues belong to the realisation, even with our uninterested contribution if asked.

To the extent that we remain available when and if you see the need to meet you personally to offer our cooperation.

Thank you for your attention.