December 1996 € Volume 23 € Number 6

Challenging Conventional Wisdom

Barnett receives INFORMS President's Award for tackling important societal problems

Armed only with statistics, an analytical mind and a keen sense of humor, Arnold I. Barnett of MIT's Sloan School of Management has skewered more than his share of conventional wisdom regarding public policy matters during a remarkable career in operations research. At the recent INFORMS meeting in Atlanta, Barnett's courage and cleverness were honored by the institute's president, Al Blumstein, who named Barnett the 1996 recipient of the INFORMS President's Award.

The award recognizes a member of the OR/MS community who has made significant contributions to society through his or her work as an operations researcher or management scientist, particularly in the areas of public affairs and public policy.

Blumstein lauded Barnett for having "consistently displayed a deep commitment to addressing important societal problems" and for "challenging conventional wisdom" though a series of papers and presentations with such intriguing titles as "Threats to Life and Limb," "Business Schools: Failing Fast?" and "America's Vietnam Casualties: Victims of a Class War?"

Barnett was cited for his "major contributions to the literature on air safety, often engaging in a debate with the FAA," and for his "important" research into crime "where he has emerged with some striking findings about the probability of being a victim of homicide." The citation noted that Barnett's research papers in these areas have been cited in leading national publications like Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. Blumstein also noted that Barnett has ventured into a variety of nonconventional areas for OR, stimulating public debate about the empirical claims related to the book, "The Bell Curve," job discrimination and affirmative action.

"His concern for effective communication is reflected in the fact that the students in the MIT Sloan School have five times selected him as the recipient of their award for most effective teaching," Blumstein said. "Anyone who has ever listened to Barnett's presentations marvels at his consummate skill in presenting substantive insights intermingled with clever humor."

Barnett's comments in accepting the award served to underscore Blumstein's remarks.

"The betterment of society is so much a part and parcel of what people in INFORMS do, that singling out one person is a bit problematic," Barnett said. "Now don't get me wrong, I'm still going to accept the award. But I accept it humbly."

Barnett acknowledge that tackling certain topics in the public policy arena is risky business for operations researchers, but it is generally a risk worth taking.

"When I was a student at Columbia, the president of the university once said that 'when a professor takes off his academic gowns, he wears only the emperor's clothes.' The relevancy here is that it's possible if we go far afield from our core competencies, we may, in some cases, make fools of ourselves. That's a risk.

"On the other hand, there are risks involved with inaction. There are important problems impacting society now, and if we don't contribute, there will be other people there to make decisions which could be suboptimal and all society might suffer from our absence.

"There's even a more parochial concern -- INFORMS has a strong interest in avoiding the danger of professional obscurity.

"We hope the day will come when the word INFORMS will have as much cachet as the American Psychological Association, the American Historical Association or the American Statistical Association," Barnett concluded. "And that day is more likely to come if members of INFORMS are speaking loudly and insightfully in places where lots and lots of people are listening. Woody Allen once said that 90 percent of life is just showing up. Maybe in some of these areas close to public policy we would do well to show up more often."

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