In the open letter to the University community written last fall, Bok said, "Our current rules relating to secrecy in research do not seem either adequately framed or sufficiently understood within this community to deal satisfactorily with the kind of issues we have been discussing."

In his open letter, Bok said he thought University rules should be made more explicit, and "apply equally to all research carried out by professors while on the Harvard payroll."

Prompted by the overarching complaints contained in the letter, the Faculty Council--the legislative organ of the full Faculty--approved legislation to clarify rules about sponsored research. The legislation called for a merging of the two relevent documents, because the one which contained all the rules about what conditions could be placed on research, was entitled, "Criteria for the Acceptance of Sponsored Research."

Dean of the Division of Applied Sciences Paul C. Martin, who introduced the changes, says the title made it appear that only scholarship which needs University approval, should apply under University rules.

"In some people's mind, the line was the office of sponsored research, and that was an absurd line," Martin says. He says that one code should apply to all work done by Harvard faculty members, whether done for the government or not.

Martin earlier this year proposed a change that would again seek to make University rules more inclusive by applying the University standards of scholarship to research conducted on a "individual basis," if it "might reasonably be perceived to involve the institution, however slightly." Prior to this, there was confusion about whether rules would affect scholars when they were working during the one day in five that is allocated to independent research.

According to Dillon Professor of Internation Relations Joseph Nye, Bok's recommendations were designed to amend the rules "to encompass the whole person."

"In the past there had been a vagueness," Nye says.