“He seemed really open-minded about it at the time,” Mackinnon said. “What the University has told us really directly reflects things we said to Iuliano and to Summers last spring...which suggests that the conversation was genuine.”

While HSAS has not convinced the University to agree to the stricter code it had earlier demanded, Mackinnon says the group has no plans to pursue the issue.

She said that in their April meeting, Summers conditioned WRC membership on HSAS dropping its demand for a new code.

The current code is “less than ideal, but it’s enough to allow the monitoring organizations to do what they need to do, and maintain a presences in the factories,” Mackinnon said.

“Especially because [Harvard is] in these organizations with other universities, its strong enough to get the job done.”

—Staff writer Stephen M. Marks can be reached at marks@fas.harvard.edu.