Academic 'brain trust' could help State recover

THE GOVERNMENT should draw on the expertise of Ireland’s academics in dealing with the complex policy choices the country is facing, the president of the Royal Irish Academy, Prof Nicholas Canny, said yesterday.

He was speaking at the admittance ceremony for 24 newly-elected members of the academy, including Noel Dorr, former secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs; Sir Kenneth Bloomfield, former head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service; and Geraldine Kennedy, Editor of The Irish Times.

Also among the new members was the chairman of the National Gallery of Ireland and the ESB, Lochlann Quinn, and the author and political scientist Richard English. Prof Canny said Ireland was lagging behind other developed countries which were following the example of Franklin D Roosevelt, who chose a “brain trust” of professors to help him solve the problems created by the Great Depression of the 1930s.

“Academics should feature more prominently as opinion leaders and architects of recovery in our society, since they are the ultimate source of new knowledge and innovation,” he said.

Prof Canny commended the new members for their outstanding achievement in the academic world and public life.

Noel Dorr was described as “one of the most outstanding civil servants in the history of the State”. Before becoming secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs in 1987, he served in a number of senior positions, including permanent representative to the UN in New York, Irish representative on the UN Security Council and ambassador of Ireland in London.

Sir Kenneth Bloomfield became permanent secretary to the power-sharing Executive in 1974 and ultimately became head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service from 1984 to 1991. Since his retirement, Sir Kenneth has held a number of public and private sector appointments, including founding chairman of the Chief Executives Forum and Northern Ireland Governor of the BBC.

Geraldine Kennedy was commended for leading The Irish Times"with verve and courage" through this, its 150th year, and was elected "in recognition of her contribution to journalism and public life" in Ireland. "Under her editorship, The Irish Timescontinues to give much-needed support to education and research, to the arts, humanities and the sciences, while encouraging thoughtful comment on all major issues," the citation stated.

The 24 new members are, in the sciences: Daniel Bradley, TCD; Martin Caffrey, (UL); Vincent Fusco, QUB; Colin Hill, UCC; Peijun Hu, QUB; Tony Kavanagh, TCD; Myung Shik Kim, QUB; Marina Lynch, TCD; Thomas Ray, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies and David Taylor, TCD.

In humanities and social sciences: Sir Kenneth Bloomfield, former head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service; Noel Dorr, former secretary general at the Department of Foreign Affairs; Richard English, QUB; Desmond FitzGerald, Knight of Glin and president of the Irish Georgian Society; Anne Fuchs, UCD; Keith Jeffery, QUB; Geraldine Kennedy, Editor of The Irish Times; Damien McManus, TCD; Stephen Mennell, UCD; John Morison, QUB; Máireád Nic Craith, UU; Nollaig Ó Muraíle, NUIG; Kevin ORourke, TCD; Lochlann Quinn, chairman of ESB.

Eight honorary members were also elected to the academy in 2009. They are Lisa Randall, the first female tenured theoretical physicist at MIT and Harvard University; David Dumville, medievalist and Celtic scholar; Drew Faust, president of Harvard University; Joep Leerssen, scholar of modern European literature; Amartya Sen, Nobel Prize-winning economist; Yves Meny, president of the European Universities Institute; Arthur Jaffe, theoretical physicist and mathematician; and Michael McElroy, Professor of Environmental Sciences at Harvard University.