The University of Helsinki rector Ilkka Niiniluoto set up an expert committee on Tuesday to ascertain whether the principles of good scientific practice were violated in connection with the 1937 rejection of the doctoral thesis of Jewish scholar Israel-Jakob Schur.
The group is to provide the rector with a written conclusion on the matter by the end of April.
The three-member group is led by Olli Mäenpää, Professor of Administrative Law at the University of Helsinki. The other two members are Professor of General Linguistics Fred Karlsson and Docent of Comparative Religion Olli Alho.
Behind the move to set up an expert committee was the public discussion brought on by an article by researcher Simo Muir published in the Finnish periodical Historiallinen Aikakauskirja ("Historical Journal" 4/2007).
According to Muir, the anti-Semitic trends of the late 1930s had a role to play in the rejection of Schur’s ethnographic dissertation.
