Getting clearance from an “Institutional Review Board” (IRB)

On 7.10.2016 I asked the head of school to allow us to establish a small and efficient IRB board to allow the people who run experiments in Jena to satisfy the IRB related requirements for experiments in economics. I also suggested to entrust these decisions to those people who actually do experiments here.

The head of school did not say exactly “no”, but, on 1.11.2016, decided to establish, contrary to my request, a grand IRB committee with external members, etc., i.e. a substantially stricter requirement as, e.g., for experiments with humans in medicine. That committee would be run by a person who has no relation to experiments.

I regret this decision. Neither do I find the restrictions set by the head of school adequate, nor do I expect that, with these restrictions, competent external members can be found to do the necessary work (decide in a timely manner about our experiments).

I am currently investigating alternatives.