The DEI Pendulum: Despite Backlash, the Work Must Continue

If a pendulum sways gently to the ticking of time, we would be hard pressed to describe the current zeitgeist around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives as anything but gentle. The pendulum has swung so far in the opposite direction that it is hard to believe just 4 years ago, in 2020, we had most organizations affirming their commitment to the principles of DEI. The impetus for this article came from the work of a subgroup of the CSE DEIA (A is for accessibility) committee charged with reviewing materials posted on the CSE DEIA resource page,1 which was previously described in Science Editor. The page review, a common practice for web-based resources, yielded a discomfiting observation—some of the links either did not exist any longer, or were replaced with a general webpage that no longer referenced DEI. One major academic publisher had previously posted a statement entitled "Committed to Inclusion and Equity, We Stand in Solidarity with Black Communities – Because Black Lives Matter," but now that link lands on a general main page. The question of why organizations and decision makers would make such an about-face on advancing the cause of DEI is a multidimensional one at best, with no easy answers. Because organizations exist within a system of rule of law, they follow the direction of legislation around what is possible with DEI efforts. And organizations in scholarly publishing are no different. Prior to the U.S. Supreme Court decision against affirmative action in June 2023, many states …