The Fields Institute Turns Twenty-Five 170725 Final book with covers | Page 103

CHAPTER 16
A Director Is Not a Dictator
Barbara Keyfitz
“I see that your list of participants to invite does not include any
women. Can you explain your reasoning?”
If there were only one mathematics research institute in
the world, it would likely not thrive; but there are many,
and collectively they have changed the culture of research
in mathematics, particularly by defining collaboration as
beneficial. (There is a similar comment about lawyers thriving
only when there is more than one, but I think the reasons
are different.) Thus, an essay on the Institute might well
start by naming Fields as an example of this cultural shift
towards inclusion, co-operation, and communication. Those
of us partial to Fields might think of it as a particularly good
and successful example, but Fields would not have succeeded
without role models.
Fields has been spectacularly successful, and now serves as
a role model itself. I see the success as having two distinct