Investigations

The Boeing Parts Scandal

Boeing in The Post 

The Schuster Institute played a key role in exposing alleged problems in aircraft manufacturing reported by three whistleblowers. Learn more:

Homelessness

Homelessness: First Things First 
The Schuster Institute awakened Beacon Hill to the issue of homelessness with its article "First Things First," published in the "Ideas" section of the June 24, 2007, issue of The Boston Globe. 

Political & Social Justice Project

Investigative journalism trailblazer Ida Tarbell, whose 1904 book, "The History of the Standard Oil Company," helped lead to the break up of the Standard Oil Trust in 1911.

Investigative journalism trailblazer Ida Tarbell, whose 1904 book, "The History of the Standard Oil Company," helped lead to the break up of the Standard Oil Trust in 1911.

In the tradition of Ida Tarbell, whose 1904 work exposed monopolistic and corrupt practices in the Standard Oil Company, leading to long-lasting reforms, we act as watchdogs, investigating abuses of government, political and corporate power, which often intersect.

For example, we examine questionable government decision-making, some involving companies doing business with the Pentagon, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Securities and Exchange Commission and more.

We know from history that watchdogs are essential to a strong, functioning democracy. John Gardner, former secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, observed that as a government insider, he had seen that the special interests and corporations with financial stakes in government policy know exactly where and how to focus their considerable resources to get what they wanted from the system. "Everybody's organized but the people," he warned, when creating Common Cause. Gardner's wise words underpinned Common Cause Magazine, the investigative reporting journal created in the 1980s by the Schuster Institute's Founding Director, Florence George Graves.