Countering academic fraud, suppression and exploitation

Published as “Contrarrestando el fraude, la nulificación y la explotación en las instituciones académicas,” in Martha Patricia Castañeda Salgado, Adriana Aguayo Ayala and Florencia Peña Saint Martin (editors), Expresiones de violencia en el entorno universitario: casos, protocolos y estrategias para su erradicación (México: Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, 2022), pp. 225-239, translated by Florencia Peña Saint Martin. This is the English original.

pdf of chapter in Spanish

Brian Martin

Adriana worked as a scientist in a large university laboratory. She came across evidence that a senior scientist, Professor Dodgy, was fabricating evidence. What should she do?

Bernardo was an outspoken academic, often taking controversial stands on issues and challenging university leaders. Bernardo also had a high opinion of himself and alienated quite a few of his colleagues. He received some warnings about his behaviour from administrators. Then one day he was dismissed from his tenured position. What should he do?

Carlotta was a research student, carrying out research for a PhD. She discovered that her supervisor was using some of her results in publications, without telling her. What should she do?

Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta’s stories are examples of the sorts of problems that occur in universities. Arguably, the underlying source of problems in universities is systems of power, because power tends to corrupt.[1] Academic systems of power include external funders and pressures on universities, the academic hierarchy, patriarchy, racism and academic disciplines.[2]

Governments and corporations provide funding for universities and sometimes expect that teaching and research will serve their interests, or at least not threaten their interests.[3] Due to the influence of the military, for example, there is far more research that is oriented to military interests than there is research oriented to the interests of the peace movement, which has little money or power (Martin, 2001).

The academic hierarchy includes the power of administrators over academics, the different ranks of academics, the greater security of academics with tenure, and the power of academics over students. Patriarchy and racism influence universities just like everywhere else.[4] Finally, academic disciplines — from archaeology to zoology — have their own systems of reward and exclusion (Blackburn, 1972).

These various power systems enable a range of abuses, including favouritism, mobbing, exploitation and fraud. There are special academic versions of each of these. For example, research fraud can involve altering or manufacturing data as well as stealing of money and resources.[5]

The usual response

What should be done about abuses in academia? The standard response is to set up formal procedures, such as codes of conduct, grievance procedures, appeal bodies and disciplinary committees. I will call them official channels.[6] The idea is that codes and guidelines will encourage people to do the right thing, while processes for making complaints, carrying out investigations and applying penalties will be used to deal with violations. This sounds sensible and promising. After all, it’s the way the legal system is set up for wider society.

When most people behave properly, a system of official channels seems okay. In practice though, official channels often don’t work well, especially when those in power are the transgressors, who may include individuals with narcissistic and psychopathic tendencies.

Consider, for example, sexual harassment (Martin, 2020: 81–115). This has occurred for centuries, but only was named and challenged in the 1970s, during the second wave of the feminist movement. Within organisations, including universities, the response of administrators was to set up sexual harassment procedures. When someone, usually a woman, felt harassed, she could make a complaint to a designated authority and then there would be a process of investigation and, if appropriate, penalties.

One problem with official channels is that they are usually very slow. Harassment can occur over a matter of days, weeks or months; serious cases may involve a single incident. After making a complaint, there can be a delay of months or even years while there is an assessment of the complaint, invitation to attend mediation, investigation, appeals and outcome. During this time, the complainant may have to continue to work with her alleged harasser.

Another problem with official channels is that they focus on procedures. This may involve submitting a complaint within the proper format and time. The investigation of a sexual harassment complaint may look at whether an action constituted harassment according to a particular definition, or whether the complainant had invited the alleged actions. In sexual harassment, the woman usually wants the harassing behaviour to stop, and perhaps seeks an apology. In other words, she wants some form of justice and resolution. However, complaint procedures seldom focus on justice but instead focus on proper processes for dealing with the complaint.

A third problem with official channels is that parties have unequal resources. In a typical case, a senior academic harasses a junior colleague, an administrative assistant or a student. The harasser usually has more money, status and connections than their target. During the process of complaint and investigation, usually the alleged harasser retains their position and income. Sometimes the target, often a woman, takes leave or discontinues her studies due to stress.

When actions go to court, the disparity in resources is even starker. A powerful perpetrator can hire expensive lawyers, while the target of harassment seldom has the same resources.

In the most serious type of sexual harassment — rape and sexual assault — court proceedings can be highly traumatising for plaintiffs. Complainants can be put on the stand and quizzed about events and about their sexual behaviour. This sort of hostile treatment is sometimes called the “second assault.”[7]

            The vignettes about Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta, though fictional, give a feeling for the essence of many real-life cases.[8] Actual cases are always complex and contested and hence are hard to summarise in a fair way. So how might Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta’s stories continue if they used official channels?

Adriana spent a long time preparing information about the research fraud, and submitted it to university officials. Nothing happened for a long time. Some documents were supposedly lost. Eventually her complaint was dismissed, and instead a complaint was made about her.

Bernardo went to his union and obtained support for going to court over unfair dismissal. The union said that while the case continued, Bernardo should not make any public comments. After many months, Bernardo and the union won in court. However, the university administration appealed the decision. After many more months, a settlement was agreed. Bernardo was lucky, obtaining a significant payment. But he didn’t get his job back. His career was ruined.

Carlotta reported her supervisor’s use of her work to the dean. Nothing happened, so she sent information to the president of the university. Again nothing happened, except that her supervisor found out about the complaint and undermined her studies, so she left without a degree.

The fundamental problem with official channels

Official channels are based on the assumption that someone in a position of power — a senior official, a politician, a judge, an ombudsman — is able and willing to tackle a problem. Complainants often imagine that individuals in these positions are necessarily ethical, free of conflicts of interest and not concerned about their own careers, and willing to make unpopular decisions. These ideas are sometimes right, but they are unfounded and misguided when the system of power is itself the problem.

In cases of police corruption (Punch, 2011), why should anyone expect that a senior member of the police, or some specially appointed person, or the human resources unit, will address the corruption? There’s a chance of fixing the problem if the corruption involves just an isolated individual, but when corruption is systemic, challenging it is extremely difficult. It is also extremely difficult when senior commanders are implicated, either as part of the corrupt practices or as having tolerated it or being friends or allies of those involved.

In universities, the fundamental problem is the same as with the police. A dean or a designated unit such as human resources is usually reluctant to take action that disturbs the system of power, especially when it potentially undermines their own role and power. When the president dismisses an academic, there is no internal process to deal with it, and outside bodies are usually hesitant to intervene, hamstrung by regulations, limited by funding and compromised by personal connections.

The fundamental problem can be better appreciated by imagining that official channels worked perfectly, as members of the public are expected to believe. This would mean that a single complainant could bring down an academic who plagiarised a student’s work, exploited others’ labour, cheated on a research experiment, misused funds from a research grant, made misleading claims in a job application, or any number of other actions. Given that some shady practices are commonplace in academia — such as senior scientists putting their names on papers to which they did not suitably contribute, or selection panels appointing candidates on the basis of friendship rather than scholarly performance — the existence of effective official channels would profoundly upset the hierarchy (Martin, 2016).

We know that totally effective channels do not exist. All sorts of problems persist, and seldom is much done about them. The example of sexual harassment is revealing. Procedures were set up decades ago but this did not get rid of harassment. Few complaints are ever made because most targets of harassment realise that they are the ones at risk if they complain.

In contrast, what has made a difference is collective action by the feminist movement. The #MeToo movement showed that speaking out was necessary to expose problems that had existed for decades, even though procedures and laws were available the whole time.

For many years, I have been involved with Whistleblowers Australia, a voluntary group that provides advice, information and contacts for whistleblowers. Since the 1990s, Australian governments have passed whistleblower laws. When they do this, they never consult whistleblowers. In all my years talking with whistleblowers, I have never heard of a single employer that has provided one of the standard manuals for whistleblowers to employees. Instead, they tell their workers about whistleblower procedures, in other words seeking action through official channels.

Developing skills

Let’s go back to Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta. Instead of using official channels, imagine that they sought advice and went down different paths.

Adriana, before reporting the suspected fraud, decided to consult with another scientist who was known for having spoken out. Based on the advice she received, Adriana changed plans. She did not challenge the fraud immediately but instead collected lots more evidence about it. She also collected information about the way senior university figures responded to bad news and decided not to report the fraud within the university. Instead, she waited two years until she obtained a permanent job at another university. Then she sent all her information to an independent watchdog organisation, which exposed the fraud.

Bernardo, after being dismissed, needed to decide what to do. He thought of suing the university but first collected information about what had happened to others before him who had gone to court for unfair dismissal. He talked to several of these former academics and discovered that none of them had been reinstated. Some of them gained a bit of compensation but only after a long and exhausting effort. Bernardo was most interested in continuing his career and decided to go quietly and seek another job. Many years later, he wrote up his story to provide lessons for others.

Carlotta visited a women’s centre and obtained advice. She contacted as many of her supervisor’s current and previous students as she could and found several who were willing to meet. Together, they shared stories about being exploited by the same supervisor, but also learned a few ideas about ways to prevent this. Carlotta had several options. She decided to wait a bit and then to change to another supervisor.

In each of these examples, Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta did not act immediately and did not assume that official channels would be the solution. Instead, they sought advice, learned about their situation, and used their understanding to guide their actions. This points to a neglected option for dealing with academic abuses: skill development. A key point here is that managers seldom do much to systematically enable workers to develop and practise these skills. What they do more commonly is encourage employees to learn how to use official channels.

A variety of skills can be useful for any scholar who encounters a problem in their organisation or wider professional field. I list six of them here (Martin, 2020: 58–68).

Collecting information In many situations, having detailed documentation about problems is essential for convincing others that it is indeed something that needs to be addressed. This could be information about cheating, financial records, witness statements and much else. In dealing with fraud, lots of information is needed to show that behaviours are intentional and can’t be easily explained away as mistakes. In dealing with harassment, details of actions, including what, where, when and how, are vital to show patterns of behaviour.

Many scholars are highly skilled at collecting data in their professional domains, for example data about chemical reactions or forms of rhetoric. However, few have any training in collecting data about abuses, especially when they are personally affected.

Writing about your experience To convince others about the existence and seriousness of a problem, it is helpful to be able to write a clear, brief and convincing account about it. Academics gain skills in writing abstracts of scholarly papers but not in writing summaries of problems. Writing an account about your own experiences is especially difficult, so training and practice can be especially useful. Other modes of communication sometimes can be helpful too, for example speaking or producing a podcast.

Understanding organisational and professional dynamics To figure out what to do about a problem, it is vital to understand how the system operates, the system being a university department, a professional association, a large-scale collaboration, a research grants system or whatever set of relationships is relevant. Understanding how the system operates enables predictions about what will happen when you take action. How are complaints handled? Which sorts of individuals are helped or marginalised? Who has power and how is it used?

Many scholars simply assume that systems operate according to their stated principles and therefore believe that complaint procedures work, academic journals treat submissions fairly and that people are promoted on merit. It’s important to see behind the surface and understand the actual operating principles (Reisman, 1979).

Building support To tackle problems, it is extremely valuable to have allies. Working as a team is usually far more effective than acting alone as an individual. If there is a petition, the more who sign, the stronger the message and the less risk for each of the signatories.

Therefore, a vital skill is knowing how to convince others to join a collective effort or to be supporters if needed. Being able to write an account is helpful, and so is knowing who to approach, what to say to them, when to push harder and when to back off, how to hold meetings and reach agreements, and many other skills for working in groups. As well as finding supporters who will join in actions, also important is gaining sympathy among those not directly involved. Turning those who are neutral into sympathisers changes the general atmosphere and makes life easier for challengers.

Using media To build support and to coordinate supporters, it is valuable to know how to use media, both mass media and social media. This includes understanding how journalists select and write stories, knowing how to set up a website or otherwise put material on the web, and being familiar with the strengths and weaknesses of social media platforms. It also includes knowing what to do if you are attacked in the mass media or on social media, for example appreciating the options of remaining silent, making a personal response and organising supporters to respond. It includes knowing the shortcomings of media-related official channels, such as complaining to editors or tech corporations.

Some universities offer media training to staff so they can promote their research. Such training is worthwhile. It can be used for other purposes.

Understanding yourself One of the most difficult aspects of acting against injustice is understanding your own personal dynamics, for example how you react to being attacked. If, for example, you become angry and start shouting, this may be counterproductive. On the other hand, you might become frightened and retreat into a shell. This is also unhelpful.

Also important is understanding how others perceive you, which can be exceedingly difficult to learn yet incredibly valuable. It is helpful to know, for example, whether your colleagues see you as hardworking, friendly and generous, or alternatively as volatile, lazy, self-important and fragile, because the way they perceive you affects how they will behave towards you. You might want them to give you emotional support, but sometimes it is more helpful when someone honestly tells you about your weaknesses, as that can enable you to be more effective.

These six areas for developing skills are among the most important if you want to challenge an injustice. There is much more that could be said about each of these skills, and there are others too, depending on the person and the situation.

Cultural change

Now consider a different set of paths for Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta — perhaps ones only available in an ideal world.

Adriana obtained a job in another university. In her new lab, the atmosphere was positive. Everyone tried to do the right thing and there were regular discussions about ethical behaviour. Furthermore, when someone made a mistake, this was used as an opportunity for learning rather than blame.

Bernardo also obtained a job in another university. In applying, he was open about his outspokenness and that he had been dismissed. At his new university, his willingness to speak out was seen as a positive. There were vigorous discussions at all levels of the university, with disagreement welcomed. In forming policy, when everyone agreed from the start, someone was assigned the role of being a devil’s advocate who gave the strongest argument against the proposed policy. Dissent was prized as an aid to better decision-making.

Carlotta switched to another supervisor in a different department and entered a supportive atmosphere in which academics and research students shared an interest in helping each other. Her supervisor added her name to a paper to which she made a modest contribution and helped her understand best practice in research and authorship.

Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta each moved from a toxic, exploitative culture to a supportive, generous one. The question is, how can such positive cultures be fostered? They are not created overnight, nor are they easy to maintain. They involve mutual respect, openness and, quite often, an egalitarian ethos. They are easier to maintain when members share common goals that are seen as more important than individual advancement.

In the management literature, there are many recommendations on how to create such thriving organisations. In academia, there are a few examples here and there, but despite the emphasis on high performance and best practice, creating a positive culture seems not to have become an overwhelming imperative. The reason can be traced back to the structural conditions that shape universities: funding by vested interests, hierarchical systems, and competition between universities for prestige and money.

Adriana, Bernardo and Carlotta couldn’t create supportive, dynamic groups on their own. They did learn that they could play a role in maintaining the groups they joined, by trying to be role models for others and by giving support to their colleagues.

Conclusion

Universities, like other organisations, have all sorts of problems, including abuses that adversely affect individuals. When it comes to fraud, harassment and exploitation, the normal idea is that administrations should be the saviours by setting up codes of conduct and procedures that will deter misconduct and address it when it occurs. This is fine when it works. What is remarkable is how little attention is placed on two complementary approaches: developing skills and fostering supportive cultures. Neither of these approaches is easy or quick, but considering the many and ongoing failures of official channels, promoting skills and fostering cultural change should be higher on the agenda.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Magdalene D’Silva, Jody Watts and an anonymous reviewer for valuable comments on drafts.

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Notes