First American snowflakes, then Canadian deans—now it's German politicians!
To make a long story short, we're trying to learn how to read German over the break (trying to go from zero to Hegel in just a few weeks is fun, let us tell you!), and, mostly because we can, we decided to have a peek at Der Spiegel. Oh my. Was ist das?
Yes, it's in German—apologies to those whom the german Language not do read—but, long story short: politician gets busted red-handed plagiarizing a substantial part of her doctoral work. As a bit of flava, it seems that of the 30 different sources she stole from, two-thirds weren't even in the bibliography.
The University of Heidelberg, naturally enough, ain't too happy—and Ms. Koch-Mehrin is now the "Ex-Doctor" K-M.
Now, a university revoking a degree when you get busted—sure, we hope that's par for the course. Getting branded as "Ex-Doctor" as your title?* We think this should be done more often! Just imagine: if our cheating little snowflakes had to be known as "ex-student" or "ex-BA/BS holder" for the rest of their lives . . . well, a nice little Mark of Cain like that might cut down on our problems, no? We may institute it in our Domain.
*We remember hearing once that, in German-speaking countries, "Doktor(in)" becomes part of your legal name; we honestly hope that, as a just penalty for plagiarism, "Ex-Doktorin" becomes part of hers. Have it written on every single legal document from here to her gravestone . . .
We can dream, right?
I'm afraid you're a little behind the curve! This is merely the Nachhall or Nachbeben, if you will, of a much larger plagiarism scandal that brought down the Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg earlier this year. Now all German politicians with doctorates are under intense scrutiny. Good thing for Angela Merkel that she's a physicist. According to wikipedia, her dissertation is entitled: Untersuchung des Mechanismus von Zerfallsreaktionen mit einfachem Bindungsbruch und Berechnung ihrer Geschwindigkeitskonstanten auf der Grundlage quantenchemischer und statistischer Methoden. Who wants to wade through that?
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that a number of German politicians not only have doctorates, but advertise the fact enough to provoke scrutiny. In the U.S., a doctorate seems to be something for a politician to live down or explain away (perhaps as one of those things one does when one is young and foolish) than to play up. Obama doesn't even have a Ph.D. (just a J.D. and a law review editorship and some teaching experience, which admittedly is a pretty close equivalent), and he gets called "professorial," almost always as a criticism.
ReplyDeleteI like the "ex-Doktor" idea, though, and would rejoice to see it applied to some of the principals and other "school reformers" who turned out to have diploma-mill Ed.D.s (a phenomenon which I fear will be appearing more and more among college administrators as well, as such positions are filled by people who make administration a career, and view the Ph.D. mostly as a credential, rather than a preparation for a career involving research and/or the teaching of research).
The English version is here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,762116,00.html
Blame the German system! You have to write two dissertations, one to get IN the program, and one to get OUT. It's downright Schmerzvoll!
ReplyDelete@Doug: We didn't realize how far this whole thing went: when we mentioned this to someone with a PhD from Heidelberg (she kinda took this one personally), she gave me an entirely different name than either of the two so far mentioned.
ReplyDeleteWe're quite happy to leave Dr. Merkel's work unread. Even if we were better at reading German, we're pretty sure that, just by the title, we would fall asleep reading it.
@Frankity: the French system is almost as bad, at least for government-types; apparently, everyone goes to the same school (UParis 10/X) to study engineering, leading to somewhat absurd results. France is what happens when you put the hypercompetitive, insecure engineers in charge. Whether that's a bad thing, though . . .
This is the SECOND big case to hit. The first was the minister of defense who had to resign a few months ago because large pieces of his dissertation were plagiarized.
ReplyDeleteNo, you don't have to write two dissertations. To get the doctorate, however, you have to publish the dissertation. You are ABD with your MA degree (which takes several years, however), then just write the mo-fu, publish it, and you're golden. The universities offer instant online publication if you want that option.
To become a prof, however, you need to go beyond the doctorate and get what is called a "Habilitation" (hah-bee-lih-TAH-tzee-ohn). That is just like a second dissertation. People without this Habil-thingy, but who are working on it, have "assistant" jobs which are essentially like pre-tenure professorships. Those last for five or six years. When you're done with that, you have five or more years teaching experience, a second book, you're 30-45 years old - and you're ready for "tenure" - called a professorship. By the end of the day, it isn't all that different.
The oral exam for the dissertation is usually easier than in the States, but the Habil exam can go south if you become the plaything of departmental politics. You're 40 and are defending a 600 page book against a team of weenies who want to poke each other's eyes out, so they take it out on each other's candidates.
*Die* Plagiaten. Plural.
ReplyDeleteI have a friend over in the Vaterland who tells me there are more than the two, more like 7 or 9. There seems to be another plagiarizing politician falling by the wayside every week or so.
Bands of pseudonymous grad students are apparently ripping the theses to shreds, and someone has put up a scorecard to help you follow the game: http://www.doktorarbeitendomino.de/
And if you need a quick title, for a fee you can write one on the history of medicine in Würzburg (http://www.sueddeutsche.de/karriere/promotionsskandal-an-der-universitaet-wuerzburg-entsetzen-ueber-die-doktorfabrik-1.1103415). 35 pages suffice.
The bizarreness appears to continue.
Sorry for this all being in Deutsch.
I love the Ex-Dr. That would be a sort of Scarlett Letter