Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
06BEIJING9091
2006-05-15 11:10:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Beijing
Cable title:  

PLAGIARIZE OR PERISH? SCANDALS ROIL CHINESE

Tags:  PGOV PHUM KCUL SOCI CH 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO4510
PP RUEHCN RUEHGH
DE RUEHBJ #9091/01 1351110
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 151110Z MAY 06
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5345
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIJING 009091 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/15/2031
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KCUL SOCI CH
SUBJECT: PLAGIARIZE OR PERISH? SCANDALS ROIL CHINESE
ACADEMIA

REF: BEIJING 8115

Classified By: Political Section Internal Unit Chief Kin W. Moy. Reaso
ns 1.4 (b/d).

Summary
-------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIJING 009091

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/15/2031
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KCUL SOCI CH
SUBJECT: PLAGIARIZE OR PERISH? SCANDALS ROIL CHINESE
ACADEMIA

REF: BEIJING 8115

Classified By: Political Section Internal Unit Chief Kin W. Moy. Reaso
ns 1.4 (b/d).

Summary
--------------


1. (C) Headline-grabbing scandals have erupted at the
most prestigious Chinese universities as a wave of
plagiarism and academic misconduct is stimulating
sharp debate on campuses, in courtrooms and in the
media. The Propaganda Department has banned coverage
of one case involving a prominent law professor with
ties to top Party brass who stands accused of stealing
swaths of scholarly text from a dissident's legal
writings. Such high profile cases, however, only
represent the tip of the corruption iceberg, contacts
said. A "publish or perish" mentality has spawned a
cottage industry of academic journals that survives on
kickbacks from professors who need their theses to
appear in print. The controversies are reverberating
beyond campus. Recent unethical conduct in academia,
which average Chinese people view as a bastion of
honesty in a society rife with corruption, has
prompted discussion among scholars about the
deterioration of the moral state of Chinese civic life
overall. End Summary.

Scholars Behaving Badly
--------------


2. (SBU) Foreign and official Mainland media outlets
reported May 12 that the Chinese Government has
determined Professor Chen Jin, a famous young
scientist at Jiaotong University in Shanghai,
fabricated important high-tech research findings in
2003 and 2004. The high-profile case is the latest in
a series of scandals roiling China's top universities.
When Liu Hui, an assistant dean at Tsinghua
University's medical school, was fired in April amid
charges of plagiarism and lying about his
qualifications, a media uproar ensued. Several of
Beijing's major high-circulation dailies ran articles
about the case. China Newsweek used the scandal as a
springboard for a 20-page cover spread about academic
misconduct entitled "The Extraordinary Corruption of
Higher Education." The segment included a sidebar
listing recent prominent cases besides that of Liu:

-- After six Ph.D. students posted an open letter on

the Internet accusing well-known Nanjing University
Professor Pan Zhichang of plagiarizing another
scholar's research on Chinese classical literature,
the school opened an investigation into Pan in March.
The probe is ongoing.

-- In December 2005, Fudan University doctoral student
Zhang Zhi'an accused Xiamen's Shantou University media
studies Professor Hu Xingrong of copying content from
Zhang's thesis for an article Hu published in Hong
Kong on China's most influential media managers. Hu
publicly apologized to Zhang and resigned his post.

-- In November 2005, Shen Luwei, a Professor at
Tianjin Foreign Language Institute, was found guilty
in Tianjin Intermediate Court of plagiarizing a thesis
published in 1981 by Professor Zhou Yuzhu of Henan
University. The language institute "relieved Shen of
his teaching duties" and imposed other unspecified
"major disciplinary" measures.

From Classroom to Courtroom
--------------


3. (C) But more than any of these scandals, foreign
media and Chinese intellectual circles have fastened
on the plagiarism case involving Zhou Yezhong, a law
professor at Wuhan University. Zhou, a renowned
constitutional law specialist, has briefed President
Hu Jintao and other top leaders about legal issues,
press reports said. But last year, legal scholar and
dissident Wang Tiancheng charged that Zhou's most
recent book contains large segments that were copied
from Wang's own work. "I was leafing through the new
book and saw passages that were mine," Wang told
Poloff. His first step was to write an e-mail to Zhou
seeking an explanation. No response came, Wang said.
Next he decided to go to the media with his complaint.
Contacts related that after a small item appeared in
the Beijing News about the matter, the Propaganda
Department barred further coverage and fined the

BEIJING 00009091 002 OF 003


journalist and three editors at the paper RMB 2,000
(USD 250) each. The reason: Publicly discrediting
Zhou would be embarrassing to top leaders, some of
whom enjoys close relations with Zhou, journalists
told us. With media coverage not forthcoming, Wang
decided to go to court, he said. His case will
reportedly be heard sometime in May.


4. (C) The influential biweekly Caijing Magazine is
strongly considering running an article in its next
issue about the Wang-Zhou case, said Wang Feng
(protect),an editor at Caijing. Academic misconduct
is commonplace, but this case has gotten political,
Wang said, adding that many intellectuals dislike
Zhou. They view him as arrogant and sycophantic, not
interested in honest scholarship. Wang said Caijing's
editors are aware of the Propaganda Department's ban
and of the Beijing News reprimand. But he added that
Caijing always looks for ways to test the rules and
expand the space for free speech. As such, the
magazine is betting that a straight report on the
court proceedings, without editorial comment, will
make it past the censors. In any case, there is no
love lost in the newsroom or among intellectuals for
Zhou. "People want to see him fall," Wang observed.

Tip of the Iceberg, Exposed by the Internet
--------------


5. (C) The cases that get media play (or unwelcome
attention from the censors) represent the tip of the
corruption iceberg, said Yang Yusheng, a professor of
American Studies at China University of Political
Science and Law. "Dishonesty in academia has been a
problem for years," Yang told Poloff, adding that the
crisis extends beyond professors failing to cite their
sources. Yang said misconduct on Chinese campuses
takes many forms, including students submitting essays
and theses they bought from Internet sites, students
bribing doctoral review panels, sexual harassment,
admissions fraud and other unlawful behavior.


6. (C) One change in recent years is the emergence of
the Internet, which can play a watchdog role. In
fact, the first doubts about Chen's research arose
when a whistleblower questioned the findings in a chat
room. In this context, Yang said he brought Academic
Criticism (www.acriticism.com) online in 2004 in part
to expose suspect scholarship. The aim of the site
and the two web logs Yang operates is to give scholars
throughout China a forum for open debate on such
issues. The site regularly carries links to essays in
which professors challenge the work of their
counterparts. Although Yang has not shied away from
posting sensitive content (such as articles by
controversial Zhongshan University Professor Yuan
Weishi, see reftel),the Zhou Yezhong case has yet to
receive treatment on the site. In addition to Yang,
notable free lance writer and former science
researcher Fang Zhouzi maintains a web log hosted by
Sohu.com that chronicles misconduct in Chinese higher
education. The address, however, is intermittently
blocked in the Mainland, said Zhou Qing'an (protect),
a regular contributor to the Beijing News who will
begin teaching at Tsinghua University's School of
Journalism and Communication in fall of this year.


Plagiarize or Be Poor?
--------------


7. (C) Zhou will be working on a campus that remains
rattled by the Liu Hong case, said Professor Shi Anbin
(protect) of the university's School of Journalism and
Communications. Shi acknowledged that plagiarism is
plaguing in academia, arguing that the root of the
problem is increased pressure to "publish or perish."
Promotion can hinge on how prolific, and printable, a
scholar is. College administrations evaluate
professors every three years, Shi said, adding that
while teachers are rarely fired, institutions rate
them based on academic output, including the number of
scholarly papers they publish. Moreover, the Ministry
of Education assesses every university annually for
performance. Part of the MOE analysis equation
includes the number of published papers a school's
instructors produce. Money is at stake. The MOE
links the amount of funds it allocates to a given
institution to the school's overall rating, Shi said.


8. (C) Most universities require professors and
doctoral students to publish articles in so-called key

BEIJING 00009091 003 OF 003


academic journals as often as three times a year, the
China Newsweek article reported. The piece went on to
assert that even the least reputable publications can
thrive on kickbacks from professors who want to ensure
their work sees print. A recent Ministry of Science
survey found that of 180 people with doctorates, some
60 percent admitted to paying to have their essays
appear in journals, Chinese and foreign press
reported. At the same time, professors themselves can
gain handsomely if their theses run in prestigious
magazines. According to China Newsweek, Northwest
Normal University in Gansu Province pays RMB 50,000
(USD 6,250) to any scholar whose academic writing
appears in UK-based Nature Magazine. Publication in
China's domestic key journals can earn a professor up
to RMB 5,000 (USD 625).

China's Moral Health
--------------


9. (C) The fact that the issue has garnered so much
press attention reflects concern in intellectual and
media circles about the moral state of Chinese society
overall, said Zhou of Tsinghua. Moreover, regular
Chinese have seized on the story, he said. "People
view universities as the last bastion of honesty in
Chinese society," he remarked, adding that the
question then becomes, "if academia is corrupt, what
does that say about our civic life overall?" For
Zhou, the commotion over academic corruption will have
two practical results. First, he plans to review his
doctoral thesis, due this spring, in painstaking
detail to make sure he has cited all his sources.
Second, next semester, when he makes his initial foray
into the classroom as a teacher, the first thing he
will discuss with his students the importance of
honest scholarship.

Comment
--------------


10. As the stakes increase for producing original
research and writing in China, it is likely that more
cases of academic corruption will surface. So far, it
appears that the Internet has given Chinese
intellectuals a tool to "self-police," and many appear
all too happy to dig up dirt on colleagues, especially
those who are academic rivals.
RANDT