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 
------- 
 
¶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