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The real costs of plagiarism: Russian governors, plagiarized PhD theses, and infrastructure in Russian regions

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  • Anna Abalkina

    (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)

  • Alexander Libman

    (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
    National Research University Higher School of Economics)

Abstract

This paper investigates whether politicians who have plagiarized their PhD dissertations perform worse in running their polities than those who have not committed plagiarism. We look at the Russian regional governors and document that a substantial portion of them have plagiarized PhD theses. We find a negative association between plagiarized PhD of a governor and development of infrastructure (specifically, housing construction and spread of broadband Internet) in a region, controlling for other region-level characteristics potentially affecting infrastructural development. We argue that in the Russian context, a plagiarized PhD thesis is likely to indicate that a governor both is inclined to dishonest behavior and possesses poor managerial capabilities, which should have a particularly negative effect on the performance of their regions in terms of the development of infrastructure.

Suggested Citation

  • Anna Abalkina & Alexander Libman, 2020. "The real costs of plagiarism: Russian governors, plagiarized PhD theses, and infrastructure in Russian regions," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(3), pages 2793-2820, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:125:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-020-03716-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-020-03716-x
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    2. Berdymyrat Ovezmyradov, 2023. "Applying quantified indicators in Central Asian science: can metrics improve the regional research performance?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(1), pages 177-206, January.

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