Hostage authorship and the problem of dirty hands

Bülow, William; Helgesson, Gert

doi:10.1177/1747016118764305

Cited by 32 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Acknowledgment abuse may appear at first sight as a relatively minor transgression compared to coerced or hostage authorship, yet the emotional impact of acknowledgment abuse should not be understated. In cases of acknowledgment abuse, the perpetrator is often a friend or an esteemed colleague (Day and Gastel, 2011), as described in this case, which is not necessarily so in coerced or hostage authorship conflicts, where the misdeed usually involves supervisors or superiors (Bülow and Helgesson, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unconsented acknowledgments as a form of authorship abuse: What can be done about it?

Koljatic

2020

Research Ethics

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Unwelcome or unconsented acknowledgments is an unethical practice seldom addressed. It constitutes a form of authorship abuse perpetrated in the acknowledgments section of published research, where the victim is credited as having made a contribution to the paper, without having given their consent, and often without having seen a draft of the paper. The acknowledgment may be written in such a way as to imply endorsement of the study’s data and conclusions. Through a real-life case, this paper explores the issue of unconsented acknowledgments and makes recommendations to prevent its occurrence, thereby promoting research integrity.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unconsented acknowledgments as a form of authorship abuse: What can be done about it?

Koljatic

2020

Research Ethics

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“…The practice of honorary/gift authorships is apparently rampant (Smith and Williams-Jones, 2012;Teixeira da Silva and Dobránszki, 2016). Although all morally problematic, some are relatively more 'well-meaning' in nature than others (Bülow and Helgesson, 2018). In many cases, sharing of credit in the 'I have you on my article and you have me on yours' mode is done under the guise of research collaboration and/or strategic development, which is difficult to fault.…”

Section: What 'Ought To Be' Donementioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, refusal to do so could mean an unsatisfactory or unacceptable downgrading of research scale and depth, or a devastating retardation of research progress that may amount to termination of a particular project or research direction. Bülow and Helgesson (2018) posited that it might not always be wrong for the author(s) to include X as a co-author. They drew a parallel of such situations in biomedical research publishing with the problem of 'dirty hands' -a concept that features more prominently in political philosophy and applied ethics (Gaus, 2007).…”

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confidence: 99%

Responding to devious demands for co-authorship: A rejoinder to Bülow and Helgesson’s ‘dirty hands’ justification

Tang

2018

Research Ethics

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Bülow and Helgesson discussed the practice of gift/honorary authorships and expounded on a most devious form of these, termed 'hostage authorship'. The authors drew a parallel of such situations in research and publishing with the problem of 'dirty hands'. In this case, acceding, albeit with regrets, may well be '… what we ought to do, even if it requires us to do something that is intrinsically bad', especially if 'this is both practically necessary and proportionate to the end'. Here, I caution against this being a morally cogent, normative course of action. Tangible benefits from research not yet performed or published could not be predicted with any certainty, and as such could not be deemed sufficiently important to override moral constraints of justice and fairness. The utilitarian argument for any measure of beneficence with 'dirty hands' could therefore be nothing more than a self-serving act, or a self-exonerating form of moral disengagement. Such actions could have lasting ill effects on junior researchers and perpetuate a dark research culture, which will ultimately undermine the research enterprise and the pursuit of knowledge. One could further argue that what 'ought to be' done when coerced or held hostage in an authorship context is to break the cycle by reporting on the perpetrators, and ultimately for the community to devise consensus measures that could deter such predatory free riders.

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“…This is a welcome contribution to the literature on decolonising the researcher and research (Datta, 2017) and on authorship and research ethics (Bülow and Hegesson, 2018; Jeffery, 2014). But in this paper we argue that insufficient attention has been paid to the languages through which such partnerships are carried out.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 95%

‘The time where the British took the lead is over’: ethical aspects of writing in complex research partnerships

2020

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Writing reflects some of the different characteristics of the language being used and of the people who are communicating. The present paper focusses on the internal written communication in international and inter-disciplinary research projects. Using a case study of an international public health research project, it argues that the authorship and the languages used in internal project communication are not neutral but help to generate or reinforce power hierarchies. Within research partnerships, language thus raises ethical issues that have so far been neglected. Current ethics guidelines often focus on interactions between scientists and participants of social research and clinical trials, with less attention paid to the interactions among the scientists themselves. Describing all the different project phases based on writing within a research project, the paper distinguishes different influences on the distribution of power that emerge through a focus on written communication. The focus of the present paper is to illuminate the issues of ethics, power and the dimensions of hierarchy, physical location and native versus non-native English speakers that arise from paying attention to such communications.

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Hostage authorship and the problem of dirty hands

Cited by 32 publications

References 14 publications

Unconsented acknowledgments as a form of authorship abuse: What can be done about it?

Unconsented acknowledgments as a form of authorship abuse: What can be done about it?

Responding to devious demands for co-authorship: A rejoinder to Bülow and Helgesson’s ‘dirty hands’ justification

‘The time where the British took the lead is over’: ethical aspects of writing in complex research partnerships

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