Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

From Bogus Journals to Predatory Universities: The Evolution of the Russian Academic Sphere Within the Predatory Settings of the State

  • Published:
Minerva Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The transition to the market economy, which began in Russia more than 30 years ago, has dramatically affected the performance of the Russian academic sphere. The market transformation in the country coincided with significant changes in the global academia. Bureaucratization and obsession with performance indicators have been very welcomed by the Russian system and have been incorporated in various academic excellence programs adopted in the country. A closer look at these programs reveals that the real driving force behind the initiatives is not public spiritedness of the country’s policymakers but wishes of various groups to be engaged in the rent-seeking activities of contemporary Russia. The present paper focuses on the interplay between the predatory publishing industry and the apparent encouragement of fraudulent practices by some universities in Russia. It highlights the problem of “predatory universities” and explains the evolution of such strategies in the academic sphere of the country. The Russian case allows to look at the problems of the global academia from a new angle. It should be acknowledged that the predatory publishing industry is much greater than it seems within the initial “open access” model. It is clear that the authors are very often not less predators than the publishers, and this predatory ecosystem has been significantly expanded beyond the merely publisher-author interactions. Moreover, the noticeable players in these predatory markets are universities and governments that play with the systems designed by the leading citation databases and global ranking organisations, which apparently also benefit from these arrangements.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Such claims have been also supported by numerous social polls dedicated to the problem. For example, in the survey conducted in 2008 by the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM), one of the oldest and largest polling organization in the country, the educational domain was mentioned by the respondents among the top-6 most corrupt “spheres and social institutions” in Russia (see the press release on the official website of the organization https://wciom.ru/analytical-reviews/analiticheskii-obzor/prichiny-korrupczii-i-kak-s-nimi-borotsya (accessed on Feb. 20, 2023)). The study of another prominent Russian polling organization, Foundation "Public Opinion", observed in 2011 that the universities are the leading sector in terms of “corrupt growth indicators” (see the 2011 report “Everyday Corruption in Russia” [Bytovaya Korruptsiya v Rossii] on the website of the organization https://fom.ru/obshchestvo/138 (accessed on Feb. 20, 2023)).

  2. The second one is the contract theory.

  3. See, e.g., the 2021 Corruption Perception Index list by Transparency International where Russia shares the 136 position with such countries as Angola, Liberia, and Mali (available at https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021, accessed on Feb. 20, 2023). Similar results can be found in the Worldwide Governance Indicators of the World Bank (available at http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/Home/Reports, accessed on Feb. 20, 2023).

  4. The summary of the study is available on the website of the HSE University https://www.hse.ru/news/1163613/1114397.html (accessed on Feb 20, 2023).

  5. It has been also revealed in the so-called “School Olympiads” that allow their winners to enter the university studies without YeGE (RIA NOVOSTI 2017).

  6. Rosobrnadzor is the federal agency that is responsible for the supervision and control of the national educational and scientific sphere.

  7. The report attracted attention even of the state-owned mass media. See the news from May 25, 2010 on https://www.vesti.ru/article/2069328 (accessed on Feb. 20, 2023).

  8. The excerpt from the interview was published by the NEWSru.com on Oct. 3, 2001 on its website. Available at https://www.newsru.com/russia/03oct2001/sadovnichiy_bribe.html (accessed on May 27, 2023).

  9. There have been reasonable suspicions that Russian president Vladimir Putin is, in fact, not the author of his candidate of sciences dissertation (see, e.g., Balzer 2005; Volchek and Coalson 2018).

  10. For doctor of sciences dissertations the requirement existed even before, but the adoption of the rule for candidate of sciences merely multiplied the market demand.

  11. See also the analysis of Anna Abalkina of the connections between the journals and dissertation councils in the area of economic sciences through the presence of the same “phony” works (Abalkina 2016).

  12. See “Disseropedia” of scientific journals on Dissernet. Available at http://biblio.dissernet.org/ (accessed on May 27, 2023).

  13. See, e.g., procurements 31401554328, 31806497740, 31806408193, 32009059717, 32009831530, 31704778486, 31502731540, 31604395859, 31401345568, 31502132449 (the procurements can be found on the official website of state procurements of Russia zakupki.gov.ru).

  14. See, e.g., procurements 31807340683, 31907808801.

  15. See, e.g., the description of Project 5-100 on the official website of the project https://5top100.ru/en/about/more-about/.

  16. See the information on http://rosvuz.dissernet.org/, accessed on Feb. 20, 2023.

  17. The opinions from his Facebook personal page were reprinted in Novaya Gazeta in September 2021. The article is available at https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/2021/09/05/vitse-prezident-ran-obiasnil-vysokie-pozitsii-riada-rossiiskikh-vuzov-v-reitinge-times-higher-education-nakruchivaniem-news (accessed on Feb. 20, 2023).

  18. Sapunov and Tkhagapsoev (2016, 93), for example, notice that many rectors have transformed “public universities to private business, that brings them and their cronies millions while the level of the teachers’ salaries is humiliating”.

  19. This peculiarity was even advertised by some of the 5top100 participants. See, e.g., the interview with the regional director of the Times Higher Education in Russia on the website of Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University at https://kantiana.ru/news/predstavitel-times-higher-education-bfu-im-i-kanta-pretenduet-voyti-v-prestizhnyy-mezhdunarodnyy-rey/ (accessed on Feb. 20, 2023).

References

  • Abalkina, Anna, and Alexander Libman. 2020. The real costs of plagiarism: Russian governors, plagiarized PhD theses, and infrastructure in Russian regions. Scientometrics 125: 2793–2820. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03716-x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Abalkina, Anna. 2016. Zhurnaly s somnitel’noi reputatsiei, ili “Korchevatel’” vozvrashchaetsia [The Journals with Dubious Reputation, or "Korchevatel’" is Back]. Troickii Variant, 196 edition, sec. Nauka.

  • Abalkina, Anna. 2020. Organisation of dissertation mills in Russia. In 6th International Conference PAEB2020 First Virtual ENAI Conference, 18–24.

  • Accounts Chamber. 2021. Bulletin of the Accounts Chamber. 2(279). Universities. Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation.

  • Anderson, Gary M., and Peter J. Boettke. 1993. Perestroika and public choice: The economics of autocratic succession in a rent-seeking society. Public Choice 75: 101–118. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01048356.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Anderson, Gary M., and Peter J. Boettke. 1997. Soviet venality: A rent-seeking model of the communist state. Public Choice 93: 37–53. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1017996425179.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Auzan, Alexander. 2017. Razvitie i “koleja” zavisimosti [Path dependence problem and possibilities of its overcoming]. World Economy and International Relations 61: 96–105. https://doi.org/10.20542/0131-2227-2017-61-10-96-105.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Balatsky, Evgeny. 2008. Formirovanije “Dissertacionnoj Lovushki” [Formation of the “Dissertation Trap”]. Economics of Education 4: 149–160.

    Google Scholar 

  • Balzer, Harley. 2005. The Putin Thesis and Russian Energy Policy. Post-Soviet Affairs 21: 210–225. https://doi.org/10.2747/1060-586X.21.3.210.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Balzer, Harley. 2020. Can Russia Catch Up/Keep Up? Russian Science and Education in Putin’s Fourth Term. In Putin’s Russia, Steven Rosefielde, 127–198. WORLD SCIENTIFIC. https://doi.org/10.1142/9789811212680_0006.

  • Beall, Jeffrey. 2012. Predatory publishers are corrupting open access. Nature 489: 179–179. https://doi.org/10.1038/489179a.

    Article  ADS  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bell, Kirsten. 2017. ‘Predatory’ Open Access Journals as Parody: Exposing the Limitations of ‘Legitimate’ Academic Publishing. tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique 15: 651–662. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v15i2.870.

  • Buchanan, James M. 2008. Rent seeking and profit seeking. In 40 Years of Research on Rent Seeking 2: Applications: Rent Seeking in Practice, eds. Roger D. Congleton, Arye L. Hillman, and Kai A. Konrad. Vol. 2. Springer Science & Business Media.

  • Chirikov, Igor. 2021. Does Conflict of Interest Distort Global University Rankings? Research & Occasional Paper Series. University of California Berkeley: Center for Studies in Higher Education.

  • Dawisha, Karen. 2015. Putin’s kleptocracy: Who owns Russia? New York: Simon & Schuster.

    Google Scholar 

  • Denisova-Schmidt, Elena. 2016. Academic dishonesty or corrupt values: the case of Russia. In Corruption in Public Administration, Davide Torsello, 105–137. Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781785362590.00012.

  • Diamond, Larry. 2008. The Democratic Rollback: The Resurgence of the Predatory State. Foreign Affairs 87. Council on Foreign Relations: 36–48.

  • Egorov, Georgy, and Konstantin Sonin. 2011. Dictators and their viziers: Endogenizing the loyalty–competence trade-off. Journal of the European Economic Association 9: 903–930. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1542-4774.2011.01033.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Evans, Peter B. 1995. Embedded autonomy: states and industrial transformation. Princeton Paperbacks. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

  • Eve, Martin Paul, and Ernesto Priego. 2017. Who is Actually Harmed by Predatory Publishers? tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique. Open Access Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society 15: 755–770. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v15i2.867.

  • Fuchs, Christian, and Marisol Sandoval. 2013. The Diamond Model of Open Access Publishing: Why Policy Makers, Scholars, Universities, Libraries, Labour Unions and the Publishing World Need to Take Non-Commercial, Non-Profit Open Access Serious. tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique. Open Access Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society 11: 428–443. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v11i2.502.

  • Halffman, Willem, and Hans Radder. 2015. The Academic Manifesto: From an Occupied to a Public University. Minerva 53: 165–187. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-015-9270-9.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Josephson, Paul R. 1994. Russian Scientific Institutions: Internationalisation, democracy and dispersion. Minerva 32: 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01096654.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kalimullin, Tagir. 2005. Russian Market of the Dissertation Services (beginning). Journal of Economic Sociology 6: 14–38. https://doi.org/10.17323/1726-3247-2005-4-14-38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kalimullin, Tagir. 2006. Russian Market of the Dissertation Services. Journal of Economic Sociology 7: 14–37. https://doi.org/10.17323/1726-3247-2006-1-14-37.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kearney, Margaret H., INANE The Predatory Publishing Practices Collaborative. 2015. Predatory Publishing: What Authors Need to Know. Research in Nursing & Health 38: 1–3. https://doi.org/10.1002/nur.21640.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Keohane, Robert O. 2001. Governance in a Partially Globalized World “Presidential Address”, “American Political Science Association, 2000.” The American Political Science Review 95. [American Political Science Association, Cambridge University Press]: 1–13.

  • Klein, Eduard. 2014. Academic Corruption and Reform in Russia and Ukraine. In Governance Failure and Reform Attempts after the Global Economic Crisis of 2008/09: Case Studies from Central and Eastern Europe, eds. Leonid Kosals, Heiko Pleines, Sabine Fischer, and Hans-Henning Schröder, 173–190. New York: Ibidem Verlag.

  • Klein, Daniel B., and Eric Chiang. 2004. The Social Science Citation Index: A Black Box - With an Ideological Bias? Econ Journal Watch 1. Fairfax: Fraser Institute: 134–165. 912953958. ABI/INFORM Global.

  • Komissiia RAN. 2019. Kandidaty v chleny-korrespondenty i akademiki RAN [Candidates to Corresponding Members and Academicians of the RAS]. Moscow: Komissiia RAN po protivodeistviiu fal’sifikatsii nauchnykh issledovanii [The Commission on Counteracting Falsification of Scientific Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences].

  • Komissiia RAN. 2020. Inostrannye khishchnye zhurnaly v Scopus i WoS:perevodnoi plagiati rossiiskie nedobrosovestnye avtory [Foreign Predatory Journals in Scopus and WoS: Translation Plagiarism and Russian Unscrupulous Authors]. Moscow: Komissiia RAN po protivodeistviiu fal’sifikatsii nauchnykh issledovanii [The Commission on Counteracting Falsification of Scientific Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences].

  • Kurt, Serhat. 2018. Why do authors publish in predatory journals? Learned Publishing 31: 141–147. https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.1150.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ledeneva, Alena. 2008. Telephone Justice in Russia. Post-Soviet Affairs 24: 324–350. https://doi.org/10.2747/1060-586X.24.4.324.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lekka-Kowalik, Agnieszka. 2022. Academia in the Grip of the Wolf and Its Utopia. Minerva 60: 139–158. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-021-09449-2.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Leontyeva, Elvira. 2013. Corruption Networks in the Sphere of Higher Education: An Example from Russian Mass Universities. In Informality in Eastern Europe: structures, political cultures and social practices, eds. Christian Giordano and Nicolas Hayoz, 361–381. Interdisciplinary Studies on Central and Eastern Europe Vol. 11. Bern New York: P. Lang.

  • Levi, Margaret. 1981. The Predatory Theory of Rule. Politics & Society 10: 431–465. https://doi.org/10.1177/003232928101000403.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Levin, Mark, and Georgy Satarov. 2000. Corruption and institutions in Russia. European Journal of Political Economy 16: 113–132. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0176-2680(99)00050-6.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Logvinenko, Igor. 2020. Authoritarian Welfare State, Regime Stability, and the 2018 Pension Reform in Russia. Communist and Post-Communist Studies 53: 100–116. https://doi.org/10.1525/cpcs.2020.53.1.100.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lovakov, Andrey, Maia Chankseliani, and Anna Panova. 2022. Universities vs. research institutes? Overcoming the Soviet legacy of higher education and research. Scientometrics 127: 6293–6313. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-022-04527-y.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Macháček, Vít, and Martin Srholec. 2017. Predatory journals in Scopus. Institut pro demokracii a ekonomickou analýzu (projekt).

  • Makeeva, A., A. Tsivinskaya, M. Sokolov, N. Sokolova, and K. Guba. 2020. Plagiarism in Russian Doctoral Dissertations: How Much, Where, and in Whose Work? Mir Rossii 29: 27–48.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mikhailov, O.V. 2014. Fenomen “VAKovskie zhurnaly” v sisteme attestatsii kadrov vysshei kvalifikatsii RF [The Phenomenon of “VAK Journals” in the System of Certification of Highly Qualified Personnel in Russia]. Vysshee Obrazovanie v Rossii = Higher Education in Russia 6: 94–100.

    Google Scholar 

  • Naím, Moisés. 2012. Mafia States: Organized Crime Takes Office. Foreign Affairs 91. Council on Foreign Relations: 100–111.

  • North, Douglass C. 1979. A framework for analyzing the state in economic history. Explorations in Economic History 16: 249–259. https://doi.org/10.1016/0014-4983(79)90020-2.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • RIA NOVOSTI. 2017. V Minobrnauki rasskazali o korruptsii pri provedenii olimpiad shkol’nikov [The Ministry of Education and Science tells about corruption in School Olympiads]. RIA NOVOSTI, October 9, sec. Sotsial’nyi Navigator.

  • Olson, Mancur. 2003. The logic of collective action: public goods and the theory of groups. 21. Printing. Harvard Economic Studies 124. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press.

  • Osipian, Ararat L. 2012. Education Corruption, Reform, and Growth: Case of Post-Soviet Russia. Journal of Eurasian Studies 3: 20–29. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euras.2011.10.003.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Panin, Viktor. 2010. Korruptsiya v Obrazovanii Sovremenoi Rossii [Corruption in Education in Today’s Russia]. Analytical review. All-Russian Public Organization “Protection of educational services consumers society.”

  • Panova, Anna, and Maria Yudkevich. 2021. Research and Higher Education in Russia: Moving Closer Together. In Universities in the Knowledge Society, eds. Timo Aarrevaara, Martin Finkelstein, Glen A. Jones, and Jisun Jung, 22:183–201. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective. Cham: Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-76579-8_11.

  • Robinson, James A. 1999. When is a State Predatory? CESifo Working Paper 178. Munich: Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo).

  • Sapunov, Mikhail B., and Khazhismel G. Tkhagapsoev. 2016. Russian Educational Reality and Its Converted Forms. Vysshee Obrazovanie v Rossii = Higher Education in Russia 6: 87–97.

    Google Scholar 

  • Severin, Anna, and Nicola Low. 2019. Readers beware! Predatory journals are infiltrating citation databases. International Journal of Public Health 64: 1123–1124. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00038-019-01284-3.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Sharafutdinova, G. 2010. Subnational Governance in Russia: How Putin Changed the Contract with His Agents and the Problems It Created for Medvedev. Publius: the Journal of Federalism 40: 672–696. https://doi.org/10.1093/publius/pjp036.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shekshnia, Stanislav, Alena Ledeneva, and Elena Denisova-Schmidt. 2017. Managing Business Corruption: Targeting Non-Compliant Practices in Systemically Corrupt Environments. The Slavonic and East European Review 95: 151. https://doi.org/10.5699/slaveasteurorev2.95.1.0151.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shen, Cenyu, and Bo-Christer. Björk. 2015. ‘Predatory’ open access: a longitudinal study of article volumes and market characteristics. BMC Medicine 13: 230. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12916-015-0469-2.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Sterligov, Ivan. 2018a. Why Blacklists Matter. Higher Education in Russia and beyond 3: 14–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sterligov, Ivan. 2018b. Russian Federal Universities: A Bibliometric Comparison with 5Top100, C9 and Ivy League. Higher Education in Russia and beyond 1: 17–22.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sterligov, Ivan, and Tatiana Savina. 2016. Riding with the Metric Tide: Predatory Journals in SCOPUS. Higher Education in Russia and beyond 1: 9–12.

    Google Scholar 

  • Trubnikova, Ekaterina. 2018. Red Tapes in the Sphere of Science and Education. Vysshee Obrazovanie v Rossii = Higher Education in Russia 27: 108–121.

    Google Scholar 

  • Trubnikova, Ekaterina. 2020. Project 5–100: A view through the prism of the theory of institutional corruption. Mir Rossii 29: 72–91. https://doi.org/10.17323/1811-038X-2020-29-2-72-91.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Trubnikova, Ekaterina. 2022. The Exchange of Gifts in the Academic Sphere: Predatory Practices, False Signals, and Conflicts of Interests in Excellence Programs. Mir Rossii 31: 25–48.

    Google Scholar 

  • Truth, Frank. 2012. Pay Big to Publish Fast: Academic Journal Rackets. Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies 10: 54–105.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tullock, Gordon, Arthur Seldon, and Gordon L. Brady. 2002. Government failure: a primer in public choice. Washington, DC: Cato Institute.

  • Vedomosti. 2007. Summa vziatok za postuplenie v vuzy v Rossii otsenivaetsia v $520 mln v god [The Sum of Bribes for Entering Universities in Russia is Estimated at $520 Million per Year]. Vedomosti, July 27.

  • Volchek, Dmitry, and Robert Coalson. 2018. Cut-And-Paste Job: “My Father Wrote Putin’s Dissertation.” Radio Free Europe, March 7, sec. Russia.

Download references

Funding

None.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia

    Dmitrii Trubnikov

  2. Center for Advanced Studies Southeast Europe (CAS SEE), University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia

    Dmitrii Trubnikov

  3. Independent researcher, Belgrade, Serbia

    Ekaterina Trubnikova

Authors
  1. Dmitrii Trubnikov
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Ekaterina Trubnikova
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dmitrii Trubnikov.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

Authors have nothing to disclose.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Trubnikov, D., Trubnikova, E. From Bogus Journals to Predatory Universities: The Evolution of the Russian Academic Sphere Within the Predatory Settings of the State. Minerva 62, 49–68 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-023-09502-2

Download citation

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-023-09502-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation