Scholarly Misconduct Law, Regulation, and Practice

Professional misconduct within the academic community is highly publicized. Retractions of falsified research have reached record levels and allegations of fraud and misconduct by scholars generate high-profile investigations and sometimes professional disgrace. Such cases frequently reach the courts, with tribunals determining whether research fraud, plagiarism, sexual misconduct, defamation, discrimination, forensic impropriety, thefts, and other forms of improper behavior have been committed. With claims including patient deaths, miscarriages of justice, and exploitation of funding agencies, the legal, reputational, and financial stakes for the individuals and institutions concerned are extremely high.

Scholarly Misconduct: Law, Practice, and Regulation is the first text of its kind to scrutinize the topic of academic integrity through a legal lens and across disciplines. Freckelton chronicles and analyses case law from around the globe, looking specifically at the legal and regulatory responses that were generated. The work also assesses the current policies and practices of academic and research institutions and government agencies worldwide. Finally, it reflects on the measures that need to be undertaken to reclaim and promote scholarly integrity and to institute rigorous, fair, and clear processes to establish whether scholars have indeed engaged in misconduct.

Ian Freckelton QC, Barrister,

Ian Freckelton is a Queen's Counsel in full time practice at the Bar from Crockett Chambers in Melbourne, Australia. He is also a Professorial Fellow in Law and Psychiatry at the University of Melbourne and an Adjunct Professor of Law and Forensic Medicine at Monash University. He is a Commissioner at the Victorian Law Reform Commission running its reference on Medicinal Cannabis and the Law and is the Editor of the Journal of Law and Medicine and the Editor-in-Chief of Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. He has been a member of many statutory tribunals, including the Medical Practitioners Board, the Psychologists Registration Board, and the Disciplinary Appeals Tribunal in Victoria. He has appeared extensively as counsel before disciplinary tribunals, and on appeal in criminal and civil cases, as well as in administrative law matters, including those involving staff and student misconduct at universities and other institutions.