University autonomy under democratic backsliding: a case study of a plagiarism investigation against Serbian Minister of Finance (2014-2019)

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dc.contributor.authorTomic, Slobodan
dc.contributor.authorRadeljic, Branislav
dc.date.accessioned2024-02-23T13:56:09Z
dc.date.available2024-02-23T13:56:09Z
dc.date.issued2022
dc.departmentNEÜen_US
dc.description.abstractScholars have documented a tendency of (semi-)authoritarian regimes to undermine university autonomy, mainly through organizational (de jure) changes. This paper presents a case study of a publicly triggered plagiarism investigation by the University of Belgrade into the doctoral thesis of the Serbian Minister of Finance, one of the key members of the increasingly authoritarian regime. The analysis finds a proceduralized and delayed response of the university's leadership, which indicates lowered de facto autonomy from politics, despite the university's continually high de jure autonomy. The investigation was closed only after a mobilization within the academic community which resulted in a university's blockade that forced its leadership to retract the contentious thesis. The case study shows that, in contexts of democratic backsliding, political capture can extend farther than usually thought, impacting even the implementation of internal university standards. On the other hand, the analysis also shows that political capture is not necessarily irreversible and that academic community can mobilize to 'undo' it. This reinforces the notion of academic communities as value-driven groups capable of exerting peer pressure to override even authoritarian pressures. In order to understand the dynamic of the plagiarism inquiry in its entirety, we apply insights from theory of power to complement and overcome the limitations of the conventional theoretical frameworks on democratic backsliding and academic autonomy.en_US
dc.identifier.doi10.1007/s10734-021-00811-7
dc.identifier.endpage1001en_US
dc.identifier.issn0018-1560
dc.identifier.issn1573-174X
dc.identifier.issue5en_US
dc.identifier.scopus2-s2.0-85128452955en_US
dc.identifier.scopusqualityQ1en_US
dc.identifier.startpage979en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-021-00811-7
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12452/11099
dc.identifier.volume84en_US
dc.identifier.wosWOS:000784820100001en_US
dc.identifier.wosqualityQ1en_US
dc.indekslendigikaynakWeb of Scienceen_US
dc.indekslendigikaynakScopusen_US
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherSpringeren_US
dc.relation.ispartofHigher Educationen_US
dc.relation.publicationcategoryMakale - Uluslararası Hakemli Dergi - Kurum Öğretim Elemanıen_US
dc.rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessen_US
dc.subjectUniversity Autonomyen_US
dc.subjectPlagiarismen_US
dc.subjectDemocratic Backslidingen_US
dc.subjectAcademic Integrityen_US
dc.subjectPoweren_US
dc.titleUniversity autonomy under democratic backsliding: a case study of a plagiarism investigation against Serbian Minister of Finance (2014-2019)en_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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