Who writes and whose right?

Writing is considered “the act of one person giving a piece of their soul to another.” And the “purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.” But one of the common issues faced by publishers is disputes over authorship. Due to “publish or perish” compulsions, there has been a surge in the number of authorship abuse cases. Authorship issues have mostly to do with the phenomenon called author inflation, or the involvement of multiple authors.

A study predicts an average of eight authors per publication by the end of the next decade. The issues range from who should be included as authors and the sequence thereof: first, second, and corresponding. Notably, Arthur Schopenhauer’s second typology of authors (those who write for writing’s sake) is more responsible for such issues than the first one -- those who write for the subject’s sake.

Authorship is not just about getting credit for knowledge creation, innovation, or problem solving. It also has to do with taking responsibility for what is written. As the Council of Science Editors notes, “The ultimate reason for identifying authors and other contributors is to establish accountability for the reported work.” Authorship, therefore, has to be looked at from the right perspective. The International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), lays down four criteria for authorship:

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data;

Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;

Final approval of the version to be published;

Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work, ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

To claim to be an author, one has to fulfil all the above criteria. Anything short, one is a ‘contributor’, who should duly be acknowledged by the actual authors. There is thus a difference between ‘authorship’ and ‘contributorship.’ By merely suggesting a topic, providing guidance, collecting data, or securing funding for a project, one cannot become an author.

Research Councils UK mentions the following as unacceptable research conduct: Misrepresentation of involvement, such as inappropriate claims to authorship and/or attribution of work where there has been no significant contribution, or the denial of authorship where an author has made a significant contribution. In this regard, the Council of Scientific Editors (CSE) identifies three kinds of inappropriate authorship: guest, ghost, and gift.

A guest author is one who lends her or his name to boost the credibility of the publication. Several scams have been unearthed, especially in the medical field, where certain drug companies paid huge amounts to noted authors to use their names for articles endorsing certain of their products.

A ghost author is one who is left out of the list of authors despite making a substantial contribution, though they are usually compensated financially.

On the other hand, a gift author is the one who is included as an author despite not making any contribution. Gift authorship, if done voluntarily and with good intentions to lift junior researchers up, is not disputed. Issues come to the fore only when coercion is used for “gifting.”

The most concerning is the act of what Kwok calls “white bulls,” who use their position of power to dictate authorship in their favour. Junior researchers/students, due to lack of awareness and vulnerability, usually give in to the demands of the “white bulls”. It is a misnomer to think that articles have high chances of acceptability if names of senior faculty are included as ‘first authors,’ which is the most favoured because of ‘citability’ advantage. Most of the publishers go by what is, than who has, written.

It is important for institutions and journals to lay down clear-cut guidelines on authorship. Turning the other way will bring down the credibility of the writers and the academic institutions they belong to. Each institution may consider setting up (if not already in existence) a ‘Committee on Publication Ethics’ to look into inter alia authorship issues as well. Awareness of authorship could be part of research methodology courses.

On their part, it is better that the researchers transparently agree on their respective contributions to a particular article before its drafting. The Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT), which classifies author tasks into 14 categories, is worth taking note of in this regard. Having an authorship contract in written form at the commencement of the project may be considered.

Journals can also insist on clearly identifying the contribution of each author in the publication contract so as to exclude “free riders.” Needless to say, careers can be made by credible publications, but they can also be marred by unethical and inappropriate authorship.

(The author is Director, Centre for East Asian
Studies, Christ University, Bengaluru.)