Scientists will answer according to the articles – Newspaper Kommersant No. 205 (7406) dated 11/03/2022

The Higher Attestation Commission (HAC) has approved a new register of scientific journals, publications in which are mandatory for dissertation defense. Scientists are offered to publish not only in domestic publications, but also in foreign ones, but now publications abroad will not be considered mandatory. The Dissernet project has serious complaints about the list of Russian journals: more than a hundred of those that were awarded the highest category contain publications with large-scale plagiarism and dubious co-authorship. The Higher Attestation Commission is ready to consider specific claims of colleagues.

At the end of October, the Higher Attestation Commission approved a list of publications in which scientific articles can be published by applicants for the scientific degrees of candidate and doctor of science. This was announced to Kommersant by the chairman of the Higher Attestation Commission Vladimir Filippov. The list includes, in particular, 2593 Russian scientific publications (“VAK List”), as well as publications from the Russian Science Citation Index (RSCI; compiled by the Russian Academy of Sciences, unites about 900 domestic journals) and international databases. The list of VAK is divided into three categories – according to the demand (citation index) of the journal by the scientific community. So, the commission assigned 662 journals to the highest quartile (K1), almost 1.3 thousand publications to K2, the rest were awarded the third quartile.

On the basis of this list, the Higher Attestation Commission at its meeting on September 26 approved new criteria for members of the dissenting councils and requirements for applicants for the scientific degrees of candidate and doctor of science.

So, in the biological, geographical, physical, mathematical and chemical branches of science, graduate students must publish at least two articles, one of which must be published in publications classified as K1 or K2 from the VAK list, or in the Russian RSCI. For the humanities and other sciences, the requirements remain without taking into account new categories – three and two articles, respectively.

Future Doctors of Humanities must publish at least 15 articles, of which five must be published in publications classified as K1 or K2, or in journals based on RSCI. For other branches of science – at least ten, but five of them must also be published in the publications listed above.

The criteria for defending a dissertation on a scientific report have also been approved. Recall that in October the head of the Ministry of Education and Science Valery Falkov proposed to conduct an experiment and exempt postgraduate students from technical and natural sciences from writing dissertations. To obtain a Ph.D., it will be enough to defend a report based on previously published scientific articles. Officials believe: this will encourage graduate students to complete research on time (see “Kommersant” dated October 7). The final decision will be formulated in December together with the Ministry of Education and Science. So far, the HAC proposes to allow postgraduate students to defend a dissertation in the format of a report if they publish at least four articles in publications from the list of the HAC, classified as K1 or K2, or in the RSCI database. According to the commission’s plans, the new criteria should come into force on September 1, 2023. The final decision will be formulated in December together with the Ministry of Education and Science.

Mr. Filippov reminded Kommersant that in March 2022, by a decree of the Russian government, the requirement for citation and publication in journals from the international WoS and Scopus databases was canceled: “Therefore, it became necessary to develop our own Russian criteria that would take into account the need for publication in good Russian publications “. However, publications in international databases will still be counted, but will not be considered mandatory, as before, he says. We are talking about the Web of Science, Scopus, MathSciNet, PubMed, AstroPhysics, Chemical Abstracts databases. Articles in these databases will be equated to publications in journals classified as K1 of the VAK list.

Andrey Rostovtsev, co-founder of the Dissernet project, points out that 124 publications fell into the highest category K1, to which Dissernet has serious claims.

It is, according to him, about the presence in these journals of publications with large-scale plagiarism and dubious co-authorship, duplication of texts, as well as “a significant number of avid dissertation writers in the editorial boards.” In addition, he points out, many of these publications accept reviews of dissertations from the authors themselves, although according to the rules, it must be written by an independent scholar. As an example, he cites the journal Administrative Law and Process, where Dissernet experts found ten articles with plagiarism or false authorship. There are 28 such publications in the Basic Research journal, and 34 in the Tambov University Bulletin. These publications were also on the previous list of the Higher Attestation Commission, Mr. Rostovtsev admits. However, he points out, the requirement to write a dissertation was also preserved in the past. “Even before, it was possible to go to paid, predatory journals, necessary dissertation advice, and in some cases pay immediately on a turnkey basis,” he says. “But now they are offering to make the procedure even simpler and not even write a dissertation.” According to him, the quality of dissertations, as well as the level of candidates and doctors of sciences, may fall from this.

Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Aleksey Khokhlov draws attention to the fact that even now graduate students in physical, chemical, mathematical and biological specialties prefer to publish in foreign publications or in Russian publications from the RSCI list, and not in journals from the VAK list: “Scientific councils, when defending dissertations, pay attention to what journals were the articles published by the graduate student – in decent or junk ones. For many years, the RAS had questions about publications from the VAK list, he admits. The academician also says that on October 20, the Ministry of Education and Science completed work on the so-called white list of publications as part of the national evaluation system for scientific publications.

Mr. Khokhlov does not rule out that only publications from the “white list” will be counted in leading universities that have the right to independently award academic degrees.

In total, the list includes more than 30 thousand publications, including those that were previously indexed in WoS and Scopus, as well as 944 journals from the Russian RSCI. Aleksey Khokhlov points out that the document is now being approved by the government. “In my opinion, it is necessary to adhere to the “white list,” he says. “And the fact that the VAK, on ​​its own initiative, did the work of rating the journals that remained outside the RSCI, is good. It is possible that this rating will be useful for some specialties, as well as in terms of considering new candidates for the RSCI list.”

Vladimir Filippov calls the claims of Dissernet and other scientists to some journals from the VAK list “natural”: “We do not yet have official submissions from them or facts that need to be verified. We will consider the received proposals and claims to specific publications at meetings of the commission’s expert councils. Then the presidium of the VAK will make a decision on the preservation or exclusion of publications from the list.”

Anna Vasilyeva