When I was very young, the father of the neighbor's family a young academic - suddenly disappeared. The young academic was working, I was later told, on original research upon which he had pinned the hopes for his career. Nearing the completion of his work, however, a professor he had been working with published the young academic's original work under the professor's own name.
There was a complaint but the professor prevailed. This was and often still is the case in such unequal power relationships.
This young academic's one piece of career-making work stolen and not finding justice through the academic process, he ended his life. It was an extreme response, but one that illustrated the absolute seriousness of intellectual property. It also illustrated the intellectual dishonesty that pervaded academia.
Having heard past complaints by more junior researchers that senior academics regularly publish researcher's work under the academic's name, it was easy to consider this as a serious but uncommon issue. Yet the examples continued and it is now difficult to not believe that there is a continuing problem. In short, there is considerable anecdotal evidence that intellectual dishonesty remains common.
It is a bedrock academic proposition that plagiarism is not tolerated. Students are regularly failed, or worse, for plagiarising the work of others. Plagiarism scandals have also claimed the professional scalps of a small number of high profile academics, if usually informed by other agendas.
Yet the incidence of senior academics claiming the researchers' or PhD students' work as their own is, it seems, widespread.
In one recent case, a young researcher left her position when, after more than a year of writing up research, she had a senior academic give it a light edit, append his own name and publish it as his own work. This is not just lifting some material from another source and claiming at as one's own, it is effectively lifting...

The announcement by President Jose Ramos-Horta that he will seek re-election for a second term in office has thrown open Timor-Leste’s presidential race, all but guaranteeing that the process will now run to a second round of voting. Although Ramos-Horta’s candidacy adds another strong contender to the presidential stakes, added to two other strong contenders and what will probably be a list of around a dozen less likely candidates, it now seems unlikely that any one candidate will receive the requisite 50%+1 in order to win the presidency in the first round. President Ramos-Horta announced his decision to run again for the presidency after receiving a petition signed by more than 116,000 East Timorese asking him to stand again for the office. He had been considering whether or not to run again throughout 2011 and had at times said that he would both run and not run again. In part, his deliberations on the presidency were informed by the need for the political process to be handed over to other, capable candidates, to help ensure there was a broader range of political voices. In part, too, having represented Timor-Leste to the international community for decades and then been its Foreign Minister, briefly Prime Minister and then President, he had more than fulfilled his role to the nation. After being shot and critically wounded in 2008, there were also moments of personal reflection, as well as physical recovery. However, Ramos-Horta has recovered remarkably well from that water-shed event, which marked the end of the 2006-7 political violence in Timor-Leste and ushered in a new period of a return to something approaching normality. The real question in the presidential race will be how Timor-Leste’s multiple political parties align themselves with candidates and whether the two leading independent candidates, Ramos-Horta and Taur Matan Ruak, receive backing from a major party, such as CNRT. This will in turn depend on the status of the rela...

At a time of unprecedented good bilateral relations with Indonesia, Australia is now looking to its future. Indonesia's shift towards a more open democratic framework has allowed the previously troubled relationship to stabilise, but its future remains uncertain, especially over the medium to longer term.
The renewed focus on relations with Indonesia reflects its continuing critical value to Australian foreign policy. It is Australia's largest near neighbour, the world's largest Muslim country, a major regional diplomatic actor, the key transit point for Australian trade, travel and irregular migration and, again, a growing economic partner.
Australia policy thinkers are therefore looking at options for the longer term relationship. Among those considerations is increasing bilateral strategic engagement. More than any other aspect of the relationship, this is likely to generate controversy both within Australia and in Indonesia.
Indonesia's potential as an important strategic partner reflects a perceived need for the two countries to develop a regional security bloc. The problems that would accompany pursuing such a policy, however, reflect widespread public reluctance in Australia to endorse the Indonesian military, given its history of human rights abuses, impunity and its stalled reform process.
Beyond this challenging security focus, engagement with Indonesia is, to a large extent, shaped by Australia's Indonesia 'literacy', or the extent to which Australia understands its sprawling, complex neighbour. Australia's once strong claim to a high level of Indonesia expertise, supported by a secondary school Indonesia language program, has markedly declined.
Public understanding of Indonesia also remains limited, often misinformed and generally untrusting. This is not assisted by Indonesia specialists often presenting Indonesia in an unrealistically positive light, or as too different to be adequately assessed in Western terms.
D...