As I’ve commented on before in this blog, the world of academia is the site of many interesting and challenging conflicts of interests (COI) that go beyond financial interests. And in many cases, the COI results not from individual misbehaviour, but because of institutional realities that create situations where people unavoidably have multiple and potentially conflicting interests.
A case in point is the issue of how we evaluate graduate theses. When students submit a Masters or PhD thesis for evaluation, it is common to require external, i.e., impartial, examiners of various sorts (e.g., external to department, or to university) to review the thesis and ensure that the review process is fair and meets widely shared academic standards. But as noted in this commentary by Yves Laberge in UniversityAffairs — How external is your external examiner? — “It was easier to draw the line between “internal” and “external” examiners before the 1980s, when collaboration between faculties at different universities was less common.”
In an era of national and international collaboration, alongside increasing hyperspecialization of research fields, it is likely that the people best placed to review a graduate student’s thesis have also collaborated with the supervisor and/or student. Academics are busy people, and organising a review committee is a time consuming process. Often, we have to call in favours to get colleagues to review student theses or sit on exam committees. And there is little (if any!) funding with which to bring in physically external colleagues to participate in an exam, although video conferencing helps somewhat (but has its own limitations).
Now there are clearly policies and practices in place to reduce the risk or harm of bias (e.g., excluding collaborators from committees), but these often rely on a simple distinction between “internal” and “external” evaluators. And they may also undermine the review process, when for example, external reviewers are non-specialists in the student’s area of study, because the student and supervisor have worked with most of the specialists!
As Laberge concludes,
One thing is certain: it is easier to point out emerging problems than to suggest efficient solutions.
In my opinion, universities need to redefine the status of the “insider” and the status of the “external examiner,” to acknowledge the new kinds of networking relationships that have developed in the last three decades. These issues need to be addressed and debated, and not only by deans.
The bottom line is that a colleague who works on the same research project as the can didate and thesis supervisor but comes from another university should not in any instance be considered an “external examiner.” To maintain the validity of their thesis and the value of their degree, future PhD candidates should face a real jury that is not too familiar with their work nor onside in advance.
