For the better part of the 21st century, China has achieved a lot. For instance, this is a country that has managed to change the military leadership and political arena of the United States. At the same time, the country has managed to conquer more world markets than any other country. During this entire time, the nation has set sights to become the global powerhouse in the field of scientific research. The country has taken the necessary steps by outspending the European Union in regards to development and research. As a result, China now ranks second behind the United States in producing scientific articles. However, the quest for dominance has come at a cost. Retraction Watch recently released a report showing that China has retracted more scientific papers that the whole world combined. Also, the report noted that the retraction was as a result of faked peer reviews. Retraction Watch is an international blog that keeps track of research papers retraction with the aim of publicizing them. Latest scandals in this field have taught China and other nations that it takes a lot to be a scientific superpower. For this to happen, a nation must put in place means and ways to fight the festering issue of systemic fraud.
This was echoed by a Xi’an Jiaotong University professor known as Zhang Lei. He said that it’s the wish of his nation to become a scientific leader in the world. However, he said that they hadn’t figured a way to do that while at the same time preserving the quality of science. In April, 107 biology research papers were retracted by a scientific journal. The same happened this summer when a gene scientist form the country was forced to retract his research. This came when scientists from other parts of the globe could not replicate his results. An investigation by the Chinese government also discovered that there was an online black market in the country that could sell virtually anything. This included positive reviews and even entire research articles. Turning China into a global scientific and technology powerhouse is something that has also been echoed by the current president Xi Jinping. To exhibit its vast engineering prowess, China has embarked on an extensive infrastructure that is characterized by bridges, ports, rail, roads as well as roads. However, this has come at the cost of poor quality products and piracy problems.
Dil Bole Oberoi
