The Danish parliament has passed a new Research Misconduct Act

 

New Research Misconduct Act

On 1 July 2017 the new Danish Research Misconduct etc. Act came into effect. This is the first law bringing research integrity issues together in a single law specifically addressing these matters by creating one legal framework for handling research misconduct and questionable research practice – QRP.

The purpose of the Act is to enhance credibility and integrity in Danish research by establishing definitions of research misconduct and QRP at the national legislative level as well as introducing a clear division of responsibilities between the Danish research institutions and the national research misconduct body – The Danish Committee on Research Misconduct.

The passing of the Act through Parliament is the outcome of recent years effort to promote research integrity in Denmark. The process began with the adoption of the Danish Code of Conduct for Research Integrity in 2014 which was a joint initiative of the research community and the research administration part of government. The Code received widespread support from researchers and institutions across both public and private sector and the new Act builds on this work and the ideas behind the Code. Following the publication of the Code an expert committee was set up by the Danish Minister of Higher Education and Research to review the Danish research misconduct system and recommend adjustments based on national and international experiences. The expert committee delivered a report in 2016 with twelve specific recommendations of changes to the system. The report founded the basis for the new Act on research misconduct etc.

With the system introduced by the new Act the Danish approach to research integrity can be split into three parts:

1) Responsible conduct of research is developed in the research community based on common guidelines and practices laid down in non-legal settings such as the Danish Code of Conduct for Research Integrity;
2) Questionable Research Practice are handled by the individual institutions who are legally obliged to deal with such issues and publish guidelines for their processes in this regard;
3) All research misconduct cases – defined in the law as fabrication, falsification and plagiarism – will be handled by the DCRM, a national independent committee with legal and academic expertise.

 

For more information about DCRM please visit this website.