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Radical reform is needed to combat power abuses in academia

Nature Human Behaviour volume 9, page 424 (2025)Cite this article

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Although measures that have previously been suggested — such as the more intense and efficient monitoring of abuse, with the parallel application of more and stricter penalties3 — are necessary, they are not sufficient.

Modern universities evolved from monastic schools4,5, and the academic hierarchy originates in religious hierarchy. The elementary cell of this structure is the master–disciple relationship4. Such structures I argue are not only obsolete, but also implicitly psychologically abusive.

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  4. Riché, P. Education and Culture in the Barbarian West, Sixth through Eighth Centuries (Univ. South Carolina Press, 1976).

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Acknowledgements

Z.R. is supported by the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 101149270—ProtoBH.

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  1. Dipartimento di Fisica “G. Occhialini”, Universitá degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca, Milano, Italy

    Zacharias Roupas

  2. Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), Sezione di Milano-Bicocca, Milano, Italy

    Zacharias Roupas

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  1. Zacharias Roupas
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Correspondence to Zacharias Roupas.

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Roupas, Z. Radical reform is needed to combat power abuses in academia. Nat Hum Behav 9, 424 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-025-02127-3

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