More than 30 years after Elena Ceauescu was executed for her part in the murder of a communist leader, researchers in her home country of Romania have called on academic publishers to remove her name from more than two dozen scientific papers and books.
Elena Ceauescu was a world-famous chemistry researcher despite having no qualifications. Even though she was barely literate in science and unable to recognize basic formulas, her work is still being cited and accessed.
The Royal Society of Chemistry and the Polytechnic of Central London are two institutions that honoured Ceauescu. She did not write her PhD, but it was not taken away from her in Romania.
Chris Isloi, a neuroscience and psychology researcher based in London, and Andrei Dumbrav, a doctor and senior lecturer at the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University in Iai, are leading the call to have the scientific record corrected. Isloi says it is difficult since no academic publishers ever wrote their publishing guidelines anticipating an author might be a communist dictator's wife.
The Ceauescus were put to death on Christmas Day 1989 after their regime was overthrown in a peaceful manner, but the bloodshed that followed allowed the former communists to retain power.
There is a desire for legitimacy.
Elena Ceauescu claimed to be a scientist because of her desire for prestige and because of her country's position as the most communist state in the west.
The west praised Ceauescu for opposing the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia after he came to power. The first US president to visit a communist country was Richard Nixon. The first communist head of state to visit London was invited to the White House in 1970, and Ceauescu was invited to the White House in 1978.
Margaret Thatcher, who was a qualified chemist, was the leader of the opposition when she visited Bucharest in 1975, and met the Ceauescus again a year before her first election victory.
The Queen and Prince Philip met Elena andNicolae Ceauescu in London in 1978. The photograph is of the PA.
He presided over an appalling human rights record, cut funding for science and medicine, and built a personality cult around himself.
Dumbrav says they were hard times. It is difficult to tell the whole story for people who have never experienced totalitarianism.
He said that it was a world in which everything was dictated to you. The efforts of the Ceauescus to pay off foreign debt meant they wanted to avoid any imports which required currency. You couldn't sacrifice a cow in your village. It was not legal. If you were caught with meat, you could go to prison.
Isloi thinks Elena's scientific credentials were raised to such heights because of the Ceauescus' desire for international recognition and legitimacy.
Lavinia Betea, her biographer, says that holding the title of scientist legitimised the rise ofNicolae Ceauescu as a leader of the intellectual elite.
After the appointment of Ceauescu as general secretary of the Communist party in 1965, the Ceauescus never needed money again.
Their expenses for food, clothes and leisure were taken care of. The constitutions of communist countries stipulated that citizens had a right to work. Elena Ceauescu, the wife of the most powerful politician in the country, wanted to portray herself as a role model for other women. She wouldn't hear of having a job. Being an intellectual and being a scientist would make her a good choice for being the first female comrade of the country, as communism valued science as a force for industrial production.
Elena Ceauescu was born to a family of farmers and traders in 1916, according to her biography in the national archives. She attended night school at the Polytechnic Institute in Bucharest for seven years and then went to work at the National Institute for Research and Development in Chemistry and Petrochemistry.
Dumbrav believes that this is the reason why she specialized in research on the subject.
He says it was a matter of chance. She was an unskilled worker in the institute before she got her degree in chemistry and before she got her PhD.
In his book Kiss the Hand You Cannot Bite: the Rise and Fall of the Ceauescus, Edward Behr writes that there is no record of her chemistry degree in advance of her doctorate.
Mircea Corciovei, a scientist at ICECHIM, said that it was difficult to talk to her in her new position. She gave orders and didn't want arguments.
She never discussed the scientific aspects of the institute's work, "concerning herself only with political and administrative matters."
Corciovei tried to attend the board of examiners for Ceauescu's chemistry doctorate in 1967, but it was open to the public.
The door was locked when Corciovei showed up. The session was recorded in camera.
Everyone knew she was not real.
Ceauescu's scientific reputation could not have reached international proportions without the help of western publications, institutions and political leaders.
Isloi says that her international fame was supported by forcing her chemists to write papers, some of which were published in international journals, as well as a book that was translated in English and published by Pergamon Press, a well-known British academic publisher.
A book based on Ceauescu's PhD was published by Pergamon under the title Stereospecific Polymerization of Isoprene and has a foreword written by a British chemist.
Even a brief reading makes one think that the field of research surveyed by the author is recent and vast.
The American president did not have the same power as the Romanian. Elena had the only result.
Ion Mihai.
The hagiographic biographies of several eastern bloc leaders were published by Pergamon, including one on the dictator of Romania.
In 1991, a few months before his death, Maxwell sold Pergamon to the academic publishing giant Elsevier, where Ceauescu's two books are still available. Her work can be found through the publishers.
The Journal of Macromolecular Science and the now discontinued Journal of Molecular Catalysis were both published under her name.
The reputation of Ceauescu was promoted by officials in the west. Dumbrav says she had a desire to be showered with gifts from all over the world as a sign of her prestige.
In his 1987 book Red Horizons, the former head of the intelligence service in Romania wrote that Ceauescu wanted him to arrange for universities in New York and Washington to award her titles.
The American president didn't have the same power as the Romanian did. Elena had the only result.
The principal of London University told Dennis Deletant in 1978 that he had been told that the diplomats from the Republic of Ceauescu were trying to get her an honorific title before her state visit. Deletant was asked if it was a good decision.
He says that the Romanian embassy in London made strenuous efforts to convince British academic institutions to recognize Elena's scientific achievements, even though her doctorate was the work.
Deletant was invited by the principal of London University to discuss with him the grounds for the award of an honorary doctorate to Elena. I expressed a strong opposition to that step.
The Royal Society, the oldest national scientific society in the world, sent an emissary to plead Ceauescu's case.
The society's president, Alexander Todd, had a meeting with Deletant's wife, who was a professor at the university.
Professor Todd asked the emissary if Elena deserved an honour from the society after giving her generous hospitality. The answer was no.
The University of London and the Royal Society did not accept the requests.
The Royal Society of Chemistry made Elena an officer, and the Polytechnic of Central London gave her the title of professor.
Everyone knew she was not real.
Lavinia Betea is a biographer.
Neither organisation responded to the request for comment.
Betea says that it is important that those outside of Romania share responsibility for the legitimisation of Ceauescu.
She got her first recognitions from France and the United States before entering the academy. Can you excuse the interests of those who didn't live in a communist dictatorship, and only blame those in the country? Or just her? That is not fair, in my opinion.
Everyone knew she was not real. Those who gave her titles or pressured others to do so are guilty of contributing to an intellectual imposture of colossal proportions.
The people who took part in the deception were not punished. Elena Ceauescu would not have been a world- renowned scientist if it weren't for them.
Elena andNicolae Ceauescu were tried before a military tribunal. The couple were shot after being found guilty of crimes. Agence France-Presse/
Honesty to scientific work.
Between 1984 and 1989 Professor Mircea Teodorescu from the Polytechnic University of Bucharest co-authored papers with Elena Ceauescu. She is part of a push to have her name removed from scientific works.
At the time, Teodorescu was an assistant professor in the rubber department.
The Communist party ordered Elena Ceauescu to be the first author of the entire scientific output of this department.
This included all joint projects with researchers from other institutions. I knew from the beginning that Elena Ceauescu would be the first author of all the papers, but I accepted the situation because of the high-quality scientific research I participated in, and also because the location of the laboratory gave me the opportunity to learn.
Teodorescu wants her name removed from some of the works she was the sole author of. The science in those papers was sound, but it was Ceauescu who did not have any involvement in it.
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He believes that she didn't read those works because she didn't have the ability to comprehend them. It is a moral issue to correct.
In their letter to Elsevier, Teodorescu, Isloi, Dumbrav and their co-authors call Ceauescu's actions a ruthless act of intellectual misappropriation.
In the name of self-correcting nature of science, as well as the hard-earned Romanian democracy, we ask that you consider withdrawing the titles bearing her name, as her authorship on these works is not only fraudulent, but an offense to the anti-communist protesters who were there.
We are aware that these titles ended up in your catalog, and we are well aware of it. The scientific record correction is crucial.
Similar requests have been sent to other companies. False claims of authorship and plagiarism are grounds for revocation according to the guidelines of the publishers.
A tapestry from the Ceauescu era was put up for auction in the year 2018, showing Elena,Nicolae, and his parents. The reputation of the couple has changed in recent years. Daniel Mihilescu is pictured.
The individuals who brought this to our attention were thanked by the spokesman for Wiley.
We have begun an investigation into four articles in the journal which was discontinued in 2003 in accordance with industry standards set forward by the Committee on Publication Ethics.
The two companies did not respond to the request for comment.
The European Patent Office should take back 36 patents that were registered under Elena Ceauescu's name.
ICECHIM still lists her as a former general manager, but they don't mention her history, harsh cuts to scientific funding or lack of credentials.
Plagiarism and nepotism are rampant in Romanian academia.
Chris Isloi.
Mihaela Doni, the current general manager, said that Elena Ceauescu's time as the institute manager cannot be erased from the history of the institution.
The institute has no qualifications in determining whether Elena Ceauescu would have asked to be the co-author of some scientific works to which she did not contribute, and even more, to ask the publishers to withdraw her name from the work.
The co-authors themselves are the only ones who are entitled to do this.
Isloi says that Ceauescu's impact on science is still there.
He says that plagiarism is rampant in Romania. Much of it is a consequence of Elena Ceauescu's influence in the 70s and 80s.
Betea says that Ceauescu is no longer viewed as harshly as she was when she was alive. She says that there is a certain collective guilt over her trial and execution. Her fraud had an impact on politics and science.
The minister of innovation in Romania resigned after an investigation found that he plagiarised from an academic paper.
Elena Ceauescu's model is associated with being a student in a private university and paying to have your own books or articles published in order to advance your academic career.
The obsession that the Ceauescus had with both political and scientific figures led to the aim of the politicians of having academic titles or PhDs.
