Not Another Politics Podcast Do Dishonest People Self-Select Into Public Service?
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Feb 19, 2026 Shaoda Wang, Assistant Professor at UChicago Harris who studies academic dishonesty and political selection, discusses using dissertation plagiarism and experiments to link cheating with career paths. Short segments cover measuring plagiarism, links to civil service and judges, bias toward powerful litigants, livestreaming as a check, and how institutions and mentors amplify dishonesty.
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Plagiarism Predicts Hidden Dishonesty, Not Stated Claims
- Dissertation plagiarism predicts dishonest behaviour in incentivized games but not stated honesty.
- Past academic cheating correlates with later propensity to lie for monetary gain, showing persistence.
Civil Service Attracts More Plagiarizing Graduates
- Graduates who became civil servants show higher rates of dissertation plagiarism versus peers.
- The study documents negative political selection: dishonest graduates are overrepresented in China's civil service.
Self-Selection Explains Negative Political Selection
- Self-selection likely drives the pattern: dishonest high-ability individuals choose civil service.
- Dishonesty may give comparative advantage in public roles requiring deception or corner-cutting.