Green Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock is in trouble again. A media scientist from Austria accuses her of plagiarism in her recently published book. Your party and the publisher are fighting back with all their might.
The Austrian media scientist Stefan Weber accuses the Green Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock of having copied her book – which the Greens categorically reject. In a blog post, Weber accuses Baerbock that some of the formulations in the book did not come from her. “And if you take it seriously, there are also several copyright violations.” A Green spokesman said: “This is an attempt at character assassination.” Baerbock turned on the lawyer Christian Schertz, who specializes in media law.
Baerbock’s book “Now. How We Renew our Land” was published on June 21st. It is not an academic text for which strict standards of academic work apply. In the 240-page book, Baerbock spreads green political concepts and combines them with personal experiences. She does not use footnotes with which she could refer to sources.
Weber also admits that. “A non-fiction book by a politician at Ullstein-Verlag is not a dissertation,” he writes. But: “Text plagiarism is not ethically correct and has already been rightly criticized in non-fiction books.” The media scientist Weber, who has been dealing with inaccuracies in Baerbock’s curriculum vitae since May, lists several passages of text with parallels to other publications in his article. Weber cites contributions by the US political scientist Michael T. Klare, the Federal Agency for Civic Education and the news magazine “Der Spiegel” as examples.
Most striking passage on page 219
The parallels are more or less pronounced from case to case. Most noticeable is a passage on page 219 of Baerbock’s book about the effects of climate change on security. Weber contrasts them with a passage in the magazine “Internationale Politik”.
Baerbock writes: “Viewing climate change as a” threat multiplier “that can exacerbate raw material and social conflicts has since become a cornerstone of the Pentagon’s strategy. His conclusion: the more fragile a state is, the more likely it is that it will be special will suffer severely from the consequences of global warming – internal conflicts, humanitarian disasters and migration. The resulting chaos could in turn lead to new challenges for the US military, be it through humanitarian aid missions or interventions abroad. ”
The author Michael T. Klare writes in the magazine: “The concept of climate change as a” threat multiplier “that can exacerbate raw material and social conflicts in developing countries has since become a cornerstone of the Pentagon’s strategy. The more divided and corrupt a state is , the more likely it is that it will suffer particularly badly from the effects of global warming – internal conflicts, humanitarian disasters and mass migration. The resulting chaos could in turn lead to new challenges for the US military, be it through humanitarian relief efforts or military interventions abroad. ”
Weber is trying to “maliciously” damage Baerbock’s reputation, said the Greens spokesman. “The passages described are generally accessible facts or known green positions.” In a statement sent by the Greens press office, attorney Schertz stated: “I cannot begin to recognize a copyright infringement, since the few passages referred to are nothing more than the reproduction of generally known facts and political views.”
Publisher cannot “recognize any copyright infringement”
The Ullstein-Verlag, which published the book, protested against the allegations and argued similarly. “The manuscript of Annalena Baerbock’s book has been carefully edited by the publisher,” said the publisher. “The listing of generally accessible facts is just as little protected by copyright as the simple formulations with which such facts are conveyed. We cannot detect any copyright infringement.” As is customary with non-academic works, the book does not contain a list of sources.
Harsh criticism came from political competition. “Deliberately deceived, worked sloppily and already stacked up again with your own performance – that seems to have a system at Annalena Baerbock and once again shakes her credibility,” said CSU General Secretary Markus Blume “Focus online”. The chairman of the Junge Union, Tilman Kuban, told the portal: “First produce the résumé with little personal effort and a lot of hot air, now copy it with the book. You can’t run a country like that.”
Weber told the news agency that he had examined the book on his own account and that it was not a paid commission. “I dogged myself into the Baerbock topic because a lot comes together.” So far, he has only shown jobs that he found with the help of plagiarism checking software. “I hope that I will now get hints from readers. Because many texts are behind payment barriers that the software cannot find.” Parts of the book are unsuspicious because they are about personal stories. He cannot yet say whether more is coming.
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