Posted by Eugene Volokh:
Graduate Student / Dissertation Advisor Relationship Doesn't Give Rise to a
Fiduciary Duty:
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_05_03-2009_05_09.shtml#1241817948
So holds [1]Swenson v. Bender (Minn. Ct. App. Apr. 28):
[A] fiduciary relationship cannot arise even out of a long, close,
and trusting relationship when the purportedly trusting party
�should have known the [other party] was representing adverse
interests.� Given Bender�s roles as adjunct instructor at Capella
and as member of the committee assigned to assess Swenson�s
academic paper, Swenson should have known that Bender had an
independent obligation to Capella that at least paralleled, if not
superseded, her obligation to Swenson as it regards the
dissertation�s subject matter. Bender�s role prevented her from
being bound to act only for Swenson�s benefit on all matters.
This sounds exactly right. Swenson might not have been without fault;
according to a Capella University committee, she "acted unethically in
her student-advisor role by developing a personal relationship with
Swenson, and it found it impossible to discern which parts of
Swenson's dissertation were her own work and which were Bender's,"
though the trial court rejected one particular claim of unethical
behavior (that Swenson had misappropriated Bender's intellectual
property herself). But it would be bad to conclude that dissertation
advisors are primarily supposed to act in their students' interests
(as opposed to the interests of maintaining scholarly standards). And
it would be especially bad to conclude, as the trial court apparently
did, "that Bender's accusation of plagiarism" -- an accusation that
the court of appeals pointed out "had merit" -- was itself a legally
actionable breach of fiduciary duty.
References
1.
http://caselaw.findlaw.com/data2/minnesotastatecases/apppub/0904/opa080576-0428.pdf
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