It’s no secret that Russia has a rampant corruption problem – something that Joschka Fischer has described as a “symptom of the disease of selective modernization.” However, as an article by Jane Armstrong of the Globe and Mail shows, the culture of corruption has spread wide and far beyond the borders of government, even to have a major impact on academic life as students increasingly purchase their college degrees instead of earn them:

But it’s not just the Russian economy that is affected. Countless college and university graduates, including medical students, have entered demanding professions using bogus educational credentials.