A paper published in Ecological Economics in 2025 reported cross-country data on innovation and carbon dioxide emissions covering 229 countries from 2013 to 2020. The dataset it cited as its source for the innovation measure — the Global Innovation Index (GII), published annually by the World Intellectual Property Organization — ranked between 126 and 143 economies in any single year across that window. That leaves roughly 80 country-year entries in the paper with no apparent source in the data it cites, an inflation of about 60% over the highest number of economies the GII covered in any year of the study period, and the paper does not disclose supplementing the GII with any other dataset.
An outside academic flagged the discrepancy and requested a retraction in October 2025, three months after publication, citing what Retraction Watch reported as concerns about data integrity and possible research misconduct. As of Retraction Watch’s 27 July 2026 report, the journal’s investigation was still open, nine months in, with no expression of concern, correction, or retraction issued.
What the paper claimed versus what the source data covers
| Data point | What was reported or found |
|---|---|
| Countries in the paper’s panel | 229, across 2013–2020 |
| Economies the GII actually ranked, any single year 2013–2020 | 126–143 (per WIPO’s published editions) |
| Entries with no apparent match in the cited source | Roughly 80 |
| Approximate sample inflation over the GII’s highest annual coverage | About 60% |
| Disclosure of a supplementary data source for the gap | None reported |
| Citations to date (Web of Science, per Retraction Watch) | 5 |
The authors are three researchers at ESSCA School of Management, a French business school with a campus in Lyon. Retraction Watch quoted two of them, Naciba Chassagnon and Christoph Weber, in its report.
Timeline
- 2025: The paper is published in Ecological Economics, the journal of the International Society for Ecological Economics, published by Elsevier. It reports a negative relationship between a country’s GII innovation score and its per-capita CO2 emissions across a 229-country panel.
- October 2025 (about three months after publication): An unnamed academic outside the author team requests a retraction, citing data-integrity concerns and alleging possible research misconduct.
- Following the complaint: Co-editor-in-chief Stefan Baumgärtner, an economist at the University of Freiburg, tells Retraction Watch the journal opened what he called a “thorough and detailed investigation,” with action to follow depending on the outcome.
- 27 July 2026: Retraction Watch publishes its report. The investigation remains open; no verdict, expression of concern, or retraction has been issued.
How to check a paper’s claimed sample against its stated source
The specific numbers in this case are still under review by the journal. But the method a reader used to spot the mismatch in the first place does not require inside access to the data — it works from the paper and the source’s own public documentation, and it is worth knowing as a general check on any paper built from a named public dataset.
- Identify the exact source and vintage cited. Not just “the Global Innovation Index” in general, but which editions, covering which years, at what level (country, region, sub-index).
- Find the source’s own documented coverage for those editions. Index publishers such as WIPO state, for each annual edition, how many economies were ranked.
- Compare the paper’s reported sample size to the maximum the source could have supplied. A panel that claims more country-years than the source ever published in that window cannot be drawn entirely from that source as cited.
- Check for disclosed supplementation. Papers legitimately combine sources — but that has to be stated in the methods section. An undisclosed gap of this size is the red flag, not the gap itself.
- Look for corroborating signals. In this case, reviewers also pointed to repeated identical scores for the same country within a year, a pattern more consistent with values being copied or carried forward than independently sourced.
- Treat a mismatch as grounds to ask, not as proof. A data mismatch is a basis for the journal to request the underlying dataset and methodology from the authors — which is what is happening here — not, on its own, a finding of fabrication.
What the journal and the authors have said
Naciba Chassagnon, writing on behalf of the author team, told Retraction Watch: “No data has been fabricated, as shown by documentation provided to the editor.” The authors have since said the matter is with the journal’s editorial process and declined to elaborate further while it is ongoing. Stefan Baumgärtner said the journal would take action depending on what the investigation finds.
Investigation, expression of concern, retraction: three different things
It is worth being precise about where this stands, because the terms get used loosely. An expression of concern is a public notice that a journal has unresolved doubts about a paper while it investigates — it is not itself a finding of wrongdoing. A retraction is a formal withdrawal, issued once a journal has concluded the paper’s results can no longer be relied on. See retraction vs. correction for how those two differ, and falsification vs. fabrication for how the underlying misconduct categories are defined. As of this writing, none of that has happened here: the journal has an open investigation and an author denial, and no public determination either way. For a general walkthrough of what an open case like this typically involves procedurally, see how a research misconduct investigation actually works and how long a retraction takes.
Why this matters beyond one paper
The underlying question — does a country’s measured innovation reduce its per-capita emissions — sits inside a large and actively cited environmental-economics literature, which is part of why an unresolved data question here matters beyond the single paper. It is also a case study in a specific, checkable form of research-integrity red flag: not fabrication in the sense of invented instruments or images, but a sample that appears larger than its declared public source can support. Retraction Watch, which first reported this case, tracks this alongside other research-integrity red flags; readers who want to follow how this and similar cases resolve can use the Retraction Watch database directly. Sound cross-country panel work generally documents its data provenance closely enough for exactly this kind of check to be trivial — see CASRAI’s guide on writing a data availability statement for what that disclosure should look like.
Frequently asked questions
Has the paper been retracted?
No. As of Retraction Watch’s 27 July 2026 report, the journal’s investigation was still open. No expression of concern, correction, or retraction had been issued.
What is the Global Innovation Index?
It is an annual ranking of national innovation performance published by the World Intellectual Property Organization, covering a subset of the world’s economies each year — between 126 and 143 in the 2013–2020 editions relevant to this case.
Have the authors admitted any wrongdoing?
No. The authors, represented in Retraction Watch’s report by Naciba Chassagnon, have denied fabricating data and said documentation was provided to the editor.
Who requested the retraction?
Retraction Watch reported the request came from an academic outside the author team, who is not named in its report, in October 2025.
This account is based on Retraction Watch’s reporting and the publicly stated coverage figures for the Global Innovation Index. CASRAI was not party to the journal’s investigation and has not independently reviewed the authors’ underlying dataset; the investigation’s outcome had not been announced as of this post’s publication.
