Appointment and duties of the preliminary examiners

When appointing preliminary examiners, special attention must be paid not only to the expertise of the examiners but also to their impartiality. Preliminary examiners are always selected from outside the doctoral candidate’s home faculty and, as a rule, from outside the University of Helsinki. It is possible to appoint a docent of the home faculty as a preliminary examiner, if they work outside the faculty.

The preliminary examiner, opponent or a member of the grading committee cannot have a relationship with the doctoral candidate, the doctoral dissertation or another relevant party that may challenge their impartiality.

Consequently, for example, the following individuals are disqualified from serving as a preliminary examiner, an opponent or a member of the grading committee:

• Individuals who have co-authored one of the articles included in the dissertation
• Individuals who are or have been during the dissertation project in research collaboration with the doctoral candidate
• Individuals who have conducted close research collaboration with the dissertation supervisor within three years of the examination of the dissertation
• Close relatives of the doctoral candidate
• Immediate supervisors and subordinates of the doctoral candidate or the supervisor
• Members of the thesis committee.

The doctoral candidate may object to the selection of preliminary examiners. If you think that one or more of the proposed preliminary examiners should be disqualified, it is important that you notify the doctoral student services of your home faculty, your supervisor as well as the responsible teacher of this as soon as possible, so that your supervisor or responsible teacher can find someone else. If you are unsure about whether a proposed preliminary examiner should be disqualified, ask for advice from the doctoral student services of your home faculty.

Nb! Since 22 March 2022 The University of Helsinki does not recommend using employees of Russian or Belorussian universities as pre-examiners or opponents, or use them as scientific experts. For more information, please see University of Helsinki's updates on War in Ukraine.

The task of the preliminary examiner of the doctoral thesis is to state the merits of the manuscript, to present corrections and suggestions for improvement to the author if necessary, and to propose to the faculty in a reasoned written statement either that the public defence be granted permission or that the manuscript be rejected. The statement must not be conditional. 

If the preliminary examiners so wish, they can also issue a joint statement. 

In his or her statement, the preliminary examiner may highlight the corrections and additions that he or she requires in general. The Faculty Council decides on permission to defend the thesis on the basis of the statements of the preliminary examiners.

If the preliminary examiners are unable to give a positive statement due to serious shortcomings or errors detected in the work, or if they disagree on the quality of the work, the preliminary examination procedure will be discontinued. A discontinued preliminary examination will be brought to the attention of the Faculty Council, for example, as an announcement. The doctoral candidate may read the statements before the Faculty Council meeting and has the right to submit a written response to them if they so wish.

Preliminary examiners, either separately or together, submit a statement where they either

• Recommend granting permission to proceed to public defence of the manuscript in its current form or with minor revisions approvable by the supervisor, or
• Assess the deficiencies as so serious that it is not possible for them to submit a favourable statement recommending that permission be granted to defend the dissertation publicly.

You will be notified of the statements before the meeting of the faculty council and, if you so wish, you may submit a written objection to them, if you feel that the criticism presented in them is unfounded and you want to express your objections publicly.

The statements will be enclosed with the minutes of the faculty council meeting in which the decision regarding granting permission to defend the dissertation is made, after which they will become public documents.