Observer Says Experts Without Doctoral Degrees May Legitimately Examine PhD Candidates

Political and legal analyst Boni Hargens has affirmed that a practitioner or expert with specific field competence has the right to examine doctoral programme candidates, even if that expert does not hold a doctoral academic title.

Boni considers a person’s expertise and empirical experience to be far more important than mere formality of academic titles when examining the validity of scientific research at doctoral level. “What is required in that setting is empirical competence, not a matter of academic titles,” Boni said in a statement on Tuesday (8/9/2026).

By way of example, Boni noted that a forensic practitioner with proven experience is highly relevant to be invited as an examiner at a dissertation defence if the student’s research focus is directly related to forensic practice.

“A person with empirical competence in this illustration has the expertise to assess whether the research instrument applied is aligned with the research objectives and/or whether the data was obtained in accordance with scientific data collection methods in the field being studied,” he said.

Boni said he agreed with Professor T. Gayus Lumbuun of Unkris, who clarified that the involvement of non-doctoral experts in PhD examinations is generally positioned as validators of research instruments, to ensure that indicators and data collection methods proceed validly.

“An expert in their field, without a doctoral title, can nevertheless examine a doctoral candidate, namely in the capacity of an instrument validator,” Gayus explained.