Timeline for What should I do if a coauthor, who has contributed the most among my coauthors, declined to be listed as a coauthor?

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Jul 8, 2014 at 10:13	comment	added	Steve Jessop		Not specific to academia, but in general if someone makes a surprising decision then it can be useful to get it in email. Not that you expect a court case from them, but it means that if somebody else questions it you can say, "yes, that was their decision, and I quote from their email: ...", which might satisfy the questioner without them needing to bother the original person to confirm. Because the questioner thinks you're much less likely to lie about the contents of an email, than to have misunderstood a conversation.
Jul 8, 2014 at 9:38	comment	added	xLeitix		I am not sure if getting a written statement from the collaborator is a good idea. Yeah, it may come in handy if the same person later claims co-authorship, but, frankly, asking him to "waive" in written seems a little distrustful. I could see the other person being insulted by that. I would just make sure that all the other co-authors are aware that this one don't want to be part of the author list (e.g., by putting them in CC in the convo), and leave it at that.
Jul 8, 2014 at 9:17	comment	added	adipro		Do you mind explaining a bit more on what you mean by a written documentation and a list of contributions? Are you suggesting these to be included in the manuscript? I don't think it is common to do so in my field.
Jul 8, 2014 at 6:11	history	answered	aeismail	CC BY-SA 3.0