Germans place a greater premium on doctorates than Americans do as marks of distinction and erudition. [...] According to the Web site Research in Germany, about 25,000 Germans earn doctorates each year, the most in Europe and about twice the per capita rate of the United States.Visiting a university in Germany is almost free. More people having a "Diplom" degree means that if you want to stand out you have to aim for a "Doktor". (I use "Diplom" and "Doktor" here since the mentioned fraud-cases stem from a time without bachelors and masters) - that's the easy explanation.
Here in the homeland of schadenfreude, the zeal for unmasking academic frauds also reflects certain Teutonic traits, including a rigid adherence to principle and a know-it-all streak.
I wouldn't subscribe to the word "fetish" but there is a certain "Teutonic Trait" here and the acadmic fraud cases are just one symptom of something deeper.
People in this society, contrary to what many of them claim, feel a deep need for an authority to follow. [...] It's in them to worship authority and to totally rely on it.[...] It makes sense to me that a strong and faithful believer [...], can in his disappointment become so venomous when, as he feels, that authority has failed him. It's this huge disappointment that turns blind obedience into an uncontrolled need for slaughter. - http://www.amazon.com/Sleep-Hitlers-Room-American-ebook/dp/B... (a funny but often stupid book, nonetheless I think here the author has a point on us Germans)
A society, keen for authority, provides a reliable way for elite offspring to fill the upper ranks of politics or public service. Our fraternities are almost always tied to one of the two major political parties (SPD or CDU). While beeing a great asset for students after graduation (Alumni-Network) their main service for that offspring is to use all the dirty tricks to get you your (law) diploma. Since these student bodies are very old and established, they often fill the ranks of the personnel in the universities. They might be the ones doing the evaluation of your thesis. They can provide you with the tests beforehand and even if they can't they usually keep log of every test written by a professor, so they can provide you at least with a good approximation of future tests.
It doesn't wonder that there's an established market for ghostwriters providing you those titles, since you have so many people using that "reliable path to power" that don't seek the academic or professional acceptance at all. Most of Germany's politicians are lawyers and most of them never seen a court from the inside.
For me, this Title-Thing is a teutonic trait but it's not tied to genes but tied to culture. And culture can change. This German Title-Mania is getting less. For instance, you don't have to own a "Meister"-Title to open up certain businesses anymore since recently. How this disposal of the "Meisterpflicht" (allowance to open a business is tied to having a Meister-Title, by law) came upon, though, tells about the difference between Germany and the US: It wasn't a succesful grassroot kind of story, demanding personal/economic freedom, but an order from the EU.
And the sentence "an order from above" sums up pretty much every German right or freedom we were entitled to during our history. That makes us prone to dislinkg "game-changers" because, if you spent time obeying the rules, you won't loose on that investment by letting others take shortcuts. This translates to less career changers than in the US, and a higher stigma if you do. It translates to total absence of entrepreneurs or acclaimed business people from entering a political race, because social envy gives them no cance there. This translates to parts of our Acadamia being a thought free market of status. We don't have an american culture of self-education. And the term "Populärwissenschaft", scientists releasing books for the masses, is considered an insult in German Acadamia.