10 Years Bullied Academics Blog, 2006 - 2016

This blog started on May 14, 2006. Ten years later, we count a total of 666770 page views, or roughly about 180 visits every day on average. These are very worrying numbers.

The most visited post is 'Effects of Psychological Harassment' with a total of 6272 visits, followed by 'PhD students suffer from bullying supervisors' (4378 visits), 'Bullying of a PhD Student - One Wrong Word/Death by Paper Cuts' (3724 visits), 'Abuse of Phd students' (3708 visits), and 'Suspension of Ian Parker - International Protest' (2647 visits). These figures too, tell a story...

In terms of page views per country, the figures are: United States 241696, United Kingdom 141524, Germany 38066, Canada 23938, Russia 22994, France 21385, Australia 15795, Ukraine 12669, Poland 3844, and Turkey 2329.

This blog has been mentioned in the following papers/ news reports/ articles/ books:

• Samier, E. (2008). The problem of passive evil in educational administration: Moral implications of doing nothing. International Studies in Educational Administration, 36(1), 2-21.
  
• Fogg, P. (2008). Take that, You Bully!. Chronicle of Higher Education, 55(3), n3.
  
• McMullen, J. (2011). Balancing the right to manage with dignity at work. Perspectives, 15(1), 3-6.
  
• Birks, M., Budden, L. M., Stewart, L., & Chapman, Y. (2014). Turning the tables: the growth of upward bullying in nursing academia. Journal of advanced nursing, 70(8), 1685-1687.
  
• Coleyshaw, L. (2010). The power of paradigms: A discussion of the absence of bullying research in the context of the university student experience. Research in Post‐Compulsory Education, 15(4), 377-386.
  
• Cassell, M. A. (2011). Bullying in academe: Prevalent, significant, and incessant. Contemporary Issues in Education Research, 4(5), 33.
  
• Wyatt-Nichol, H. (2014). Strategies for Maintaining Sanity and Success. In Career Moves (pp. 9-16). SensePublishers.
  
• Pahadi, T. N. Secondary and Higher Secondary School Teachers’ Experience of Workplace Bullying: Prevalence, Nature, Effects and Prevention.
  
• Bartow, A. (2009). Internet Defamation as Profit Center: The Monetization of Online Harassment. Harvard Journal of Law and Gender, 32(2).
  
• Richards, J. (2007). Workers are doing it for themselves: Examining creative employee application of Web 2.0 communication technology. Work, Employment and Society (WES), 12-14.
  
• Keashly, L., & Neuman, J. H. (2010). Faculty experiences with bullying in higher education: Causes, consequences, and management. Administrative Theory & Praxis, 32(1), 48-70.
  
• Bullying in academia: ‘professors are supposed to be stressed! That’s the job. - The Guardian
  
• Duffy, M., & Sperry, L. (2014). Overcoming mobbing: A recovery guide for workplace aggression and bullying. Oxford University Press.
  
  and many more...

The obvious question to ask is what if anything has been achieved. Ten years ago the concept of 'workplace bullying in academia' did not exist except of the writings (and books) of Professor Kenneth Westhues. Now there is even a Wikipedia entry. Has all this changed anything? Perhaps not. There is certainly more awareness, and this is the first stage before... Any change is likely to take much time, but is this a good enough reason to give up?

Lastly, we need to mention the many who contacted us and requested anonymity while they were dealing with extreme cases of workplace bullying. Their fear was that if their names became known, this would compromise any chance of returning back to work, returning to a professional career. Sadly, the statistics indicate that once an academic is bullied out of work, very seldom they get the chance to get back their job. Often their professional career is ruined. And so, silence prevails while many suffer...

"Nothing strengthens authority as much as silence." Leonardo da Vinci
"All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men [or good women] do nothing." Edmund Burke