By Jerome A. Popp, Professor Emeritus, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
Introduction
The concept of academic freedom, as it has traditionally been conceived, is a general freedom of inquiry inherent within the status of university professor. In the language of freedom, academic freedom is the freedom to investigate and to teach about problems of shared concern, and the freedom from interference in the pursuit of those activities. However, as the term 'academic' suggests, academic freedom is a concept whose meaning cannot be established apart from our understanding of the nature of academic institutions. John Searle's ontological theory of society and institutions has given rise to an extensive literature in contemporary philosophy, social theory and legal scholarship. An important consequence of his thesis is its provision of a basis for a more complete analysis of academic freedom in terms of the specification of the rights, duties, obligations, and protections inherent in the institutional status of professor.
This analysis is timely, given the numerous reports of academic bullying now appearing in the media, because it allows us to understand the nature of the violations of these rights, duties, and obligations. Beyond the identification of the various transgressions involved in the phenomena of professors attacking professors, this analysis suggests that the curtailment of these attacks falls within the duties and obligations of academic deans. It is further suggested how academic deans may detect the presence of such attacks, so that they may address them in an expeditious manner.
Brief Review of Searle's Social Ontology
As Searle says, we live and function in a sea of institutions. To understand the nature of these institutions, including societies themselves, it is necessary to understand three concepts: (i) status functions; (ii) collective intentionality; and (iii) deontic powers. These ideas are also required to fully understand the nature of professorial institutional status. Since some readers may not be familiar with Searle's ontology of institutions, this review includes, where appropriate and helpful, quotations from Searle's 2010 statement of his theory [1].
Status Functions. Institutions such as currency, baseball, police officers, and prime ministers, like all institutions, are created by status functions that are recognized or accepted within the minds of the members of society. Status functions create some status Y for some X (person--senator, activity--baseball, or thing--dollar bill) in a given context C. When the Founders ratified the Constitution, they created the status of, inter alia, president, senator, and representative. In the language of Searle‟s analysis, the Founders created these and other status functions through a “status-function declaration.” We collectively recognize or accept these statuses, because of the legitimacy we give to the Constitution.
Collective Intentionality. In theory of mind, the term “intentionality” refers to intentions, desires, beliefs, attitudes and so forth. The basic concept or foundational idea upon which Searle's theory is built is collective intentionality, that is, the commonly shared intentions, desires, beliefs, etc. that make society possible. Status functions and deontic powers are created by, and exist within, collective intentionality. Searle's account reveals that the collective intentionality that forms society exists prior to society's institutions, including the institutions of government. (Note that this view is a rejection of the old Social Contract Theory that holds that it is governments that create societies.)
In his original 1995 statement [2], Searle holds that collective intentionality is composed of a primitive form of we-intentionality that cannot be reduced to I-intentionality. To understand this thesis, think of a track and field team. The various events in a track meet require quite different intentions, desires, and beliefs. The events of the pole vault, the shot put, and the 100 yard dash, for example, require intentionalities that have little in common. I-intentionality is what is required for individual successes. The members of the team, nevertheless, do share a collective intentionality, because the members of the team share the belief that each participant desires to make a contribution to a team victory. This belief in a shared or common desire creates the team‟s collective intentionality.
Compare the collective intentionality of the track team with that of a theater ensemble. With the exception of handoffs in the relays, the track meet requires no explicit cooperation,which contrasts markedly with the kind of participation required in the presentation of a theatrical totality. Members of the ensemble are required to have in mind the aesthetic totality to which they aspire to create together. Actors who cannot grasp the complexity of the desired totality may not be able to contribute fully to that product. When audiences detect “upstaging” in a player, they are noticing the presence of an I-intentionality, which stands out against the backdrop of we-intentionality present in the other players.
What is the source of the we-intentionality in members of the theatrical ensemble? Each player has an understanding of the aesthetic totality that the ensemble seeks to create for the audience. Moreover, each understands, at least to some minimal degree, the aesthetic whole and their role in the creation of it. Evidence of the presence of the shared knowledge of the aesthetic totality presents itself when the not uncommon anomalies or glitches in performances occur. These are resolved by various creative adjustments by the participants that overcome these difficulties—often so well that only the most informed audiences can detect their repairs.
Deontic Powers. Status functions always carry with them, “without exception,” deontic powers. [3] “That is, they carry rights, duties, requirements, permissions, authorizations, entitlements, and so on.” According to Searle, “the test for whether a noun names an institution is whether under that description the object named has deontic powers.”[4] Searle's favorite example of deontic power is promise making. When we make a promise, we feel an obligation to keep it, that is, to fulfill the conditions of the promise. If we do not keep the promise, we feel badly about it. What makes us want to keep our promises, and feel deficient if we do not, is our recognition of the deontic obligation at the heart of promise making. Young children show their grasp of this deontic force when they ask, “You promise?” Stated differently, children understand the institution of promising, because they grasp that an obligation is being created.
“It is because status functions carry deontic powers that they provide the glue that holds human civilization together.”[5] These deontic powers, which inhere within institutional statuses, may be of two types: positive deontic powers--rights, and negative deontic powers--duties and obligations. [6] It is by means of this account of deontic powers that we transition from the language of academic freedom to academic rights, duties, and obligations.
As Searle says, “once we get clear about their ontological status, the existence of rights is no more mysterious than the existence of money, private property, or friendship.” Moreove… rights, such as property rights and marital rights, are status functions; that is, they are deontic powers deriving from collectively recognized statuses. They are deontic powers that are imposed on people and can function only by collective recognition or acceptance.” [7]
“The important thing to emphasize is that rights are always against somebody.” [8] If X has a given right, then we know that other people have a corresponding obligation. “To have a right is to have those people, against whom you have the right, obligated to you, and the obligations derive from some status you have.” [9] “Because of your position in an institution, whether it is family, private property, citizenship, or membership in anorganization, you have rights, as well as duties and obligations, that are attached to the position you are in.” [10] Searle's analysis of institutions and their concomitant deontologies provides us with a basic and useful framework for understanding the nature of professorial status.
Professorial Status
Recall that the general idea of a status function is that some status Y is imposed, through collective recognition, on X in context C. When Y is professorial status, the status function assigns this status to persons in universities who fulfill the conditions of assignment of that status function. Inherent within the status of professor are positive and negative deontic powers. To understand professorial status is to understand these powers.
Positive deontic powers are negative rights, which are characterized as follows: “X has a negative right against Y to perform act A implies that X has a certain status S, which places Y under an obligation not to interfere with X‟s doing A.” [11] To know if and how this negative right is violated, it is necessary to have a clear specification of A. In the case of the negative deontic powers of professorial status, A is the duties and obligations of professors, which may generally be characterized as follows:
(i) adequately represent to students, at the appropriate level, the methods and content of the academic disciplines taught;
(ii) investigate problems of shared concern by means of the methods and content at the growing edge of one or more academic disciplines, and to make the results of these studies available to students and others who might have interest in these studies;
(iii) make themselves vulnerable to criticism from competent national and international inquirers in the professor‟s field of expertise by presenting their suppositions, evidence, and arguments in various professional meetings and media.
Note that faculty in what are thought of as teaching universities are not excused from the duties and obligations inherent in the negative deontic requirements of their status as professor.
Faculty in teaching universities, qua professors, have an obligation to: (i) teach well, (ii) participate in some fashion in the investigations of significant problems, (iii) maintain a familiarity with the growing edge of their teaching field, and (iv) find ways to have their conclusions, especially those taught in their classes, publicly exposed to adequate criticism. The latter is typically achieved by means of local, statewide, or regional professional meetings or associations. Note that the point is to have a peer review of presentations so that clarifications and omissions can be articulated by competent others in ways not possible in the typical classroom.
Accepting the institutional position of professor is to make an implicit promise to accept the negative deontic powers of the status of professor
Academic Bullying
If professors have the right to investigate problems of shared concern by means of acceptable methodologies, then all other institutional statuses (students, professors, chairpersons, deans, and higher administrators) have the obligation not to inhibit or restrict such legitimate investigations. There are numerous ways in which the right of professors to pursue their duties and obligations can be inhibited, undermined, or restricted. The most heinous of these is the violation of the negative rights of professors by, of all people, other university professors and administrators. While it is frequently emphasized that the status of professor carries with it the right of non-interference, the activities of academic bullies are often conveniently ignored.
While there is now considerable discussion of the damage done to students, faculty, and programs by professors violating the rights of other professors, and neglecting their own obligations, there are no clear attempts to view these cases in terms of an adequate social ontology. Searle's general account of social institutions provides the resources necessary to identify and explain the kinds of institutional failures that allow such professional misconduct to occur.
There are a growing number of accounts of professors and other teachers being subjected to psychological attacks, currently labeled “bullying,” and sometimes “mobbing,” by those studying this phenomenon. From the Internet and other published accounts of professors attacking professors, it is reasonably clear that the gravamen in such attacks is the violation of the attacked professors‟ negative rights. In the case where there is only one professor infringing on the rights of another professor‟s conduct, pursuant to the deontic demands of professorial status, it is typically managed through the more familiar institutional channels or interpersonal devices. What we learn from the reports of bullying is that there are cases where several professors have been involved in these violations. The collection of Ys engaged in an attack on Professor X are known as, in the lexicon of political activity, a power group. Since the goal of such groups is to achieve something against the public good, they are conspiracies.
Why do some professors bully their colleagues? What is the point of creating such a conspiracy? Cui bono? As one writer puts it, what we have is “the envy of excellence.” [12] What activates professors‟ attempts to drive away other professors who are meeting the obligations of their status? Note that it is not the nonperforming professors who are targeted for removal, because there are normal review procedures that can be used to remove them. It is the professors who do satisfy institutional expectations, and thus cannot be removed for cause, whose presence poses a threat to their attackers.
It is not uncommon to find that some professors are fulfilling the duties and obligations of their institutional status, and are highly competitive with their colleagues in publications, recognitions, and rewards. Even if such competitions may at times exceed the norms of scholarly conduct, they do not give rise to academic attacks. It is generally recognized that there are mutual benefits to be realized by working in the presence of other inquirers. Enthusiastic inquiry attracts like-minded people who want to share their ideas with interested others, as the numerous Internet postings by professors verifies.
From what we know from the growing number of accounts of academic attacks, it seems that such attacks are undertaken by professors as a defensive maneuver to conceal their own deontic transgressions. When some professors are not fulfilling their obligations, their derelictions become most obvious to students, their colleagues, and administrators when they are in the presence of professors who are performing in ways appropriate to their status function. Thus, the attackers and their enablers do profit from the conspiracy created, in that when the performing professors are driven to resign, non-fulfillment of the responsibilities of the attackers status becomes less obvious under the new local norms.
Thinking within the context of Searle's social ontology, what is created is an illegitimate, covert institution. It is an institution because it is a social fact created by a limited collective intentionality that identifies a leader by means of an informal status function. It is a covert and illegitimate institution, because the collective intentionality that sustains it are intentions and desires that its members know are incompatible with the nearly universal collective intentionality that creates the professorial status function. The attackers apparently have no sense of failure in violating the deontic powers of a legitimate institutional status.
The deontic content of professorial status places the attacking professors and their enablers in a double bind. That is, if they understand the deontic content of professorial duties and obligations that is inherent within their status, then they are knowingly violating explicit academic principles in ways that are harmful to professors, students, and the institution in which they have status. On the other hand, if they do not have knowledge of the deontic responsibilities they incur as professors, they contravene the conditions of assignment of that status. Not to understand their academic duties and responsibilities is obviously grounds for dismissal. Yet, in some institutions, those who do perform their duties and obligations are targeted for attack by those who do not.
When professors are attacked, they experience cognitive, emotional, and biological consequences. Note that the attacks in question are not cognitive criticisms of a professor's arguments and conclusions. It is the stock and trade of professors to hear, “I disagree with your conclusion” or “Your suppositions are all wrong.” We may have an emotional response, as well as a cognitive one, to these are highly cognitive objections, but the attacks mentioned in the various reports of “bullying” are psychological attacks that are based on a different methodology.
The effectiveness of such psychological attacks is explained by basic biology. When a person is attacked physically or psychologically, there are three alternative responses: fight, flight, or endure and hope to survive. The flight response should be exercised quickly to be effective. To fight back successfully is difficult, as we shall see. To endure the attack is the most biologically costly.
The biological consequences of these attacks are increased blood levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, and epinephrine, which can cause high levels of anxiety. When a person is attacked and cannot take flight, there are significant negative effects on the cognitive and emotional functioning of the targeted person. It is this degrading of cognitive functioning that reduces the attacked professor's ability to fight back effectively. Ineffective efforts encourage the attackers and further reduce the ability of the victims to defend themselves.
Doing emotional and biological harm to others is clearly immoral. Reducing the cognitive function of a professor is an attack on the mind, which, in a university of all places, should be a high crime. The results of the psychological attacks also, of course, have negative consequences for students and society. Unfortunately, Searle misses the point that the effects of words in a sustained attack can be physically harmful. He says that the effects may be, “psychological states of the hearer and not forms of physical damage. I may be annoyed, exasperated, infuriated, or simply hurt by what you say, but all the same, I am not bleeding and no bones are broken.” [13]
However, Macgorine A. Cassell reports that the following consequences are known to result from attacks on teachers: “stress, depression, suicidal thoughts, reduced self-esteem, self blame, phobias, sleep disturbances, digestive problems, musculoskeletal problems, social isolation, family problems, post-traumatic stress disorder.” [14] In some cases, there may actually be internal bleeding. From many accounts of bullying, it is clear that the traumas that lead to serious distress, and worse, are not the result of physical contact, but of language use.
If the public accounts are correct, then not only are the professors who psychologically attack their colleague abusing their status as professors, but they reveal in their publicly observable behavior that they do not respect the deontic nature of the institutional status they enjoy. People who never feel remorse, betray the trust of others, and use others for their own narrow ends, have never internalized the idea of deontic force in human affairs; thus, they are not part of “the glue that holds civilization together,” but are part of its solvent.
Deontic Powers of the Status of Dean
Within universities, there is the familiar institutional status of dean that, as noted, has positive and negative deontic powers within it, which means that there are negative and positive rights as well. As Searle says, We ought never to allow ourselves to speak of human rights unless we are prepared to state (1) whom the right is against, (2) what exactly is the content of their obligations to the right bearer, and (3) exactly why the person against whom the right exists is under those obligations. [15]
If we should be this precise about our assertions of human rights in general, surely we should be as precise in the narrower scope of rights contained within a specific type of institution. In this analysis, we are not concerned with deans as the bearers of rights, but with deans as having obligations with regard to professors who have rights against them.
The deontic aspects of the status functions that create the academic status of deans includes, inter alia, pecuniary duties and obligations, that is, fiduciary responsibilities that redound to tuition fees, endowment funds, and the use of tax monies−in the case of public institutions. Deans and chairpersons have an oversight role with regard to both the protection of negative rights, and the professorial fulfillment of duties and obligations. Deans and presidents should be acutely aware of the positive and negative deontic powers of professorial status, and those constitutive of their own positions.
As we have seen, professors have the negative right of noninterference, and their attackers have the obligation not to violate that right; but when that obligation is ignored, to whom should professors under attack turn for relief? Who in the institution has the obligation to enforce the noninterference of the negative rights of professors? It is, of course, chairpersons and academic deans.
Within this discussion we exclude the chairperson; if a power group exists in any department, the probability is that the chairperson is either a participating member of the power-group, especially if the chairperson is elected by the department, or is a hostage of it. Note that the chairperson is the first person with the status and obligation to report to professors that they are not satisfying their duties and obligations of their status. Since the chairperson may well be under the control of the attackers and their enablers, the focus here is upon the deans, because they are one step removed from the academic units in which the conspiracies exist. However, the following points are applicable to chairpersons as well as deans.
When all is said and done, everyone, in every department of every university knows the names of the good and poor teachers within their unit; everyone knows, consequently, candidates for attack. Why is it that deans do not know this? The best answer seems to have two parts: on the one hand, the creation of a covert and illegitimate group is the product of intelligent, though misguided people, who set out to undermine the function of a university; on the other hand, deans may not be looking for such covert institutions, because of ignorance, or because of the politically messy process of correcting the situation that might require the dismissal of a faculty members for cause. By the time an attacked professor seeks protection from the dean, that dean is already politically behind in the process; nevertheless, the existence (and perhaps tolerance) of such conspiratorial groups of faculty is a failure of a dean's obligations. We know from the reports of attacked professors that this failure of deans does occur.
What are the positive and negative deontic powers that inhere in the status of dean? Given the reports being made public, a major deontic problem in some universities is that no one assumes the responsibility to enforce the noninterference obligation. Professors who attack professors damage the academic institutions that employ them. Those with oversight responsibility who turn their backs on the issue are also enablers of the attacks by the quasi-professors. Who has the obligation to remove or at least curtail the ability of these faculty members to damage the institutions that pay their salaries?
Academic deans might expect that any attacked professor would report the situation to them; however, professors may feel, for several reasons, that such reporting is a redoubtable task. (i) Being attacked, as noted, creates biological changes that, when intense and sustained, lead to panic attacks. Anxiety may be seen as a sign of personal weakness by the professor and by others. Professors want to be seen, in the face of their attacking colleagues, as remaining strong. (ii) The victim may fear that the dean is a member of the power group or at least is a knowing enabler of it. (iii) A professor may fear the actions taken by a sympathetic dean. (iv) A self-respecting professor who has made major presentations to important groups, or who has successfully engaged in high-level professional activities, will not want to have the attackers find that they have been so effective.
It is likely that the percentage of attacks actually reported is low; it is also likely that bullying is going on in many academic units where it is unnoticed and unexpected by deans. Since the functioning power groups will seek to keep their activities stealth, deans should be aware of certain observable indicators of the presence of professors attacking professors. Some of these are, for a given professor: (i) marked reduction in publication and paper presentation; (ii) decrease in teaching quality; (iii) frequent cancelling of classes; (iv)noticeable lack of attendance or participation in meetings; (v) talk of, or planning to leave teaching; and (vi) observing that a professor‟s achievements are conspicuously ignored by the professor's colleagues and department chairperson, while lesser accomplishments are publicly praised.
Given that attackers are most likely to be found in the population of underperforming professors, and given that underperforming professors are often paid as well as or better than performing professors, especially when chairpersons are enablers or worse, it is now time to reexamine employment and retention policies for both professors and deans. It is time that the leadership in universities recognized that a high percentage of nonperforming professors creates a potential pool of enablers who will readily support those who violate the rights of their colleagues, in exchange for their own protection.
If the collective intentionality of a given university holds that the institution is basically a teaching university, and does not consider it an obligation of faculty to expose the content of their teaching to competent national and international critical review, then academic deans should be aware that any professors who do expose themselves to such evaluations are candidates for removal through psychological attacks. It is also the case that professors who are viewed as both well informed and popular are potential targets. Faculty who find they are not popular with students and who may not enjoy teaching are potential attackers of their colleagues who do, as is suggested in the reports of academic bullying.
The focal point for improvement is, of course, the tenure decision. Giving tenure to nonperforming professors suggests that what is dispositive in the process is membership in an illicit collective, and not what is done to fulfill the obligations of professorial status that determines such decisions. Many of the nonperforming professors would be performers if they knew that such membership would not guarantee them tenure. Given the growing number of discussions of attacks on professors and other teachers, we know that students and society deserve better from their educational leadership. If free and energetic inquiry cannot be protected in universities, then can it be protected anywhere?
References
[1] Searle, John R., (2010), Making the Social World: The Structure of Human Civilization, (Oxford University Press).
[2] Searle, John R., (1995), The Construction of Social Reality, (New York: The Free Press), p. 25.
[3] Making the Social World, pp. 8-9.
[4] Ibid., p. 92.
[5] Ibid., p. 9.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid., p. 176.
[8] Ibid., p. 177.
[9] Ibid., p. 178.
[10] Ibid., p. 179.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Kenneth Westhues, The Envy of Excellence: Administrative Mobbing of High-Achieving Professors, Tribunal for Academic Justice: Edwin Mellen Press, 2005.
[13] Making the Social World, p. 190.
[14] http://www.gimi.us/CLUTE_INSTITUTE/ORLANDO_2010/Article%20450.pdf,p. 5.
[15] Ibid., p. 185.
April 17, 2011
Stirling University lies to Employment Tribunal
As part of my claim to the Employment Tribunal, I had complained that I had been subjected to a sham grievance investigation after I had made a Protected Disclosure to the Principal. Stirling University denied this. The Tribunal asked them to provide details of the alleged investigation, including the facts that led to the decision. It took five months and several letters from me before they finally provided the information they claimed existed in March 2010.
However, there is irrefutable proof that they have lied to the Tribunal. The information they sent describes how Eileen Schofield arrived at a particular decision after referring to the contents of a certain document in March 2010. She describes its contents. Unfortunately for Mrs Schofield, the document she referred to doesn't contain what she said it does.
There is, however, a different document from the same author which contains exactly what she described; but that document was never available to her as part of the grievance process. In fact, it didn't even exist until June 2010.
Therefore, Mrs Schofield has told the Tribunal that she was able to come to a decision based on evidence that simply did not exist until three months after she made her decision.
It's a big fat lie!
It represents an elaborate fraud in an attempt to fool the tribunal into believing that a real investigation had taken place, rather than just admit that there was none.
Last week, Stirling University rejected my suggestion that they were stalling by taking so long to provide evidence that a fair investigation had taken place.
In an earlier post, I spoke about how providing false evidence is fraught with danger.
It would be astonishing if Mrs Schofield was to survive this massive fraud with her job intact.
From: http://bullyingatstirlinguniversity.blogspot.com/
However, there is irrefutable proof that they have lied to the Tribunal. The information they sent describes how Eileen Schofield arrived at a particular decision after referring to the contents of a certain document in March 2010. She describes its contents. Unfortunately for Mrs Schofield, the document she referred to doesn't contain what she said it does.
There is, however, a different document from the same author which contains exactly what she described; but that document was never available to her as part of the grievance process. In fact, it didn't even exist until June 2010.
Therefore, Mrs Schofield has told the Tribunal that she was able to come to a decision based on evidence that simply did not exist until three months after she made her decision.
It's a big fat lie!
It represents an elaborate fraud in an attempt to fool the tribunal into believing that a real investigation had taken place, rather than just admit that there was none.
Last week, Stirling University rejected my suggestion that they were stalling by taking so long to provide evidence that a fair investigation had taken place.
In an earlier post, I spoke about how providing false evidence is fraught with danger.
It would be astonishing if Mrs Schofield was to survive this massive fraud with her job intact.
From: http://bullyingatstirlinguniversity.blogspot.com/
April 05, 2011
AcademicFOI.Com: Workplace Bullying & Harassment
KEY FINDINGS
At least 1,957 university staff asked for support or advice due to bullying or harassment during 2007, 2008 and 2009. The true figure is likely to be a great deal higher since many universities do not record the numbers of informal complaints. 998 formal investigations were made into complaints of bullying or harassment. 764 of these investigations concluded that no bullying or harassment had taken place. 234 investigations upheld the complaints giving an average 23% uphold rate.
MISSION GROUPS
At Russell group universities 34% of complaints were upheld whilst at Million+ universities only 11% of complaints were upheld. This would suggest that Million+ universities either have a significant problem with false accusations or systems of investigation which are wholly defective. Alliance group universities averaged 16%. 1994 group universities averaged 19%. Guild HE universities averaged 23% whilst the universities not in any mission group averaged 29%.
HIGHEST AND LOWEST UPHOLD RATES
At the 3 universities most highly placed in the THE World University Rankings – Cambridge, Oxford and Imperial - 54% of bullying complaints were upheld.
We have identified 41 UK universities with a 0% uphold rate. At these institutions at least 430 staff had sought informal advice about bullying and 56 staff had left citing bullying as a reason. 169 investigations were mounted only to find no evidence of bullying in any of the cases.
STAFF GRADES
Complaints of bullying by staff on a similar grade were upheld in 27% of cases. Complaints against staff on higher grades were upheld in 16% of cases. Complaints against members of the senior executive team - defined as the 10 or so most senior members of staff - were upheld in 15% of cases.
LEGAL COSTS
£1.35M was spent on legal fees in connection with bullying complaints. The true figure will be significantly higher due to the use of in-house lawyers, legal insurance policies and an astonishingly high number of instances where invoices from solicitors were not broken down by reference to specific cases.
REASONS FOR LEAVING
137 staff cited bullying and harassment as a reason that they left the university. The true number will be significantly higher due to the considerable number of universities who appear to file staff exit questionnaires without analysing or reporting the contents.
FOLLOW UP ACTIONS
Dismissals were rarely cited as follow up actions to proven cases of bullying. Only 20 staff were dismissed out of 234 proven cases. No dismissals took place at Million+ universities whilst 13 staff were dismissed at Russell Group institutions.
From: http://academicfoi.com/bullyingharassment/index.htm
At least 1,957 university staff asked for support or advice due to bullying or harassment during 2007, 2008 and 2009. The true figure is likely to be a great deal higher since many universities do not record the numbers of informal complaints. 998 formal investigations were made into complaints of bullying or harassment. 764 of these investigations concluded that no bullying or harassment had taken place. 234 investigations upheld the complaints giving an average 23% uphold rate.
MISSION GROUPS
At Russell group universities 34% of complaints were upheld whilst at Million+ universities only 11% of complaints were upheld. This would suggest that Million+ universities either have a significant problem with false accusations or systems of investigation which are wholly defective. Alliance group universities averaged 16%. 1994 group universities averaged 19%. Guild HE universities averaged 23% whilst the universities not in any mission group averaged 29%.
HIGHEST AND LOWEST UPHOLD RATES
At the 3 universities most highly placed in the THE World University Rankings – Cambridge, Oxford and Imperial - 54% of bullying complaints were upheld.
We have identified 41 UK universities with a 0% uphold rate. At these institutions at least 430 staff had sought informal advice about bullying and 56 staff had left citing bullying as a reason. 169 investigations were mounted only to find no evidence of bullying in any of the cases.
STAFF GRADES
Complaints of bullying by staff on a similar grade were upheld in 27% of cases. Complaints against staff on higher grades were upheld in 16% of cases. Complaints against members of the senior executive team - defined as the 10 or so most senior members of staff - were upheld in 15% of cases.
LEGAL COSTS
£1.35M was spent on legal fees in connection with bullying complaints. The true figure will be significantly higher due to the use of in-house lawyers, legal insurance policies and an astonishingly high number of instances where invoices from solicitors were not broken down by reference to specific cases.
REASONS FOR LEAVING
137 staff cited bullying and harassment as a reason that they left the university. The true number will be significantly higher due to the considerable number of universities who appear to file staff exit questionnaires without analysing or reporting the contents.
FOLLOW UP ACTIONS
Dismissals were rarely cited as follow up actions to proven cases of bullying. Only 20 staff were dismissed out of 234 proven cases. No dismissals took place at Million+ universities whilst 13 staff were dismissed at Russell Group institutions.
From: http://academicfoi.com/bullyingharassment/index.htm
April 01, 2011
Degrees in greed: University chief picked up £1m over four years (and nine others earned more than £300,000)
The head of a former technical college earned £1million in four years before taking early retirement while her institution spiralled into debt.
Professor Patricia Broadfoot, 62, was the highest paid university Vice-Chancellor in the UK last year, according to research revealing the pay, benefits and pensions of all higher education chiefs.
The study highlighted the ‘murky’ world of ‘arbitrary’ pay at Britain’s universities and showed that three-quarters of chiefs enjoyed a pay rise last year. Ten vice-chancellors earned more than £300,000 a year. In addition they received annual cash payments into their pension schemes of up to £60,000.
A handful of chiefs at low-ranking institutions, beset with financial troubles, have been granted massive and ‘utterly arbitrary’ pay rises of anything up to 70 per cent. Most disturbing was the amount paid to Professor Broadfoot who last year earned £494,000, including her pension, while presiding over little-known Gloucestershire University.
This sum included a £196,000 ‘pay-off’, equivalent to a year’s basic salary, after she stepped down last March, a year early. Her total earnings over four years were £1,088,000.
The mother of three was also criticised for profligate spending, at one point attempting to hire a personal chauffeur. During her tenure the institution – which became a university in 2001 after teaching mechanics since 1884 – tried to expand and over-invest as the recession took hold.
It plunged into debt and was placed on the ‘at risk’ register of universities threatened with closure or merging.Professor Broadfoot graduated from Leeds University in 1971 with a degree in sociology. Some 13 years later she got her PhD from the Open University.
She was one of five high-profile figures at the university to resign between 2009 and 2011. She was followed by the Chancellor, former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey.
Yesterday the university said it had recently recorded a surplus of £2million and was making a strong financial recovery.
Spokesman Paul Brake said: ‘The university has significantly improved its financial position by reducing costs and growing income through the hard work of staff.’ The research, commissioned for the Times Higher Education Supplement, revealed high levels of pay at other low-ranking universities.
Liverpool Hope boss Gerald Pillay saw his salary balloon by 20.6 per cent to £199,077 as some 110 of his staff face the axe.
Second-highest pay: Professor Andrew Hamilton of Oxford University earned £423,000.
Ninety per cent of the vice-chancellors at the 148 universities earn more than Prime Minister David Cameron’s £142,500 salary. However, 36 vice-chancellors did see their earnings fall. Overall their average pay and benefits rose by 0.5 per cent to £213,813.
The figures come as students face mountains of debt when fees increase to a maximum of £9,000. And with Aston University yesterday announcing it will charge £9,000, as Essex and Surrey did earlier this week, observers warn that all but a handful will charge the full amount.
The study also coincided with thousands of staff at more than 500 universities and colleges going on strike over pay and conditions.
Sally Hunt, of the University and College Union (UCU), called for reform of vice-chancellor pay. She said: ‘UCU members in universities are on strike today defending their pay and conditions and it is somewhat galling to discover that many vice-chancellors are still enjoying handsome, and utterly arbitrary, pay hikes.
‘We want an end to the murky world of pay at the top of our universities and a fair system applied consistently from top to bottom.
‘We have never opposed people being well rewarded for a job well done.
‘However, today’s survey does nothing to suggest that vice-chancellors’ pay is properly scrutinised or that the process for deciding an individual’s pay is fit for purpose.
‘Even after years of promising to rein in pay at the top, there are examples of whopping rises.’
The second highest paid Vice-Chancellor was Professor Andrew Hamilton of Oxford University who earned £370,000 before his pension of £53,000 – a total of £423,000. His predecessor Dr John Hood received £78,000 to cover his relocation costs – he sent belongings to New Zealand and America.
Gloucestershire University has appointed David Willetts’s right-hand man Stephen Marston, from the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills, as its new vice-chancellor.
From: http://www.dailymail.co.uk
Professor Patricia Broadfoot, 62, was the highest paid university Vice-Chancellor in the UK last year, according to research revealing the pay, benefits and pensions of all higher education chiefs.
The study highlighted the ‘murky’ world of ‘arbitrary’ pay at Britain’s universities and showed that three-quarters of chiefs enjoyed a pay rise last year. Ten vice-chancellors earned more than £300,000 a year. In addition they received annual cash payments into their pension schemes of up to £60,000.
A handful of chiefs at low-ranking institutions, beset with financial troubles, have been granted massive and ‘utterly arbitrary’ pay rises of anything up to 70 per cent. Most disturbing was the amount paid to Professor Broadfoot who last year earned £494,000, including her pension, while presiding over little-known Gloucestershire University.
This sum included a £196,000 ‘pay-off’, equivalent to a year’s basic salary, after she stepped down last March, a year early. Her total earnings over four years were £1,088,000.
The mother of three was also criticised for profligate spending, at one point attempting to hire a personal chauffeur. During her tenure the institution – which became a university in 2001 after teaching mechanics since 1884 – tried to expand and over-invest as the recession took hold.
It plunged into debt and was placed on the ‘at risk’ register of universities threatened with closure or merging.Professor Broadfoot graduated from Leeds University in 1971 with a degree in sociology. Some 13 years later she got her PhD from the Open University.
She was one of five high-profile figures at the university to resign between 2009 and 2011. She was followed by the Chancellor, former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey.
Yesterday the university said it had recently recorded a surplus of £2million and was making a strong financial recovery.
Spokesman Paul Brake said: ‘The university has significantly improved its financial position by reducing costs and growing income through the hard work of staff.’ The research, commissioned for the Times Higher Education Supplement, revealed high levels of pay at other low-ranking universities.
Liverpool Hope boss Gerald Pillay saw his salary balloon by 20.6 per cent to £199,077 as some 110 of his staff face the axe.
Second-highest pay: Professor Andrew Hamilton of Oxford University earned £423,000.
Ninety per cent of the vice-chancellors at the 148 universities earn more than Prime Minister David Cameron’s £142,500 salary. However, 36 vice-chancellors did see their earnings fall. Overall their average pay and benefits rose by 0.5 per cent to £213,813.
The figures come as students face mountains of debt when fees increase to a maximum of £9,000. And with Aston University yesterday announcing it will charge £9,000, as Essex and Surrey did earlier this week, observers warn that all but a handful will charge the full amount.
The study also coincided with thousands of staff at more than 500 universities and colleges going on strike over pay and conditions.
Sally Hunt, of the University and College Union (UCU), called for reform of vice-chancellor pay. She said: ‘UCU members in universities are on strike today defending their pay and conditions and it is somewhat galling to discover that many vice-chancellors are still enjoying handsome, and utterly arbitrary, pay hikes.
‘We want an end to the murky world of pay at the top of our universities and a fair system applied consistently from top to bottom.
‘We have never opposed people being well rewarded for a job well done.
‘However, today’s survey does nothing to suggest that vice-chancellors’ pay is properly scrutinised or that the process for deciding an individual’s pay is fit for purpose.
‘Even after years of promising to rein in pay at the top, there are examples of whopping rises.’
The second highest paid Vice-Chancellor was Professor Andrew Hamilton of Oxford University who earned £370,000 before his pension of £53,000 – a total of £423,000. His predecessor Dr John Hood received £78,000 to cover his relocation costs – he sent belongings to New Zealand and America.
Gloucestershire University has appointed David Willetts’s right-hand man Stephen Marston, from the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills, as its new vice-chancellor.
From: http://www.dailymail.co.uk
March 23, 2011
Bullied Macquarie University staff demand an apology
Six former Macquarie University staff have demanded an official apology from vice-chancellor Steven Schwartz for the university's failure to act on claims of victimisation and bullying subsequently found to be justified by an Independent Commission Against Corruption inquiry.
In an open letter sent yesterday, they also called for further action on other recommendations in the ICAC report, including addressing a chaotic staffing regime at the Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counter Terrorism headed by former NSW police minister Peter Anderson.
The university says it has dealt with these issues, including accepting merit selection as the basis for appointments.
The letter reflects the frustration of former staff that their complaints have been largely ignored, even after the scathing findings of the ICAC-commissioned inquiry and their publication in The Australian a fortnight ago.
The report found nine of the centre's 12 staff made legitimate complaints of victimisation, marginalisation, bullying and harassment. They include the six who signed the letter. Although they pursued the complaints all the way up the university hierarchy to Professor Schwartz, the report says the university took no action to resolve them. Eight of the staff resigned and one did not have her contract renewed.
The report criticised Professor Anderson for contributing to the bullying and victimisation, as well as for appointing people with Labor connections without meeting selection criteria, for claiming inappropriate expenses and for being less than frank in his explanations to the inquiry. The report found no direct evidence of corruption but concluded there were "justifiable perceptions that the processes of recruitment and selection are corrupt".
It said the university should consider providing an apology "for the apparent failure in responding to [the complainants'] workplace grievances and taking appropriate action".
Yesterday's letter says deputy vice-chancellor Judyth Sachs "violated our trust" by forwarding the second complaint sent to her and Professor Schwartz to Professor Anderson, even though it was marked in confidence and contained their names. The former staff who signed the letter are Elton Bien, Alfred Gerstl, Belinda Helmke, Greg Pemberton, David Santoro and Alan Watson.
A university spokesman said yesterday the letter reiterated selected parts of the report, "which contains many serious flaws".
No apology to former staff was warranted as the only formal complaint lodged with the university had been found to be without merit, the spokesman said. Professor Sachs had acted "in an entirely appropriate way and consistently with normal management processes". He also provided a resolution carried by PICT staff last week affirming support for Professor Anderson and asking the university to lodge formal complaints with the Internal Audit Bureau, which conducted the investigation for ICAC, with ICAC itself and with the NSW Ombudsman regarding the "unfair processes and erroneous outcome of their investigation, giving rise to recent adverse publicity".
From: http://www.theaustralian.com.au
In an open letter sent yesterday, they also called for further action on other recommendations in the ICAC report, including addressing a chaotic staffing regime at the Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counter Terrorism headed by former NSW police minister Peter Anderson.
The university says it has dealt with these issues, including accepting merit selection as the basis for appointments.
The letter reflects the frustration of former staff that their complaints have been largely ignored, even after the scathing findings of the ICAC-commissioned inquiry and their publication in The Australian a fortnight ago.
The report found nine of the centre's 12 staff made legitimate complaints of victimisation, marginalisation, bullying and harassment. They include the six who signed the letter. Although they pursued the complaints all the way up the university hierarchy to Professor Schwartz, the report says the university took no action to resolve them. Eight of the staff resigned and one did not have her contract renewed.
The report criticised Professor Anderson for contributing to the bullying and victimisation, as well as for appointing people with Labor connections without meeting selection criteria, for claiming inappropriate expenses and for being less than frank in his explanations to the inquiry. The report found no direct evidence of corruption but concluded there were "justifiable perceptions that the processes of recruitment and selection are corrupt".
It said the university should consider providing an apology "for the apparent failure in responding to [the complainants'] workplace grievances and taking appropriate action".
Yesterday's letter says deputy vice-chancellor Judyth Sachs "violated our trust" by forwarding the second complaint sent to her and Professor Schwartz to Professor Anderson, even though it was marked in confidence and contained their names. The former staff who signed the letter are Elton Bien, Alfred Gerstl, Belinda Helmke, Greg Pemberton, David Santoro and Alan Watson.
A university spokesman said yesterday the letter reiterated selected parts of the report, "which contains many serious flaws".
No apology to former staff was warranted as the only formal complaint lodged with the university had been found to be without merit, the spokesman said. Professor Sachs had acted "in an entirely appropriate way and consistently with normal management processes". He also provided a resolution carried by PICT staff last week affirming support for Professor Anderson and asking the university to lodge formal complaints with the Internal Audit Bureau, which conducted the investigation for ICAC, with ICAC itself and with the NSW Ombudsman regarding the "unfair processes and erroneous outcome of their investigation, giving rise to recent adverse publicity".
From: http://www.theaustralian.com.au
March 15, 2011
Wikipedia: Bullying in academia
Bullying in academia is workplace bullying of scholars and staff in academia, especially places of higher education such as colleges. It is believed to be common, although has not received as much attention from researchers as bullying in some other contexts...
Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullying_in_academia
Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullying_in_academia
March 11, 2011
UniLeaks is a news organisation
Unileaks will accept restricted or censored material of political, ethical, diplomatic or historical significance which is in some way connected to higher education, an agency or government body working in partnership with an institution, e.g., a University.
We absolutely do not accept rumor, opinion, other kinds of first-hand accounts or material that is publicly available elsewhere.
We restrict our accepted material because our journalists write news based on the material, and then provide a link to the supporting documentation to prove our stories are true.
It’s not news if it has been publicly available elsewhere first, and we are a news organisation.
However, from time to time, the editors may re-publish material that has been made public previously elsewhere if the information is in the public interest but did not have proper news analysis when first released.
If you are sending us something, we encourage you to include a brief description of why the document is important and what the most significant parts are within the document. It will help our journalists to write up and release a story much faster.
From: http://www.unileaks.org
We absolutely do not accept rumor, opinion, other kinds of first-hand accounts or material that is publicly available elsewhere.
We restrict our accepted material because our journalists write news based on the material, and then provide a link to the supporting documentation to prove our stories are true.
It’s not news if it has been publicly available elsewhere first, and we are a news organisation.
However, from time to time, the editors may re-publish material that has been made public previously elsewhere if the information is in the public interest but did not have proper news analysis when first released.
If you are sending us something, we encourage you to include a brief description of why the document is important and what the most significant parts are within the document. It will help our journalists to write up and release a story much faster.
From: http://www.unileaks.org
March 07, 2011
Channel 4 is making a documentary
Channel 4 is making a documentary about the commercialisation of higher education. One of the areas the programme will explore is the conflict between university managements' desire to increase revenue and the necessity to maintain academic standards.
We are looking to speak on or off the record to academics who feel that standards are being compromised, for example by inflating grades and overlooking poor standards in English, as their institutions seek to maximise income from tuition fees from both UK and overseas students.
If you are willing to speak to me off the record and in confidence, please do get in touch in the strictest confidence.
Gurbir Dhillon - Assistant Producer - Vera Productions
Tel: 0207-292-1480 / 07768-725121
Email: gurbir@vera.co.uk
We are looking to speak on or off the record to academics who feel that standards are being compromised, for example by inflating grades and overlooking poor standards in English, as their institutions seek to maximise income from tuition fees from both UK and overseas students.
If you are willing to speak to me off the record and in confidence, please do get in touch in the strictest confidence.
Gurbir Dhillon - Assistant Producer - Vera Productions
Tel: 0207-292-1480 / 07768-725121
Email: gurbir@vera.co.uk
February 23, 2011
The Envy of Excellence: Administrative Mobbing of High-Achieving Professors
A Sample Selection from Kenneth Westhues, The Envy of Excellence: Administrative Mobbing of High-Achieving Professors, Lewiston: NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2004, 2006.
Elimination in the Narrower, Stronger Sense
The word elimination does not apply equally to all instances of a member of a group being punished, expelled, or humiliated. Every day, restaurant clerks and customers are injured and killed during armed robberies. Yet these tragedies are categorically distinct from the robbery of a New York Wendy’s outlet by an angry ex-employee on May 24, 2000, after which police found the manager and other employees bound, gagged, and shot dead in the restaurant’s walk-in refrigerator: Police had suspected the Wendy’s heist was an inside job because the killers seemed intent on eliminating the victims. “There’s a reason you shoot seven people for a couple of thousand bucks,”one investigator said. (Ridder 2000)
It is this exceptional “reason” that distinguishes cases of elimination, properly so called. It means human beings going after somebody as an end in itself. Interaction turns into a game with no object but to make someone lose, a drama with no plot but to drop some actor from the cast.
For grasping the difference between elimination in its broader, weaker sense, and in the narrower, stronger sense intended here, the hugely popular first season of the CBS documentary, Survivor, aired in the summer of 2000, is worth recalling. Sixteen contestants were secluded on a tropical island, expected to satisfy collectively their subsistence needs and to compete in tests of survival skills. They were divided into two tribes. Each week, a tribe was called together to vote one of its members off the island. As the numbers dwindled, the two tribes were combined, and the weekly voting of one member out continued. The last survivor would win $1 million.
Here was a game, an elimination ritual, that tapped something deep inside the human psyche. Week after week, the show’s ratings soared. How would the group dynamic play out? Who would be voted off next? For the first few weeks, the contestants voted off seemed to be those with fewer survival skills, and those contributing least to group achievements and morale. Most contestants seemed to like and respect almost everybody else, and to be reluctant to get rid of anyone: “I’m sorry to have to vote against X, but the game requires me to make a choice.” This was elimination in the general, looser sense.
Halfway through the series, for its issue of July 8-14, 2000, TV Guide asked a panel of experts to rate the remaining contestants’ chances of surviving to the end and winning the $1 million. The panel ranked a woman named Gretchen as the one most likely to win. An opinion poll of the viewing audience would probably have agreed. Gretchen was competent, skilled, friendly, popular, the apparent leader of her tribe. By most of the relevant criteria, she deserved to win.
To the surprise of the television audience (and to TV Guide’s embarrassment), Gretchen was voted off the very next week, when the two tribes were combined. Members of the other tribe recognized her strengths, formed an alliance, and pooled their votes, consciously and deliberately, to get rid of her. Said one of them, “She had to be voted off because she is bright, and she is strong, and she was a threat” (quoted in Michael 2000).
To the extent this TV game can illustrate a serious point, Gretchen’s ouster was elimination in the stronger, narrower sense. It was not as if the group had coalesced around certain goals or values, reached a consensus about the meaning and purpose of their game, and decided that by these standards, Gretchen was the least valuable or most expendable player. The decision-making process played out in a wholly different way. Her expulsion represented the triumph of imagined collective interest over shared values of any kind. It was a case of Lilliputians bringing down Gulliver.
Is this what happened to Herbert Richardson at Toronto? If it was, it was less obvious than in Gretchen’s case. And if it was, this was no innocent game played for entertainment purposes but a dangerous game played for keeps, where one man’s whole career was on the line. The only way to answer the question is to study the evidence systematically and thoroughly, while keeping in mind what the question is, and what kind of logic and evidence might answer it.
The First, Basic Clue
In lectures on social elimination, I have sometimes said that in every human being are three appetites: for food, for sex, and for humiliating somebody else. The third craving is not ordinarily grouped with the first two. All agree that hunger and sexual desire have a physiological basis, that they drive human behavior in overt and hidden ways, and that they are at times so strong as to preoccupy a person completely, turning him or her into a raging beast, a creature we scarcely recognize as human.
Notwithstanding its less evident basis in biology, the eliminative impulse, the lust to wipe another person out, is categorically similar. It can consume a person to the point of obsession, spread like a virus through a group, and become the driving force behind collective energy. Yet unlike the appetites for food and sex, this one has come to be proscribed in the process of civilization. It is supposed to be held in check by a universal compassion, common allegiance to the “brotherhood of man.” The eliminative impulse, when it does seize control of human behavior, is therefore almost always denied, obscured by the pretense of serving some lofty goal. Girard posits a “persecutory unconscious” in those caught up in the snowballing process (2001, p. 126). It is, he says, what Jesus referred to in his prayer on the cross, “Father, forgive them because they don’t know what they are doing” (Luke 23: 34).
How then can one tell when elimination in its stronger, stricter, narrower sense is underway? Are there identifiable symptoms, empirical indicators that an exclusionary process has escaped the bounds of reason and civilization? Against every professor and teacher a protest has at some time been raised by a student who flunked a test: “You have it in for me.” Can the teacher prove otherwise? When an imposter was forced to resign from the faculty of the University of Regina in 2001, after the degrees on her resumé were shown to belong to somebody else, while she herself had no such degrees, her lawyer protested: “It’s a real old-boys club around here. She’s a foreign-looking person. She has her abrasive side, but she’s easy to gang up on” (Perreaux 2001). Was the eliminative impulse, as the lawyer implied, behind the move to get rid of her? If I, like most professors, would defend her ouster, how do I know I am not acting on my own “persecutory unconscious”? Are there reliable signs that elimination in its savage sense is underway?
The first, most basic clue is the eliminators’ focus on the targeted person, rather than on the allegedly offensive act. “The guilty person is so much a part of his offense that one is indistinguishable from the other. His offense seems to be a fantastic essence or ontological attribute” (Girard 1986, p. 36). Social order requires pointing out errors, infractions, and offenses, and imposing penalties on their account–including jail, in the case of criminal behavior that threatens public safety. Social order does not require spoiling a person’s entire identity, which is what elimination means. An explanation of the need for sanctions that includes personally derisive and humiliating statements about the person on whom the sanctions are to be placed, a statement that break this person’s bond with everybody else: this is the basic indication that the eliminative impulse has been unleashed.
Compare two responses parents can make to a child who has just been eliminated from a spelling bee or gymnastics competition. They can say, “This just wasn’t your day, we’re sorry you won’t be going on to the advanced level, better luck next time.” Or they can say (what most of us have overhead on some occasion, and winced), “You stupid little shit, what’s wrong with you, you’ve brought shame on your school, get out of my sight.” These are radically, categorically different social processes. In the first instance, the child’s person is acknowledged and affirmed even in the midst of inadequate performance. In the second instance, a mistake is enlarged to cover and smear the child’s whole identity. Only the second instance illustrates the process that is the focus of the present book.
From: http://arts.uwaterloo.ca/~kwesthue/socialelim.htm
Elimination in the Narrower, Stronger Sense
The word elimination does not apply equally to all instances of a member of a group being punished, expelled, or humiliated. Every day, restaurant clerks and customers are injured and killed during armed robberies. Yet these tragedies are categorically distinct from the robbery of a New York Wendy’s outlet by an angry ex-employee on May 24, 2000, after which police found the manager and other employees bound, gagged, and shot dead in the restaurant’s walk-in refrigerator: Police had suspected the Wendy’s heist was an inside job because the killers seemed intent on eliminating the victims. “There’s a reason you shoot seven people for a couple of thousand bucks,”one investigator said. (Ridder 2000)
It is this exceptional “reason” that distinguishes cases of elimination, properly so called. It means human beings going after somebody as an end in itself. Interaction turns into a game with no object but to make someone lose, a drama with no plot but to drop some actor from the cast.
For grasping the difference between elimination in its broader, weaker sense, and in the narrower, stronger sense intended here, the hugely popular first season of the CBS documentary, Survivor, aired in the summer of 2000, is worth recalling. Sixteen contestants were secluded on a tropical island, expected to satisfy collectively their subsistence needs and to compete in tests of survival skills. They were divided into two tribes. Each week, a tribe was called together to vote one of its members off the island. As the numbers dwindled, the two tribes were combined, and the weekly voting of one member out continued. The last survivor would win $1 million.
Here was a game, an elimination ritual, that tapped something deep inside the human psyche. Week after week, the show’s ratings soared. How would the group dynamic play out? Who would be voted off next? For the first few weeks, the contestants voted off seemed to be those with fewer survival skills, and those contributing least to group achievements and morale. Most contestants seemed to like and respect almost everybody else, and to be reluctant to get rid of anyone: “I’m sorry to have to vote against X, but the game requires me to make a choice.” This was elimination in the general, looser sense.
Halfway through the series, for its issue of July 8-14, 2000, TV Guide asked a panel of experts to rate the remaining contestants’ chances of surviving to the end and winning the $1 million. The panel ranked a woman named Gretchen as the one most likely to win. An opinion poll of the viewing audience would probably have agreed. Gretchen was competent, skilled, friendly, popular, the apparent leader of her tribe. By most of the relevant criteria, she deserved to win.
To the surprise of the television audience (and to TV Guide’s embarrassment), Gretchen was voted off the very next week, when the two tribes were combined. Members of the other tribe recognized her strengths, formed an alliance, and pooled their votes, consciously and deliberately, to get rid of her. Said one of them, “She had to be voted off because she is bright, and she is strong, and she was a threat” (quoted in Michael 2000).
To the extent this TV game can illustrate a serious point, Gretchen’s ouster was elimination in the stronger, narrower sense. It was not as if the group had coalesced around certain goals or values, reached a consensus about the meaning and purpose of their game, and decided that by these standards, Gretchen was the least valuable or most expendable player. The decision-making process played out in a wholly different way. Her expulsion represented the triumph of imagined collective interest over shared values of any kind. It was a case of Lilliputians bringing down Gulliver.
Is this what happened to Herbert Richardson at Toronto? If it was, it was less obvious than in Gretchen’s case. And if it was, this was no innocent game played for entertainment purposes but a dangerous game played for keeps, where one man’s whole career was on the line. The only way to answer the question is to study the evidence systematically and thoroughly, while keeping in mind what the question is, and what kind of logic and evidence might answer it.
The First, Basic Clue
In lectures on social elimination, I have sometimes said that in every human being are three appetites: for food, for sex, and for humiliating somebody else. The third craving is not ordinarily grouped with the first two. All agree that hunger and sexual desire have a physiological basis, that they drive human behavior in overt and hidden ways, and that they are at times so strong as to preoccupy a person completely, turning him or her into a raging beast, a creature we scarcely recognize as human.
Notwithstanding its less evident basis in biology, the eliminative impulse, the lust to wipe another person out, is categorically similar. It can consume a person to the point of obsession, spread like a virus through a group, and become the driving force behind collective energy. Yet unlike the appetites for food and sex, this one has come to be proscribed in the process of civilization. It is supposed to be held in check by a universal compassion, common allegiance to the “brotherhood of man.” The eliminative impulse, when it does seize control of human behavior, is therefore almost always denied, obscured by the pretense of serving some lofty goal. Girard posits a “persecutory unconscious” in those caught up in the snowballing process (2001, p. 126). It is, he says, what Jesus referred to in his prayer on the cross, “Father, forgive them because they don’t know what they are doing” (Luke 23: 34).
How then can one tell when elimination in its stronger, stricter, narrower sense is underway? Are there identifiable symptoms, empirical indicators that an exclusionary process has escaped the bounds of reason and civilization? Against every professor and teacher a protest has at some time been raised by a student who flunked a test: “You have it in for me.” Can the teacher prove otherwise? When an imposter was forced to resign from the faculty of the University of Regina in 2001, after the degrees on her resumé were shown to belong to somebody else, while she herself had no such degrees, her lawyer protested: “It’s a real old-boys club around here. She’s a foreign-looking person. She has her abrasive side, but she’s easy to gang up on” (Perreaux 2001). Was the eliminative impulse, as the lawyer implied, behind the move to get rid of her? If I, like most professors, would defend her ouster, how do I know I am not acting on my own “persecutory unconscious”? Are there reliable signs that elimination in its savage sense is underway?
The first, most basic clue is the eliminators’ focus on the targeted person, rather than on the allegedly offensive act. “The guilty person is so much a part of his offense that one is indistinguishable from the other. His offense seems to be a fantastic essence or ontological attribute” (Girard 1986, p. 36). Social order requires pointing out errors, infractions, and offenses, and imposing penalties on their account–including jail, in the case of criminal behavior that threatens public safety. Social order does not require spoiling a person’s entire identity, which is what elimination means. An explanation of the need for sanctions that includes personally derisive and humiliating statements about the person on whom the sanctions are to be placed, a statement that break this person’s bond with everybody else: this is the basic indication that the eliminative impulse has been unleashed.
Compare two responses parents can make to a child who has just been eliminated from a spelling bee or gymnastics competition. They can say, “This just wasn’t your day, we’re sorry you won’t be going on to the advanced level, better luck next time.” Or they can say (what most of us have overhead on some occasion, and winced), “You stupid little shit, what’s wrong with you, you’ve brought shame on your school, get out of my sight.” These are radically, categorically different social processes. In the first instance, the child’s person is acknowledged and affirmed even in the midst of inadequate performance. In the second instance, a mistake is enlarged to cover and smear the child’s whole identity. Only the second instance illustrates the process that is the focus of the present book.
From: http://arts.uwaterloo.ca/~kwesthue/socialelim.htm
February 12, 2011
Bullying at Stirling University
I worked at Stirling University for 13 years. I was bullied by my manager, Kathy McCabe. I asked her to stop, but the ill treatment continued, and I raised grievances against her. As a result I was dismissed. Stirling University claims to be committed to allowing employees and students to be able to work and study free from bullying, victimisation and discrimination. However, here I provide evidence of the extreme lengths that management takes to protect and support bullies.
Gerry McCormac became Stirling University's Principal in May 2010. He described the university as one of the most respected in the UK. He said his focus would be on providing leadership and "getting the best out of people".
In accordance with the university's grievance procedures, I wrote to Professor McCormac in September 2010 and sent copies of my letter to Alan Simpson, Chair of the University Court, and Dr James Naughtie, University Chancellor. I alerted them to the widespread corruption that exists within the university's senior management.
You might expect that someone who agreed to take up such a responsible position, and who accepts around a quarter of a million pounds a year to perform his duties, would be horrified to learn of this and would be eager to rid the university of corruption as a matter of priority. You might also expect that he would be eager to speak with me to obtain as much information as possible in order for him to fully understand and deal with the very serious problem at Stirling University.
However, you would be wrong. Professor McCormac decided that it would be best to sweep the issue under the carpet.
It is ironic that a university Cleaner earning around £15,000 a year would probably be sacked for sweeping dirt under the carpet. Cleaners are expected to work with integrity; Principals and senior management are not.
Corrupt or what? I see no evidence to suggest that Gerry is anything but corrupt.
Shame on you, Gerry!
Oh dear! Hot off the press; Gerry has been appointed by Education Secretary, Mike Russell to head up a review of teachers' pay and conditions. Labour and Liberal Democrats are worried that the review may be a sham, and that this is just a cost cutting exercise. With Gerry at the helm, I believe they have good reason to be worried.
Gerry is aware that Mark Toole had decided that I should be dismissed because he couldn't deal properly with my grievance against Kathy McCabe's bullying behaviour. It is likely that Kathy's husband, Liam, being the Finance Director was also a factor. I had made protected disclosures about the university's failure to comply with its legal obligations, so the heat was on for the Uni. Mark's lack of integrity caused him to call in well known 'arse licker', Graham Millar, to carry out a sham investigation which was to produce a report recommending a disciplinary be held. Mark would have told Graham not to allow the facts to get in the way of the required report.
Despite all of the evidence that made it obvious I was innocent, Mark dismissed me, and other corrupt directors upheld his decision.
Immediately prior to this, Mark had arranged for Deputy Secretary, Eileen Schofield to carry out a sham investigation relating to my allegations that I had been bullied by my manager, Kathy McCabe, for several years, including bullying that took place in Mark's presence. Amazingly, despite all of the evidence, Eileen produced a report stating that I had not been bullied, but that I had bullied my manager. At appeal, University Secretary, Kevin Clarke upheld her incredible decision.
Gerry knew about all of this when he shrugged off my complaints of corruption. Interestingly, he offered no evidence to refute my claims that senior management is corrupt.
Not satisfied with being paid £250,000 a year and ruining an innocent man's career, Gerry will be hoping to be recommended for inclusion in the honours list for carrying out this review. In my opinion, he should be in jail.
Gerry has a wife and three sons. I suppose he is 'lucky' not to have a conscience.
I suppose it's unfortunate from Gerry's and other corrupt people's point of view, that we now have the internet. The world is becoming more transparent. Corrupt dinosaurs, like Gerry, will hopefully become a feature of the past.
My parents were born more than 70 years before most people had even heard of the internet, but that didn't stop them from raising me to be honest, hard working and ethical. Gerry is the type of person they warned me not to mix with.
I feel sorry for his sons who have been deprived of a normal non corrupt life in which they could achieve their goals based on their own genuine desires and honest abilities.
From: http://bullyingatstirlinguniversity.blogspot.com
Gerry McCormac became Stirling University's Principal in May 2010. He described the university as one of the most respected in the UK. He said his focus would be on providing leadership and "getting the best out of people".
In accordance with the university's grievance procedures, I wrote to Professor McCormac in September 2010 and sent copies of my letter to Alan Simpson, Chair of the University Court, and Dr James Naughtie, University Chancellor. I alerted them to the widespread corruption that exists within the university's senior management.
You might expect that someone who agreed to take up such a responsible position, and who accepts around a quarter of a million pounds a year to perform his duties, would be horrified to learn of this and would be eager to rid the university of corruption as a matter of priority. You might also expect that he would be eager to speak with me to obtain as much information as possible in order for him to fully understand and deal with the very serious problem at Stirling University.
However, you would be wrong. Professor McCormac decided that it would be best to sweep the issue under the carpet.
It is ironic that a university Cleaner earning around £15,000 a year would probably be sacked for sweeping dirt under the carpet. Cleaners are expected to work with integrity; Principals and senior management are not.
Corrupt or what? I see no evidence to suggest that Gerry is anything but corrupt.
Shame on you, Gerry!
Oh dear! Hot off the press; Gerry has been appointed by Education Secretary, Mike Russell to head up a review of teachers' pay and conditions. Labour and Liberal Democrats are worried that the review may be a sham, and that this is just a cost cutting exercise. With Gerry at the helm, I believe they have good reason to be worried.
Gerry is aware that Mark Toole had decided that I should be dismissed because he couldn't deal properly with my grievance against Kathy McCabe's bullying behaviour. It is likely that Kathy's husband, Liam, being the Finance Director was also a factor. I had made protected disclosures about the university's failure to comply with its legal obligations, so the heat was on for the Uni. Mark's lack of integrity caused him to call in well known 'arse licker', Graham Millar, to carry out a sham investigation which was to produce a report recommending a disciplinary be held. Mark would have told Graham not to allow the facts to get in the way of the required report.
Despite all of the evidence that made it obvious I was innocent, Mark dismissed me, and other corrupt directors upheld his decision.
Immediately prior to this, Mark had arranged for Deputy Secretary, Eileen Schofield to carry out a sham investigation relating to my allegations that I had been bullied by my manager, Kathy McCabe, for several years, including bullying that took place in Mark's presence. Amazingly, despite all of the evidence, Eileen produced a report stating that I had not been bullied, but that I had bullied my manager. At appeal, University Secretary, Kevin Clarke upheld her incredible decision.
Gerry knew about all of this when he shrugged off my complaints of corruption. Interestingly, he offered no evidence to refute my claims that senior management is corrupt.
Not satisfied with being paid £250,000 a year and ruining an innocent man's career, Gerry will be hoping to be recommended for inclusion in the honours list for carrying out this review. In my opinion, he should be in jail.
Gerry has a wife and three sons. I suppose he is 'lucky' not to have a conscience.
I suppose it's unfortunate from Gerry's and other corrupt people's point of view, that we now have the internet. The world is becoming more transparent. Corrupt dinosaurs, like Gerry, will hopefully become a feature of the past.
My parents were born more than 70 years before most people had even heard of the internet, but that didn't stop them from raising me to be honest, hard working and ethical. Gerry is the type of person they warned me not to mix with.
I feel sorry for his sons who have been deprived of a normal non corrupt life in which they could achieve their goals based on their own genuine desires and honest abilities.
From: http://bullyingatstirlinguniversity.blogspot.com
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