So what would you say about a group of academics who for no particular reason and in the absence of any pressure whatsoever voted to amend their college’s operational papers to give an administrator the power to veto any decision they make for their departments?
I think they are doing this on purpose. The more they self-sabotage, the greater chance they will have to write weepy “This Job Can Kill You” posts.
I’m very very annoyed right now. We waste our time on organizing committees, voting, making decisions only to be vetoed by the administration with zero explanation given. And the only reason this can happen is because we voted for it.
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It’s like a beaten wife’s syndrome.
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Oh come on. We have great working conditions so there is no reason for a pity party.
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Oh, I agree with you. They should not have voted for that veto.
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They want to be watched by a potentially scolding parent. It provides comfort barriers.
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This is smart. Oh yeah! 🙂
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The department voted for that????? Did they get somethng in exchange?? This is nuts!!!!!
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Not the department, the entire university. No, we didn’t get anything good as a result of this.
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The entire university voted for that? What? What was the justification or argument in favor of this terrible measure? I’m completely flabergasted!
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I have absolutely no idea. My best guess is that people didn’t want to invest any time into reading the proposal and just voted “yes” automatically.
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For some reason my first try didn’t go through.
Anyway, my best guess is something about legal responsibility? By letting administration override anything they do they think they’re protecting themselves from lawsuits (as in “it’s the administration’s fault for not stopping us!”)
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This has to do with the internal management of the department that doesn’t even influence anybody on the outside.
People really puzzle me sometimes.
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So maybe they’re afraid of internal law suits? Same idea, they’re not responsible because the final authority rests higher?
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“So maybe they’re afraid of internal law suits? Same idea, they’re not responsible because the final authority rests higher?”
– I haven’t thought about this but now that you say it, it just may be true. I will never learn to think like Americans do.
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