Page 152 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg

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CHAPTER 5
process thus far and am unsure how to proceed. I will not support the argument that the ranking should be changed because otherwise the dean might be tempted to overrule it; I find that argument inappropriate. My first choice would be to keep the ranking as we had originally agreed. That being said, I believe all three candidates are equally qualified and I would support any ranking which includes these three in the top, provided the arguments reflect a discussion that involves the whole committee.
Jessie argued that Stephen had written up the process in a way that did not reflect her recollection of the ranking during the committee deliberations. She objects to the fact that Stephen wrote in the report as if the whole committee agreed with the outcome. Her feelings of discomfort with the process might have been a result of the informal and collective get together of the men committee members and them leaving the women committee members out of their informal discussions. Jessie also objects to the argument used by Stephen that the dean might overrule the committee’s ranking. In reply, Anna wrote that she was “very unhappy” and “very uncomfortable” about the change of ranking. Both women committee members opposed the informal decision- making of the men but they received little understanding.
Then, a couple of days later, Jeff sent an e-mail to Jessie and Anna only, containing the following message:
Unfortunately the whole discussion has become somewhat irrelevant, as the dean turned down Laura’s case irrespective of her ranking as no. 1, 2, or 3. He has looked at her cv and letters of recommendation (which he said were impressive) but, exactly as we feared, he felt she would have too few opportunities within the Dutch and European funding climate, and added that she wasn’t an applied [researcher in the discipline] either, of which we are in dire need (it was new for me to hear that initially he had suggested the position to be open to applied [discipline] only).
This e-mail of Jeff shows that men committee members had informally presented the outcomes of the committee deliberations to the dean, before the appointment report had been finalized. Supposedly, the men in the committee had an informal relation to the dean, which facilitated their (informal) consultation with him. Going to the dean could have been a strategic move from the committee members. According to Jeff the dean had “turned down Laura’s case” as a result of this informal gathering. The political game that the committee members played became quite unsubtle. Jeff ’s message raises the question how they have presented “Laura’s case” to the dean. The men committee members who consulted with the dean were the ones who had not