I don’t think it’s fair to suggest academics have mostly embraced it, and only dare critique it in private. Most regular faculty don’t like it and a quick google turns up petitions and complaints galore. However, I suspect the issue is more that, in the grand scheme of all possible things in society that one might launch an outright revolt against, it feels like fairly small potatoes. And it’s required to fund your research, so most people just shrug, grit their teeth, and deal with it.
I know many universities who make Common CV a requirement for internal processes.
The point about the issue being to minor to warrant dissent is fair but if people won’t loudly question the Common CV, do you think that they would question the Vietnam war?
Christopher Battysays:
I guess it depends on how you are defining “open dissent” here. Essentially no one likes it, everyone knows that and is mostly happy to tell you so, and the fact that some universities also institute it internally does not contradict that fact. But, yes, people mostly have more productive things to do than quibble over the format/system through which we provide our CVs to funding bodies, as problematic as it may be.
In any case, analogizing paperwork under the modern neoliberal university to a catastrophic two-decade war that killed millions strikes me as rhetorically irresponsible. Both are bad, but framing it this way mostly just makes it seem like you’re trying to speedrun Godwin’s law. 🙂
The Vietnam war was indeed atrocious and it was generally not denounced by academics, not until the public had turned on it. That is, the academy only turned on it when it became entirely safe to do so.
One might think that universities would be better at fiercely speaking truth to power today. Could the Vietnam war happen today and would the academy speak up?
Do you have indications that the modern-day academy would be better?
I don’t think it’s fair to suggest academics have mostly embraced it, and only dare critique it in private. Most regular faculty don’t like it and a quick google turns up petitions and complaints galore. However, I suspect the issue is more that, in the grand scheme of all possible things in society that one might launch an outright revolt against, it feels like fairly small potatoes. And it’s required to fund your research, so most people just shrug, grit their teeth, and deal with it.
I think that it is fair to say that there is little to no open dissent.
I wrote about this topic back in 2013. I reported back then on the opposition.
https://lemire.me/blog/2013/08/28/funding-science-when-bureaucrats-get-out-of-control/
I know many universities who make Common CV a requirement for internal processes.
The point about the issue being to minor to warrant dissent is fair but if people won’t loudly question the Common CV, do you think that they would question the Vietnam war?
I guess it depends on how you are defining “open dissent” here. Essentially no one likes it, everyone knows that and is mostly happy to tell you so, and the fact that some universities also institute it internally does not contradict that fact. But, yes, people mostly have more productive things to do than quibble over the format/system through which we provide our CVs to funding bodies, as problematic as it may be.
In any case, analogizing paperwork under the modern neoliberal university to a catastrophic two-decade war that killed millions strikes me as rhetorically irresponsible. Both are bad, but framing it this way mostly just makes it seem like you’re trying to speedrun Godwin’s law. 🙂
The Vietnam war was indeed atrocious and it was generally not denounced by academics, not until the public had turned on it. That is, the academy only turned on it when it became entirely safe to do so.
One might think that universities would be better at fiercely speaking truth to power today. Could the Vietnam war happen today and would the academy speak up?
Do you have indications that the modern-day academy would be better?