Book Review

The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University and Why It Matters

Benjamin Ginsburg, David Bernstein Professor in Political Science at Johns Hopkins University, gives us his unified assessment of the single most problem facing higher education in “The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University and Why It Matters” (Oxford University Press, 2011).
Ginsburg begins his book by explaining The Growth of Administration. He reminisces of his nearly 50 years of academic experience. Years ago faculty members would take on part time rolls as administrators of the university. He credits the faculty as being a success due largely to the fact that “Faculty administrators never forgot the purpose of the university was the promotion of education and research.”(pg.2) He then explains how despite financial cutbacks resulting the loss of full-time faculty, armies of staff and administrators referred to as “deanlets” and “deanlings” are still being hired. He supports this statement with statistics showing an 240 percent and 85 percent increase in the supply and demand in comparison to the 50 percent increase in faculty members hired. He dismisses arguments of increases in curriculum, service offerings and government mandates on record keeping as the cause.
Ginsburg’s second section is titled What administrators do. This section of the book Ginsburg explains his interpretation of what the roll of an administrator is in the academic community and exactly what pitfalls arise from the actions of administrators. One of these pitfalls is the nature that administrators have so little to do that they organize events for the purpose of creating work. Later in the section he discusses how tuition generates far more revenue than fund-raising. This being the case he states that administrators prefer fund-raising. If more tuition was to be generated it would give faculty more power and require negotiations to teach more classes. He concludes the section with a brief look at endowments.
A diagnosis of the idea of management problems headlines the third section of the book titled Managerial Pathologies Ginsburg draws reference to many events that have transpired in history showing how administrators have misused power as well as resources for gains both financially as well as in status. Examples connect lines of political and donor relations that are not exclusive to that of personal gain. On the later end of the spectrum, a lack of checks and balances results in administrators “shirking” or not putting a solid effort into their roles as administrators. Examples are also given of fraudulent acts that were committed by administrators to obtain degrees and even just falsely stating having the credentials all together.
The fourth section takes a look at the polemic subjects of race and gender roles in the academic community. Titled The Realpolitik of Race and Gender starts by looking at the low enrollments in Multicultural Programs and the shortage in supply of female and minority faculty. These subjects as well as the use of speeches and civilities codes are used to show an alliance between university administrators and social and minority activist groups. In addition to using activist links to achieve goals in which were not intended, administrators use them to silence some of their own critics. Gender and race have also been used as an intimidation tool in cases of harassment and incivility.
There is Not Such Thing as Academic Freedom (for Professors): The rise and fall of the tenure system is the title of the fifth section. He starts with a declaration of how the supreme courts in the past have ruled towards the additional protections to academics under the first amendment. Before tenure professors held one-year contracts and feared of termination if their research was controversial or of a religious nature. In 1940 the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the American Association of Colleges (AAC) agreed on a tenure system that had been 18 years in the making. This system would protect the professors from termination based on research topics. With only thirty percent of the current faculty population being tenured, Ginsburg states that this is “the end of tenure” and that the vast majority of teaching positions will be consumed by “phantom faculty” consisting of adjunct members that do not require the resources such as offices and laboratories to teach their students.
The section titled Research and Teaching at the All-Administrative University explains the differences between the roles of teaching and research in higher education. The role of federal and private grant funding along with the importance of intellectual property are discussed. Ginsburg closes the section by discussing the current financial crisis and how it could potential change or even close universities.
In the final section of the book, Ginsburg offers some ideas that would slow down the effect that an all-administrative university brings. These recommendations include re-appropriation of the budget towards research and teaching rather than management. In addition students should not take “life building” course and some university administrators need to be fired.
I found this book to be very shallow and one sided. It is obvious that Benjamin Ginsburg is a professor and holds a very strong opinion apposing his view of the modern university. The way he introduces his arguments is one of a daytime talk show, intended on offering a shock value. I found several of his passages to be a bit wrongfully associated as in his section referring to the “giving away of MBA’s” that goes on to refer you back to chapter 1 were he states that an MBA was given to a women that did not even attend class, but the context that was presented implied that the MBA went to a fraudulent university administrator.
The second argument that I have has to do with the statics and the conclusions that are drawn. While Ginsburg does address new curriculum being introduced the had not previously existed, one major technological advance happened between that not only effected schools but the society as a whole, the internet and the personal computer. Speaking for a technical background, the infrastructure of a university has to be supported by several staff members that are included in those statistics. This to me explains some of the gain if not a large majority, in support and creative staff.
My third argument is that several sections of the material were repetitive and could have been combined. Ginsburg could have omitted the fourth section on race and included the racial and gender discussions in section five the focused on freedoms. The section on “Shadow Curriculum” discussing “life skills” classes designed for credits for athletes did not seem to fit the idea of this section. It would have been more at home in the corruption section of managerial pathologies.
In summation I do not think I would recommend this book to anyone. I don’t feel that his points were qualified and the majority of the book made me feel that Ginsburg was holding some sort of grudge against administrators that he has encountered.