19 July 2008
corrective
Ian Birchall sent me this very good email in response to my last post:
'I saw this title on Lenin's Tomb, and followed the link, thinking "I was there". I have to say that Ms Millett's experiences bear little relation to mine in Britain. My memory of the 1970s is endless struggles against cuts imposed first by the Tories then even worse by Labour. What was happening was that an older world of academic "professionalism" was being replaced by a sort of proletarianisation. The older model of professionalism wasn’t very attractive - precious few new courses at all, and precious few syllabuses that went beyond 1914. At the first ATTI (forerunner of NATFHE/UCU) meeting I attended in about 1965 I mumbled something about trade unionism, and was promptly told “we are not a trade union – we do not engage in trade”.
The positive side of proletarianisation was a rise in trade-union consciousness – we had some good strikes from 1969 onwards. The management's main aim was to improve productivity through something called "staff-student ratios". Sorry we didn't "try harder" – but really success didn’t depend on us; from 1968 to 1975 there was an upturn in working-class struggle, and academics were carried along. When that wave was smashed, by Labour’s social contract and then Thatcherism, the ability of academics to resist was minimal, though some of us did keep on kicking.
I have every sympathy with your criticisms - when I see what is going on in higher education I am so glad to be out of it – it almost compensates for mental and physical decay. I have found intellectual work outside higher education far more rewarding than it ever was inside.
So if you really want to get sacked good luck to you – though I suspect the holidays are still better than in other jobs. Pick your issue and cause a scandal that can produce a campaign. The only problem is if you win. [I had a friend once who took a job on a building site for a few weeks before going on holiday. He was sacked and the whole site struck in support of him. So he missed his holiday.]'
'I saw this title on Lenin's Tomb, and followed the link, thinking "I was there". I have to say that Ms Millett's experiences bear little relation to mine in Britain. My memory of the 1970s is endless struggles against cuts imposed first by the Tories then even worse by Labour. What was happening was that an older world of academic "professionalism" was being replaced by a sort of proletarianisation. The older model of professionalism wasn’t very attractive - precious few new courses at all, and precious few syllabuses that went beyond 1914. At the first ATTI (forerunner of NATFHE/UCU) meeting I attended in about 1965 I mumbled something about trade unionism, and was promptly told “we are not a trade union – we do not engage in trade”.
The positive side of proletarianisation was a rise in trade-union consciousness – we had some good strikes from 1969 onwards. The management's main aim was to improve productivity through something called "staff-student ratios". Sorry we didn't "try harder" – but really success didn’t depend on us; from 1968 to 1975 there was an upturn in working-class struggle, and academics were carried along. When that wave was smashed, by Labour’s social contract and then Thatcherism, the ability of academics to resist was minimal, though some of us did keep on kicking.
I have every sympathy with your criticisms - when I see what is going on in higher education I am so glad to be out of it – it almost compensates for mental and physical decay. I have found intellectual work outside higher education far more rewarding than it ever was inside.
So if you really want to get sacked good luck to you – though I suspect the holidays are still better than in other jobs. Pick your issue and cause a scandal that can produce a campaign. The only problem is if you win. [I had a friend once who took a job on a building site for a few weeks before going on holiday. He was sacked and the whole site struck in support of him. So he missed his holiday.]'
