Provost’s Review of the Social Sciences at Cornell

I seldom write about Cornell, my employer of nearly 19 years, except in a veiled way.   The university, overall, has been very good to me, providing a vital and challenging environment to work and exist.  But here I break that rule for the email below.

As an organization, Cornell tends to think and coordinate as organizations do: they form committees and generate studies.  In the context of the long email below, Cornell administration tends to be disingenuous in its statements.  In keeping with other committees investigating similar themes and topics, the sentence containing the statement that the goal of the committee is to “identify opportunities for continuing to strengthen the social sciences at Cornell” means one thing: to somehow centralized the Social Sciences at Cornell, and strip power for the individual units.

The reason for this move is cost savings.  The end result will be some overarching entity, The School of Social Science, The Social Science Entity,  Social Science Incorporated; this entity will supposedly pool resources and eliminate redundancies.

Centralization certainly has its place in congregations of people gathered together to perform some task(s). But it has a shadow side in all but ignoring the benefit of organic growth and the decentralization that fosters it.  The centralized folks, of course, prefer centralization.  It is where they derive their power and authority.  Decentralization is tantamount to disorder, and even chaos. And it is supposed to be less cost effective.  Yet where is the evidence that Cornell’s centralizing drive saves money?  Has anyone studied that outcome?

The Provost is a shadowy and strange presence on campus, feeding money or not depending upon their internal (and often opaque) reasoning.  Besides tightening a belt that may very well be on the waist of bogie man, what do they do?  Why do they exist?

Provost’s Review of the Social Sciences at Cornell

Charge

Review the current state of the social sciences at Cornell, and identify opportunities for continuing to strengthen the social sciences at Cornell.

Scope

The review will focus on the traditional social science disciplines as they appear in all colleges and schools, as well as research infrastructure units that support the social sciences. However, the review will also recognize and consider disciplines that intersect traditional social sciences. Contributions to the research, teaching, and public-engagement missions of the university, as well as the organization of social sciences faculty throughout the university, will be included.

Process

First, a small internal committee will be convened to develop a document that describes the current state of the social sciences at Cornell. The report produced by the committee will be descriptive—it will not provide a critique of social sciences, nor will it be prescriptive in tone. The report will be informed by data and information that are internal and external to Cornell, pertaining to the teaching, research, and public-engagement missions of the university. The internal committee is not intended to be representative of all social science disciplines, but rather is meant to be a small group with enough knowledge to produce the descriptive report. The Provost will invite nominations from the campus and will appoint the membership.

Second, a group of highly regarded scholars, external to Cornell, will be identified and invited by the Provost to review the report of the internal committee and to participate in a site visit that will include interviews, tours, and discussion. This group will be asked to provide its assessment, together with recommendations for further strengthening the social sciences at Cornell.

Progress reports will be provided to the Faculty Senate Committee throughout the process.

Internal Committee

Co-Chairs: Judith Appleton and Ted O’Donoghue
Members: Rose Batt, Jesse Goldberg, Katherine Kinzler, Yael Levitte, Katherine McComas, Kelly Musick, Holly Prigerson, Jed Stiglitz, and Martin Wells.

September 2017 Update

Following completion of the self-study, receipt of the report of the external review committee, and a period of invited comment on the report, the next step in Cornell’s review of the social sciences will be to address the central issues raised in the process to date.

Committees will be formed to address:

1.     Organizational Structures: university level organization of the social sciences, including academic units and centers/institutes (work to begin late September 2017)

2.     Idea Panels: explore areas of strength and opportunity for radical collaboration in the social sciences (work to begin October 2017)

3.     Administrative Issues: specific concerns regarding current policies and practices that impact faculty productivity (work to begin Spring 2018)

Charges for all three committees, along with up-to-date committee membership, can be found here [current draft September 20, 2017]

Any questions or concerns you may have on the review process may be submitted to ssreview@cornell.edu.