Hi Ken,
Thank you for your reply. My original comment was part of the original
discussion so I've returned this post to that thread and attached your 'Ox'
message to keep the context.
As I understand your message to GK on the 30th July, you seemed to be
arguing the research university sector has a special status with respect to
providing unbiased research for citizens and citizenship and the common
good. At its simplest, you appear to be suggesting professionals in the
private sector are biased in their research and knowledge creation because
they have a money making motive, and that researchers in research
universities are paid to do work for citizenship and common good and are
unsullied by such money driven biases. You seemed to me to be also
suggesting the quality and impartiality of the research from research
universities is therefore better than undertaken by profit-driven
professionals in industry and business.
You seemed to be explicitly stating the above in the following and your
writing around it <snip> ' Even though professionals are citizens who
presumably act on behalf of the larger society, high social status and power
engender forms of corruption that are not always measured in vice and
venality, but may be measured in rent-seeking and self-serving behavior. The
argument of professional conspiracy appears in Adam Smith (1976: 144). It
appears again as one aspect of the corrosion of character in Richard Sennett
(1998).'
The above quote, was what I reposted asking whether this applied to academcs
and scholars (which clearly seemed not to be your intention). By asking
whether this was referring to academics and scholars, it offers the space to
reflect on whether the opposite of your position (if I interpreted it right)
might be more true. That is, the research done in business and industry is
less corrupted and biased than that undertaken by academics and scholars.
The reasoning as to why this might be so goes as follows:
1. The management of research university activities and priorities is driven
by metrics defined by others. These include for example, government
research assessment exercises, and internal comparative metrics used to
identify which universities and which areas within particular universities
should get more investment - usually in terms of comparative 'bang for the
buck' in whatever what that is defined by the metrics.
2. As Deming (1986, Out of the Crisis, MIT Press) identified, the use of
metrics results in changes of behaviour dedicated to maximising the metrics
and this causes reduction in quality of output. It's a more general theory
from systems that the use of metrics results in local sub-optimisation.
3. In the case of research universities, this suggests academics and
scholars will produce work to maximise benefits under the metrics (either
under their own volition,, or because they are directed by their management
to do so). The result will always differ from that without the metrics. If
the non-metric driven state is the 'pure' environment in which researchers
act unsullied by the factors you attribute to 'professionals' outside
research universities, then research in a metric-shaped environment will
always be comprised to some extent. This is due to the metric-driven
rent-seeking and self-serving behaviours and related professional conspiracy
that you referred to - except seeing it as referring to academics and
scholars rather than professionals in business.
4. My observation is this metric driven behaviour in research universities
is easy to see. In Australia, it is reflected in the obsessions to obtain
ARC and NHMRC research funding, regardless of the reality that this funding
is always insufficient and hence rips research funding out of other areas
and results in other valuable research not being undertaken. It can also be
seen in the large amount of research and research papers produced, and PhDs
undertaken that are in the 'so what' category. In the UK, it can be seen in
the need for active researchers to do a 'big job' paper each year. All over
the world, it can be seen in the industry of academics and scholars to
produce articles, papers and books that are hardly read. Hands up, how many
have read all the papers in say Design Studies last year? Reading many
academic and scholarly research papers has often left me with the feeling
there were other explanations than the findings that explained the data, or
that assumptions were unjustified or the research was addressing a
multidisciplinary issue from within a single speciality that resulted in an
overly narrow understanding and sometimes misunderstanding. The overall
effect is a picture of bias due to the effects of metrics and disciplinary
blinkered-ness.
5. In contrast, by observation, research undertaken for the purposes of
design in business is honest because it is mostly only commissioned when
needed and is typically not strongly shaped by metric driven biases. For
example, research needed to investigate how to improve the design of (say) a
blow out preventer is direct, and the research methodology and data are
tightly described and recorded, and then often shared through professional
institutions. Typically, such research work happens in the industry context
rather than at universities.
6. The significant reductions in funding of universities by governments over
the last 2 decades, the concern about the quality of research training in
universities, and the adoption by universities of of business practices and
a profit model suggests a sea change in their position on research vis a
vis industry. In fact, in Australia at least, the undertaking of research by
universities is a relatively recent phenomenon. In other countries also, the
weight of research activity has often primarily resided outside the
university systems
The above combination of factors suggests perhaps that industry outside
universities may be the real home of unbiased high quality research for the
common good. This is somewhat opposite what you seemed to be suggesting in
your post to GK?
Best wishes ,
Terry
---
Dr Terence Love
PhD(UWA), BA(Hons) Engin. PGCEd,
FDRS, AMIMechE, PMACM, MISI
Director,
Love Services Pty Ltd
PO Box 226, Quinns Rocks
Western Australia 6030
Tel: +61 (0)4 3497 5848
Fax:+61 (0)8 9305 7629
[log in to unmask]
--
-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Ken
Friedman
Sent: Tuesday, 30 July 2013 7:07 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: The Ox is On My Tongue
Dear Terry,
This question is not a question about design thinking, but a question of
human nature and human behavior. I have therefore changed the header from
"Re: More on Design Thinking" to "The ox is on my tongue." (Line 38 of The
Agamemnon by Aeschylus.)
You asked whether my comment on rent-seeking and self-serving behavior
described researchers and scholars. Researchers and scholars are as guilty
of these vices as consultants and professional practitioners are.
Adam Smith was scathing in his criticism of Oxford University. Smith studied
at Balliol College, returning to Scotland with lasting contempt for the
English university system.
The problems I describe apply to universities. Even so, I propose a
distinction between universities and consulting firms. Researchers and
scholars are paid in annual salaries and our salaries are established across
the university by pay grade. We do not charge clients by the hour. We are
not paid to reach specific conclusions, but rather to examine issues and to
reach the conclusions supported by evidence.
Despite this, some professors find ways to increase their salaries. Some do
so by consulting. Therefore, they increase their salaries by maximizing
their hours. In some of these cases, professors reach the conclusions that
meet the needs of those who pay for the research.
Which goes to show you that researchers and scholars, like designers,
lawyers, and engineers, are human.
Toward the end of the movie Unforgiven, the Schofield Kid talks about
killing a villain named Quick Mike. Even though Quick Mike was a scoundrel
and a brute, the Kid feels guilty for shooting him. The Kid says: "Well, I
guess he had it coming." Will Munny, the protagonist of the movie gives this
some thought. He replies, "We all have it coming, Kid."
I suppose you can say this about everyone who takes on human form.
Professors or professionals, designers or ditch-diggers, cowboys or
consultants, none of us is perfect and we all have it coming.
"In the long run," as Lord Keynes famously said, "we are all dead." From Job
and Ecclesiastes through the Oresteia and the Theban trilogy, the verdict is
the same.
Since researchers and scholars are human, then, yes, this is about
researchers and scholars as well as professional practitioners in the many
fields of practice.
People would understand a great deal more about the world were they to read
Aeschylus and Sophocles along with Herbert Simon and Christopher Alexander.
Or at least they'd know a great deal more about themselves and what it is to
be human.
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