Abstract

In his paper ‘On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs: A Work Rant’, David Graeber argued that since the beginning of the 20th century, we have witnessed the creation of a vast array of new jobs. Graeber claimed that a large part of these jobs can be defined as 'Bullshit jobs', which he describes as: “meaningless jobs that even the employee cannot justify its existence even though at the same time the employee feels obliged to pretend that this is not the case.” (Graeber, 2018:19).
The ballooning of the academic administrative staff has been demonstrated by authors such as Delucchi et al. (2021) and Ginsberg (2011). In his provocative book ‘The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University’, Benjamin Ginsberg (2011) wrote that: “Little would be lost if all pending administrative retreats and conferences, as well as four of every five staff meetings, were cancelled.” (p41). Such a statement challenges the relevance of Research Management & Administration jobs, both for academic institutions and society at large.
This raises the question: is there an increase in bullshit jobs in RMA? And if so, what can we do about it? In this presentation I will explore these malodorous questions and try to find some freshening answers. I will contend that we need to be wary of 'Bullshit tasks' in the RMA-profession and develop strategies to stop their proliferation.

References
Delucchi, M. Dadzie, R., Dean, E. and Pham, X. (2021). What’s that smell? Bullshit jobs in higher education, Review of Social Economy, DOI: 10.1080/00346764.2021.1940255
Ginsberg, B. (2011). The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University, Oxford University Press.
Graeber, D. (2013). On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs: A Work Rant. Strike! Magazine, Issue 3, August. https://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/
Graeber, D. (2018). Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. Simon & Schuster, New York.