Berkeley's Betrayal - Public Sociology @ Berkeley - University of ...

CHAPTER 3: DIGNITY AND RESPECTU.C. Berkeley says it values its workers and regards them as its greatest resource, but theuniversity’s actions speak louder than its words. Although many workers have built supportivecommunities with their colleagues, and some individual supervisors are liked a great deal,workers we talked with feel unappreciated by the university and report a barrage of daily indignitiesin their encounters with authorities. We were surprised to find that seemingly “minor” indignitiescaused workers as much anguish as did the “major” injuries of insufficient incomes andunhealthy working conditions. They are as outraged by the intangible insults of such everydayindignities as they are by the concrete economic and physical injuries they suffer.Why is this the case? Workers’ sensitivity to everyday insults is symptomatic of their deeperand more profound disappointment and loss of trust in their employer. Typically, people startwork at the university assuming that a public institution dedicated to higher education would alsotreat its workers as members of a community. Yet sooner or later, each one of them experiencesan event, a “crucial test,” which tells them that they are simply cogs in a money-makingmachine rather than human beings who are valued members of a community that comes togetherto serve a higher educational purpose. During such crucial tests, workers find their health, wellbeing,comfort, knowledge, or security compromised simply because the university is trying tosave time and money. These critical events clarify for them the university’s view of its workersas dispensable objects rather than full-fledged human beings; workers are led to the disturbingrevelation, “So this is all I am worth to the university!”Many of the workers describe deep psychological distress at discovering that their humanityis, in itself, not a sufficient reason for the university to address their work-related problems.Instead, they find that the only way to receive recognition from the university is by frighteningor annoying it, or by threatening to pose some significant cost to the university that exceedsthe cost of solving the initial problem. But even if workers succeed by using such tactics,“winning” in this way does little to ameliorate the humiliation, grief, and anger they feel overneeding to struggle to receive basic recognition as human beings and respected members of theuniversity community.22