Bullying and Astronomy
Yesterday I gave a talk at the UK Euclid Consortium (EC) Meeting in London in my role as Chair of the ECDC (Euclid Consortium Diversity Committee). I didn’t actually go to London, but delivered my talk virtually (not without a few hiccups, but I won’t go into that). My presentation was just a short one, outlining some of the things the ECDC does and encouraging others to get involved. One of the matters arising was the EC Code of Conduct, which has recently been updated. This document covers work within the EC generally, as well as specific rules governing EC-sponsored events, such as the meeting I spoke at. Incidentally, one of the latter rules is that organizers should facilitate virtual attendance at meetings, which they clearly did for me yesterday!
Coincidentally, there was a news item in Nature today that reminded me of a post on this blog from a couple of years ago. That was when news first broke of a bullying scandal at the University of Lund, specifically in the historic Lund Observatory, home of the Astronomy Department. Two professors were involved, Sofia Feltzing and Melvyn Davies. As far as I understand the situation, both are still employed by the University, in the Department of Geology and the Department of Mathematics respectively.
The latest news from Lund is that in the aftermath of this scandal, the Astronomy Department has been closed and the staff previously in it subsumed into Physics. That’s a pretty drastic step. In my experience forced mergers of departments, though popular with autocratic managers, are usually counterproductive from the point of view of staff morale. Precisely what the closure of the Lund Observatory after 350 years is meant to achieve is beyond me, but I assume that the atmosphere there had become so toxic that the authorities couldn’t think of anything else to do.
This is a demonstration of something I’ve often said in talks about EDI work. When matters come to formal disciplinary process – if they ever do – the outcome is almost never satisfactory in any respect, not least because the outcomes are often concealed by Non-Disclosure Agreements. The only really hope of creating an inclusive workplace is to ensure that bullying and harassment don’t happen in the first place, or are snuffed out very early on. Early intervention, mediation and conflict resolution are far more likely to provide a successful outcome than formal processes. The problem is that junior members of a department, who are most likely to be the target of bullying, do not feel empowered to make a complaint until it’s too late.
A binding Code of Conduct is one thing, but in order to work it has to be able to be enforced. That is why I agree with the approach suggested by the 21 Group, namely that there should be independent investigators for such matters whose conclusions are binding.
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This entry was posted on December 15, 2023 at 10:05 am and is filed under Euclid, Harassment Bullying etc with tags Code of Conduct, Euclid, Euclid Consortium Diversity Committee, Lund Observatory, Melvyn Davies, Sofia Feltzing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
In the Dark 
December 15, 2023 at 11:48 am
The merger happened because the management failed, or did not really try, to either remove Feltzing from the university (as should have happened) or move her away from the rest of the astronomers. The rest of the department was united in saying that her return to the Observatory would be disastrous. Management decided that they couldn’t move her out of the department, so the department had to cease to exist.
December 15, 2023 at 8:34 pm
It is a sad story. Two quotes from the article stand out:
“The longer a bullying situation drags on, the more traumatic the situation becomes”
“The university took so long to find a solution, it was nearly impossible to do science at times during the past few years”
The failure of senior management to deal with bullying always makes the situation far worse for everyone.
December 16, 2023 at 8:38 am
My own view on bullying & harassment has become that we are all collectively responsible for the behaviour of all academics in our department.
We should all take responsibility for our colleague’s behaviour if/when a complaint is made. We should take ownership of a departmental improvement plan. This keeps the problem outside official channels and HR, which as Peter notes rarely have a good outcome. In fact, usually, the outcome is a complete catastrophe, as we see with the closing of Lund Observatory.
Of course, this requires everyone not to look away when a colleague behaves badly. And it requires prompt action, before bullying behaviour takes hold & the situation becomes irreparable.
—–
Written submissions to the Select Committee on UK astronomy — looking inter alia at its culture — are here
https://committees.parliament.uk/work/7918/uk-astronomy/publications/written-evidence/?page=1
December 16, 2023 at 11:49 am
In the article about Lund Observatory, the professors involved are still at the University. One moved to Mathematics Department, and other to Geology. All the other former astrologers moved into the Physics Department, and the Observatory itself shutdown. A very strange solution.
I looked randomly at the investigation papers and saw that the woman professor had very vigorously questioned a presentation. It started off as part of the scientific process of wanting to understand the science and went out of hand. Feltzing admitting had gone to far. There also seemed to be a generational problem in that Feltzing and Davies wanted a more interactive session at the whiteboard, and the accuser wanted to run a movie presentation. The two senior professors at the centre of controversy seemed to believe they had more leadership weight than actually had. They were not the other academics bosses.
Back when was a Phd Student at QMC had to do informal friday lunch time lectures/presentation in the Astronomy Unit occasionally.. In my first went for a over serious presentation of magnetic fields and convection. Some quite established academics didn’t have any qualms about intensively questioning a young student, especially the guest speaker for the main lecture that night. At the time, it seemed an expected roasting, and educational. I certainly didn’t enjoy it, and learnt to make further presentations at the lunch time event much more light hearted, Maybe the present snowflake generation would consider this bullying? I suppose it depends if the intensity goes beyond any scientifc/ education purpose. Lund University also had a problem disciplining Feltzing especially, because sacking one of the few woman astrophysics professors in Sweden, wouldn’t have looked good either. The more think about this case it is quite a minefield. Don’t envy the decisions the university authorities had to make at all.
December 16, 2023 at 1:43 pm
Lol by english is so bad, I have made the funny mistake astrologers when meant astronomers. There isn’t an edit/delete button to correct.
December 17, 2023 at 10:30 pm
Many years ago I was at an astronomy department that was also disbanded and merged to another partly because of bad atmosphere (though there were other reasons, too). At least in that case it was the right thing to do. The astronomy department was small, so if the bad players were removed, there would have been hardly any seniors left anyway.
December 18, 2023 at 11:08 am
It can sometimes be the right thing to do, as small departments are particularly susceptible to being dominated by a bad player (as you say).
Here, though, it looks a bit odd.
As John Simmons points out, those accused of bullying are being exiled to Mathematics or Geology.
It is not clear why the Observatory is being shut — it looks like a “punishment beating” of the innocent by senior management.
But, perhaps there is a reason to do with facilities or funding?
December 18, 2023 at 11:14 am
I wonder if the Departments of Geology and Mathematics were consulted before these new members were added to them?
December 19, 2023 at 8:40 am
To the best of my understanding, the leadership of both Mathematics and Geology were consulted and OKed it. Whether there was any internal discussion including, to pick a non-random example, any of the PhD students or postdocs I do not know.
Wyn: The official justification has always been that the astronomers need to ‘integrate’ with the rest of their new department colleagues in Physics by moving into their building. That they are just over the road seems not to be sufficiently close for this. It feels a lot like a punishment, but financial factors may be at play too.