GEORGE FLOYD’S DEATH AND THE 2020 PROTESTS

Claims of disproportionate service burdens have long been reported in the profession. In addition to well-documented assertions that departments, colleges, and universities are fraught with insult and degradation (Fraser-Burgess et al. Reference Fraser-Burgess, Warren-Gordon, Humphrey and Lowery2021; Rodríguez Reference Rodríguez2012), existing literature reveals the ways women academics and faculty of color are overrepresented on committees that involve more service than prestige and that advance neither their salaries nor academic careers (Alter et al. Reference Alter, Clipperton, Schraudenbach and Rozier2020; Anonymous and Anonymous 1999; APSA Political Science in the 21^st Century 2011; Mitchell and Hesli Reference Mitchell and Hesli2013; Nair Reference Nair2018). Take, for example, ad hoc committees on institutional diversity in the wake of George Floyd’s death. Colleges and universities faced a moment of reckoning with demands for racial justice, putting faculty of color in a precarious position if they saw themselves as part of a continuum of activism linking police shootings, on-campus protests, and the Black Lives Matter movement. Although it is incumbent on us all to seek a more equitable and antiracist society, faculty of color can feel obliged to do so because of the insidious nature of racism on campuses. Still, it should not be assumed that they have such an interest.

Standing in solidarity with those who are marginalized is no easy task. Thus, we cannot emphasize enough the importance of ally training. The stakes are high, especially when universities, through their practices and policies, are as complicit in injustice as are police departments and juries that refuse to acknowledge the humanity of people of color (Fraser-Burgess et al. Reference Fraser-Burgess, Warren-Gordon, Humphrey and Lowery2021). It is especially frustrating when departments and other academic units resist elevating the discourse and oppose efforts to remedy systemic inequalities. Although the practice of cluster hires can promote diversity and the inclusion of faculty of color, especially Black faculty, or of scholars whose work focuses on racial and ethnic disparities, the recruitment and hiring process is time consuming and emotionally exhausting for those involved in such a campus-wide approach. Our concern is not with the initiative itself, but the labor costs associated with conducting multiple searches at once. Although many faculty have dreamed of such hiring initiatives, given the low percentage of faculty of color in political science who identify as Black (4.88%), Latino (5.92%), or Asian (7.34%), the labor involved in serving on these hiring committees is considerable, and more attention to work-life balance is needed for those involved in the recruitment process, especially women academics and faculty of color (APSA 2020 Dashboard Data Report).

The classroom is a diverse social setting and resembles an incubator for democratic inclusion. To respond effectively to the call to promote equity and inclusion, we in our respective departments, colleges, and universities, as well as disciplines, must—through the research we publish, the authors we invite to speak, the courses we teach, and the individuals we hire—raise colleague awareness and inform successive generations of students entering the workforce that these seemingly intractable problems are rooted in socioeconomic and political systems that entrench structural power and privilege in the hands of a few. As such, it becomes increasingly important for all faculty and students to develop and refine skills needed to practice political knowledge and cultural competence, which in no way displaces the collective responsibilities of educational institutions.

Take, for example, the protests that followed George Floyd’s death. They created the need for interpretive labor to help others within the university, discipline, and community writ large understand state-sanctioned anti-Black violence. There was an immediate response and extraordinary desire to draft statements, organize forums, and coordinate workshops involving such antiracist activists as Robin DiAngelo and Ibram X. Kendi. The demand for faculty of color to write op-eds and blog posts and to facilitate webinars was exceptional as well. Although most would concede that the work is necessary, it was arduous and unevenly distributed among these faculty. Given their low numbers and concentration in junior ranks, women academics and faculty of color necessarily serve above their skill level as the most junior and least experienced members of ad hoc committees for institutional diversity and inclusion, when they are not experts in handling grievances and demands on a university-wide scale. Absent diverse support networks, ally training, and a measured approach, women academics and faculty of color are likely to experience role strain. Addressing racial inequities requires a concerted and coordinated effort shared by deans, directors, and department heads who influence large numbers of faculty, students, and staff.

In response to George Floyd’s death, racial initiatives included but were not limited to changes to curriculum requirements, climate surveys, focus groups, town halls, and symbolic marches. Although it is the responsibility of the university’s chief diversity officer (CDO) to inform such institutional responses and be a resource for faculty, staff, and students alike, in many cases, these burdens fell disproportionately onto the shoulders of faculty of color: they committed evening and weekend hours to diversity-related service that simultaneously interfered with their wellness during a global public health emergency. They were working these long hours at the same time they were coping with the impact of repeated exposures to incidents of police shootings in the media and the rapid spread of the coronavirus in their communities. Although this moment afforded them an opportunity to interpret a groundswell of civic participation and activism, as well as its public impact, they seemingly emerged as props, to be displayed by the universities that employed them. Some faculty of color spent considerable time and energy both behind the scenes and on the frontlines organizing street-level protests, despite the risk of contracting the coronavirus alongside activists on the ground.

COVID-19

It is important to consider the disparate impact of COVID-19, just as we have the murder of George Floyd. Women academics and faculty of color, as a group, already juggled more domestic and affective, or emotional, labor prior to the pandemic (Argyle and Mendelberg Reference Argyle and Mendelberg2020). For women with multiple roles—be they ethnic, gender, or familial—the coronavirus exacerbated inequities, making it more difficult to find balance between different kinds of work (research, teaching, mentoring, and service) while at the same time stripping them of essential supports such as childcare that better equipped them to strike that balance. Early data showed that COVID-19 adversely affected women’s research productivity as evidenced by “unusual” and “gendered patterns” of overall submissions according to editors of lead journals in the discipline (Flaherty Reference Flaherty2020; Kramer Reference Kramer2020).

Studies have shown that women and men devote significantly different amounts of time to caregiving; for example, with preschool children or elderly parents (Jacobs and Winslow Reference Jacobs and Winslow2004; Schiebinger and Gilmartin Reference Schiebinger and Gilmartin2010; Stack Reference Stack2004; Windsor and Crawford Reference Windsor and Crawford2020b). These allocations of time are rooted in work and family arrangements over which life partners and significant others had limited control and to which they had to respond in creative, if not satisfying, ways to address crises brought about by COVID-19. For female-headed single-parent households, the labor involved in meal preparation, helping children with remote learning, caring for the sick and elderly, as well as for babies and young children, exacted a physical toll. Whereas two-parent households might have been able to juggle their schedules to accommodate faculty meetings or online course instruction, a single parent might have had to choose between missing a faculty meeting or arranging elder care or childcare. Thus, the single parent may have had unequal opportunities to participate in certain faculty activities as compared with others and may have paid a considerable cost if there was a “child-free” departmental culture.Footnote ¹

Understanding the larger contexts in which coping strategies are crafted is necessary before making recommendations that will influence how the professoriate looks several years from now and that go beyond institutional responses that prioritize budgetary imperatives (Minello Reference Minello2020; Sax et al. Reference Sax, Hagedorn, Arredondo and Dicrisi2002; Windsor and Crawford Reference Windsor and Crawford2020b). Although work–life balance issues exist for all faculty members, it can have deleterious effects on the careers of women academics, especially mothers of young children and faculty of color with aging parents or sick partners. Orders to stay at home, social distance, self-quarantine, and restrict travel intrude on field research, interview protocols, focus group preparations, experimental laboratories, and use of big data repositories. The devaluation and classification of care work at home as gendered, racialized, and classed have resulted in a lack of institutional prioritization by administrators who favor austerity measures over systems of support. Because women academics and faculty of color are typically paid less than their white male colleagues and single parents have fewer economic resources and support options (Guarino and Borden Reference Guarino and Victor2017; Mason, Wolfinger, and Goulden Reference Mason, Wolfinger and Goulden2013; Mitchell and Hesli Reference Mitchell and Hesli2013), they will have a harder time coping with capitalist imperatives to impose furloughs, cancel merit raises, reduce salaries, extend budget cuts, and suspend matching contributions to retirement accounts.

The demand for more web-based instruction and online communication has made it increasingly difficult to set clear boundaries in our academic lives (Crook Reference Crook2020; Windsor and Crawford Reference Windsor and Crawford2020a). Before the pandemic, professors worked on average more than 50 hours a week, regardless of institution type and at all ranks, based on data from a national survey of postsecondary faculty in the United States (Jacobs and Winslow Reference Jacobs and Winslow2004). During the pandemic, as we moved from classrooms to living rooms and personal home offices, the amount of time spent on research shifted between weekdays and weeknights, the working week and weekends, and holidays and vacations. Faculty work hours increased greatly to accommodate the move of classes to hybrid and online formats, cutting further into research time; given that research productivity counts most toward career advancement, this affected junior faculty the most. Increased faculty work demands were accompanied by equally substantial changes in responsibilities at home, particularly for those with school-aged children. This posed a catch-22 for women academics and faculty of color, as new work–family crises emerged—given that wives perform a larger share of the parenting and domestic tasks in heterosexual marital arrangements and people of color are more likely to experience increased anxiety and stress because of the higher rates at which their families became infected, developed serious complications, or died from COVID-19 (Jackson and Pederson Reference Jackson and Pederson2020; Misra, Lundquist, and Templer Reference Misra, Lundquist and Templer2012). Women academics and faculty of color were the hardest hit and the least able to rebound from the impacts of this pandemic because they faced intense pressures to fulfill faculty responsibilities at work and domestic duties at home simultaneously.

Many women academics, especially Black women academics, have come to accept the expectation that they will neglect self-care to support children, parents, and extended family members; during the pandemic, this care burden increased as families were in isolation, and existing support networks were depleted (Beauboeuf-Lafontant Reference Beauboeuf-Lafontant2009; Jackson and Pederson Reference Jackson and Pederson2020; Matthews Reference Matthews2020). Black women are especially vulnerable to chronic psychological stress, a result of early health deterioration and the cumulative impact of their persistent, high-effort coping with systemic inequality as they strive to put others at ease and counteract negative stereotypes of themselves (Alexander-Floyd Reference Alexander-Floyd2015; Geronimus et al. Reference Geronimus, Hicken, Keene and Bound2006; Matthews Reference Matthews2020; Michelson and Lavariega Monforti Reference Michelson and Monforti2021; Simien Reference Simien2020). The belief that Black women are tireless, deeply caring, and invulnerable has helped maintain exploitive hierarchical arrangements at home and in the workplace (Beauboeuf-Lafontant Reference Beauboeuf-Lafontant2009) while contributing to negative health outcomes and such chronic conditions as diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease that made the coronavirus more deadly (Simien Reference Simien2020).

RECOMMENDATIONS

Some of these systemic factors associated with George Floyd’s death and the pandemic may be beyond the scope and control of departments, colleges, and universities—and even the profession. Still, we offer a list of recommendations to counteract their negative impacts on women academics and faculty of color. If they prioritize these initiatives, universities can reallocate existing departmental, college, provost, and university funds to support them.

For faculty facing additional service following Floyd’s death, the hiring of additional faculty members of color may be a necessary action. It is critical to distribute the service roles related to diversity and inclusion more equitably, with ally training made available to all employees at the university. Institutions should provide additional resources that support faculty who wish to revise their course syllabi or offer programs that address anti-Black racism. Making sympathetic faculty aware of available funds, competitive awards, teaching center workshops, and technical support could be very effective, aiding faculty members of color who otherwise would be disproportionately burdened by these tasks.

As did the antiracism protests, the pandemic revealed the reluctance of federal, state, and local governments under the Trump administration to reduce social inequalities and systemic racism through newly created policy measures and additional resources. In these unprecedented times we should explore contradictions within higher education institutions that cause them, like government, to be slow to acknowledge faculty concerns, create new policies, and allocate resources. Policies that would provide robust support include the following:

• • paid leave for parents with pressing childcare or elder care needs

• • childcare subsidies

• • flexible class schedules, including evening and weekend options, and offering multiple sections of the same course

• • grading and teaching support from an additional teaching assistant

• • alternative work arrangements like shared teaching responsibilities

• • course reductions

• • tenure clock extensions

• • adjustments made to tenure standards, especially in areas that have normally undervalued the contributions made by women academics and faculty of color

• • waiving all nonessential service for departmental or campus-wide committees, even recording departmental meetings so that they can be accessed asynchronously

• • pausing student evaluations for the duration of the pandemic

• • offering telehealth services among other resources for self-care and optimal safety

There must be a shift in what administrators, coworkers, partners, and families expect from women academics and faculty of color. Institutions have varied in their responses to the pandemic, many creating ad hoc systems whereby individual faculty members had to make a case before their chair or dean to receive accommodations.

Such ad hoc systems illuminate the power hierarchies that structure interactions between faculty members and university administrators. Given the tension between the faculty member’s right to privacy and the need to make a persuasive case that merits accommodation, the disclosure process can trigger an involuntary recall of personal trauma and evoke unanticipated emotional reactions. Ad hoc systems offer faculty members some degree of autonomy but heighten their vulnerability. It would behoove institutions to set up necessary resources, supports, and counseling in advance of these conversations. Although it is impossible to anticipate all topics that might be discussed, administrators might benefit from a forewarning of certain topics in preparation for hearing potentially disturbing narratives. Being sensitive to such candid testimony would help alleviate faculty members’ anxiety, given the additional emotional, cognitive, and physical labor that goes unrecognized at this unprecedented time (Kramer Reference Kramer2020; Scheiber Reference Scheiber2020).

In keeping with this ad hoc systems approach, a self-assessment of service differentials should be administered across and within departments, colleges, and universities, controlling for such determinants as race, ethnicity, gender, marital status, and rank. This would raise the awareness of department chairs and deans of how service assignments are being allocated; colleagues’ awareness of service loads would also enable women academics and faculty of color to accept or decline service requests at the same rates as others (Flaherty Reference Flaherty2017). In short, greater institutional efforts and accountability at the administrative level are necessary.

Although some institutions have conducted preliminary surveys on COVID-19 and its impact on faculty, we are unaware of any surveys that include items related to George Floyd’s death and the protests that followed this event. These data would capture how faculty members view these challenges as influencing their well-being and career trajectory. Any policies that are implemented to provide support should be evaluated routinely by faculty in terms of their efficacy. Regular data collection would facilitate sustained dialogue about the systems and policies put in place and indicate when reevaluation of them is needed to assess whether they are working as intended and effectively over time. Reforms that are instituted immediately may be short-term solutions to the interactive, cumulative effects of these combined events that exacerbated preexisting structural inequalities at universities. Yet, the long-term goal must be to institute a more comprehensive but targeted approach from both top-down and bottom-up perspectives for the purpose of dismantling the structures that perpetuate disproportionate service, thereby ensuring equitable treatment at higher education institutions.

Although considerable progress has been made in tackling the coronavirus pandemic and nearly all institutions of higher education have made the decision to return to in-person classes, the pandemic is far from over. Faculty continue to raise concerns about the health and safety practices on their campuses, given relaxed social distancing and other preventive measures, like volunteer masking versus mandates, absent a layered approach that includes masking, ventilation, quarantining, and social distancing (Olberding Reference Olberding2021; Petit Reference Pettit2021). For faculty with young children who are not eligible for vaccination or only recently became eligible, rising surges among the unvaccinated, while access to reliable childcare remains difficult, are particularly worrisome. And so, institutions of higher education must be adept at revising their support mechanisms and implementing policies for the benefit of those who have been disproportionately affected by the protests that followed George Floyd’s death and the pandemic.

Future research might explore explicit ways that allies can contribute to these efforts both in terms of antiracism and disproportionate service, including how legal structures outside academe might protect women academics and faculty of color from being the target of harassment by right-wing conservatives. It is recommended to compile a list of best practices at colleges and universities, including both bottom-up and top-down approaches that involve administrators, faculty, staff, and students alike. Finally, political science associations like the APSA or individual organized sections should consider ways they can similarly institute reforms to offset disproportionate service and support anti-Black racism efforts via section awards, research grants, conference events, and short courses. Adding to the list of recommendations and identifying more ways that the profession can support these efforts can only enhance our current understanding of disproportionate service burdens for women academics and faculty of color. Whether the proposed reforms outlined here are accepted or contested by the discipline remains to be determined by our academic institutions and colleagues in the profession.