Are there actually any public policy candidates left on the market?
[closed]
Canada
(168 posts) (24 voices)-
Posted 2 years ago #
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Any updates on what's happening at Waterloo and and Laval? Has an offer been extended at Laval?
Posted 2 years ago # -
Any updates on what's happening at Waterloo and and Laval? Has an offer been extended at Laval?
Posted 2 years ago # -
I know it's anonymous and all, but trust me, I know how searches work. The thing is that as a candidate, it's incumbent upon you to pitch your talk to appeal to a broad enough coalition, especially when you know that there are important differences such as those at UofT. It takes experience to understand that, so I'm not surprised that the candidates weren't able to do it.
I know the retort: you have no idea how idiosyncratic the process is, especially at a place like Toronto.
To which I reply: first, there's lots of info on those idiosyncracies. It's not like the place is under the radar. Second, presumably the candidates got some amount of inside info. I mean, let's be real, we all know how searches work, and we all know that they have friends (well, at least a friend:). Third, it can be done (e.g., look at the recent past). You just have to be good, polished, politically savvy, etc.
Posted 2 years ago # -
"To which I reply:..."
LOL I think you dropped your monocle there, douchehound.
Posted 2 years ago # -
"(e.g., look at the recent past)"
The UofT has indeed hired in the...recent past. Umm, great observation. :s
Love it, ABC. Bring on more wisdom please.
Posted 2 years ago # -
No problem. I'm really comfortable making observations from where I stand. I know it hurts, especially when you're the ones not getting job offers. But keep thinking that the reason that all 3 candidates didn't get an offer was the department's idiosyncracies, insanity, etc. I'm sure it helps cushion the blow.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Holy crap I'm so glad I'm not Canadian. All these assholes piling on to taunt the UT interviewees, via the extraordinarily passive-aggressive technique of pious faux-lectures about how smart people go about getting hired. I have no idea who these people are, but I'm guessing they've all got a lot more going for them, and have much brighter futures, than the small minded failures gleefully pissing on their graves.
Posted 2 years ago # -
^ Yeah, no kidding. I'd prefer a straightforward belligerent, rude **** to this sort.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Maybe the lesson here is that it's time to stop with the nonsense of "Canadian Politics" as a subfield. It's parochial and intellectually bankrupt. Canada is a case in comparative politics. There's no earthy reason to train a political scientist to focus on one sole case. Comparativists who focus on Canada as one of their major cases should be able to teach basic courses in Canadian politics, which of course is a necessary part of the undergraduate curriculum. It's ridiculous overspecialization, and it's obviously limiting to the process of accumulating actual knowledge about the political world.
Hopefully, this failed search is a sign that major departments at Canadian universities are figuring this out. I doubt it, but one can hope.
(And yes, I know the problem is just as bad south of the border. But the US has been a belligerent, un-self aware empire addicted to the myth of its own exceptionalism for a long time. Not a model worthy of emulation)
Posted 2 years ago # -
^ Obvious Troll is obvious.
Posted 2 years ago # -
I like the current set of junior Canadianists, the ones who interviewed here and a handful of others. The seniors and about-to-retires are one thing, but when I look at the associates that are going to be "leading the field" in the years to come, I cringe.
Posted 2 years ago # -
^ Think about it--perhaps the people who comprise the field are intellectually bankrupt because it's intellectually bankrupt to treat "Canadian POlitics" as a field? Does it ever occur to you there might be a relationship here?
Posted 2 years ago # -
Yes, blah blah blah, area studies are bad, yawn. You need to have this discussion with the rest of your PhD cohort, son. Buy them a round as thanks for politely listening.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Think about a book like Ran Hirschl's Towards Juristocracy. Hirschl's a very smart, up and coming politics scholar in Canada. His book covered Israel, NZ, South Africa and Canada. If he'd written a book on judicial review in Canada only, because he'd been trained to do that sort of thing by narrow scholars in thrall of the idea of a Canadian field, he'd have written a book that, however godo and well done it had been, would have been nowhere near as important or interesting as the book he wrote.
Good thing for Hirschl he wasn't trained in Canada.
Posted 2 years ago # -
"I'd prefer a straightforward belligerent, rude **** to this sort"
Oh hey, was someone looking for me?
abc, you lick hairy goat balls. I saw you, at that Montreal club during CPSA last summer. Why the ****'d you bring on goat on stage? The act was great until then. Especially the monocle bit.
Goat soup: you nailed it, but I know you're just pissed about abc and the goat.
UofT isn't insane. They don't even suck (although don't tell that to the entitled **** in their grad program). But they need to trim some of the deadwood downtown, or stupid **** like this will keep happening.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Personally, I am tired of conceptual stretching between states and meaningless comparison for the sake of pleasing reviewers like Hans, who don't do comparative work but think it's cool because a handful of bad UofT academics told him it is.
Anyway, I'm sure that Hans is already a much better scholar than, I don't know, Alan Cairns.
Also funny that big sophisticated comparativist uses one case to make his argument. lol
Posted 2 years ago # -
[Thread Closed]
If you would like to reopen threads about each individual search in the proper forums then feel free. If you would like to discuss the merits of subfields like Canadian politics then please open a thread in the proper forum.
The days of the omnibus Canadian thread are over.
Posted 2 years ago #
Topic Closed
This topic has been closed to new replies.