Hi all,
Sorry to be a
bit late to the party in writing up my initial blog post. Since I’m nominally the one who is
responsible for dragging Die Familie Copelovitch halfway around the world, I
thought I’d take some time and answer some of the pressing questions that you
might have about our Berlin adventures.
Here goes…
OK, so what’s the
deal here? This is a year-long vacation “boondoggle” in Europe, right?
Well, no, not exactly. While there
will certainly be elements of both European vacation and boondoggle, we are living
in Berlin for my sabbatical year. I am on leave from my job as Associate
Professor in the Department of Political Science and the La Follette School of
Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin – Madison, where I teach and
study international political economy (i.e., the politics of international
trade, money, and finance) and international organizations (boring further
details on my professional life and research, for those interested, can be
found here: https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/copelovitch/web/Site/HOME.html). I am
spending the academic year as a Visiting Scholar at the Hertie School of
Governance (http://www.hertie-school.org/).
Hertie is a decade-old public policy school in Berlin, with an excellent
group of scholars in political science, economics, sociology, law, and public management. I have several professional colleagues
and friends here, and it seemed like an ideal place to spend the year focusing
on my new research projects. I
will also teach one seminar in the Master of Public Policy program on the
politics of international money and finance.
What is this
“sabbatical” of which you speak?
Don’t you lazy professors/parasitic public employees/effete
intellectuals ever work?
I was all prepared to write up a
detailed explanation and defense of the academic sabbatical, but then I saw
that our good friend, Ankur Desai (who is with his family on their own UW
sabbatical in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany) has already written an excellent
description of the rationale for sabbatical, what it is and is not, etc., on the
Desai family’s own sabbatical blog (http://5badgers.wordpress.com/). Take it away, Professor Desai:
The root of “sabbatical” is the Biblical word Shabbat
(Hebrew) or Sabbath (English) – the idea that the 7th day of creation, G-d
rested and so should we (and eat salmon and challah) [MSC: Ankur, I’m pretty sure G-d wanted some meat in his cholent on
Shabbat, but that’s another discussion…]. Later, somewhere in Exodus
I think, comes the commandment that every seven years, all land must be left fallow
(and food that does grow is to be left for the poor) and all debts forgiven. The idea is renewal. The concept can be
applied to work as well and is most well known in academia, where professors at
many institutions are eligible for a paid sabbatical leave after every six full
years of service. I haven’t done enough research to know how or when this
started in higher education, but it’s a bedrock of how scholarship (creating
and communicating knowledge) is renewed in most of higher ed.
Often, in the media, sabbatical, especially for professors
at publicly funded universities, is lambasted as an expensive perk, an
extremely gratuitous paid vacation, and of course, you might get some of that
impression from reading about our adventures getting to Germany! But like I
mentioned earlier, for academics, sabbatical is not a vacation (most
professors, in fact, on 9-month contracts, like me, do not get any paid
vacation). We are still employed, still working, still conducting scholarship.
We are only released from our commitments towards teaching courses and serving
on university committees. It does not release me from my obligations as a
principal investigator on grants, as a thesis advisor to my graduate students,
as a supervisor to my staff, as a scholar in my field presenting at conferences
and writing/revising papers, to keep my field sites and lab experiments
running, to help my department retain its top-tier national ranking, nor to
serve my national and international commitments to journal editorships, steering
committees and Boards, peer reviewing, and the like.
Some scholars stay close to home and work on catching up on
writing. Others take the time to develop new courses, write a textbook, or lead
a new campus or discipline initiative. And others use the leave as a good
reason to visit other labs, learn about their methods, and forge new
partnerships and collaborations. Many great discoveries in science have arisen
from chance encounters during sabbatical leaves. The kind of science I do is
inherently interdisciplinary and international in scope. Many of my closest
colleagues are in Europe and it’s nice to be able to spend more focused time
with them beyond the occasional hello and beer at a conference.
And yes, it is about rest. Scholarship can exhaust the mind.
Sometimes a change of scenery or pace is critical to retaining creativity and a
sustained level of competitiveness required to attain research grants, write
groundbreaking papers, and be inspiring in the classroom. Sabbatical is
not an entitlement either. I had to write a proposal to the University, gain
department and University approval, and ensure that classes I would normally
teach would somehow get taught or made up in the curriculum in other ways.
OK…that
sort of makes sense, even though I still think that you’re just drinking beer
and eating (kosher) bratwurst all day long. But, why are you in Berlin?
Good question.
Well, actually, that’s two questions: 1) Why did you choose to go away
on sabbatical? 2) Why did you choose to go to Berlin, specifically? I’ll try and briefly answer both.
When I first began thinking about taking a sabbatical, the
obvious question was, “Where should we go?” My initial instinct was to stay in Madison, largely to avoid
the upheaval of moving four Copelovitches overseas and dealing with the time
and cost of finding an apartment, schools for the kids, and so forth. As Beth and I spoke more about it,
though, we kept coming back to two points in favor of going away. First, there were the professional
reasons. I have seen several of my colleagues in
the last seven years take their sabbaticals at home, only to have those
sabbaticals turn into no sabbatical at all. Basically, the lesson of their experience seemed to be that
“if you’re in the office, it’s fair game to ask you about X, request you to
attend meeting Y, knock on your office door and set up a meeting about project
Z,” etc. etc. The alternative –
avoiding the office completely and working elsewhere – also seemed less-than-promising. I’m not sure what it is, but since the
kids came along, I find it very hard to be productive at home; I think the feng shui of the house is wrong, or
something. So, I spend most of my
work time at the office or in cafes.
And much as I like singlehandedly keeping Barriques and the Froth House
(my local cafes of choice) in business, I wanted to get away, both physically
and intellectually. As Ankur
wrote, the change of scenery and pace is perhaps the most important and
attractive element of a sabbatical.
After nearly seven years in Madison (and the last three years in full-on
“head down, get tenure” mode), it was high time to step back and away. So, while I am blessed to have amazing
colleagues at a world-class university (and, more generally, we are blessed to
have wonderful friends and neighbors in a wonderful city), I wanted to get away
from it all and recharge the batteries.
Professionally, the timing is ideal for me. First, the topics
that I study and research – financial crises, exchange rates, global financial
governance, financial regulation, etc. – are nowhere more important and in the
news these days than in Europe, and the opportunity to be here as things happen
is extremely exciting for me.
Second, I am fortunate to have been granted tenure this past spring. This
means a number of things, most good (long-term employment, a raise) and a few
less so (more departmental and university committee work), but most immediately
it means that I can step back from the “publish or perish” grind of faculty
life (at least briefly) and read (as in read books…not articles, not
introductory chapters of books, not book reviews…actual books in their entirety),
think, and figure out what the next chapter of my academic career looks like. Most importantly, I can take the time to
plan and launch some exciting and longer-term research projects. Not just “the next paper on X” sort of
projects, but actual new research that will continue for several years. The main one of these is a new book
project on financial crises that I am working on with David Singer, my close
friend and collaborator who is now a professor at MIT. I’m also working on organizing a group
of colleagues (on both sides of the Atlantic) to write a series of articles on
the politics of the Euro crisis, which will hopefully end up as a special issue
of one of the journals in my field.
Finally, I’m working on a new paper (the first of several, we hope) with
one of my graduate students and two other colleagues on decision-making within
the international financial institutions and the limits of US power within
those organizations (e.g., the IMF, World Bank, etc.). And of course, that stack of “next
paper” projects is still not completely cleared, tenure and new projects notwithstanding.
So, there is a lot of work for me to do, and sabbatical
gives me the time to actually do it, rather than simply thinking about it (or
not thinking about it) while teaching a full course load, attending committee meetings,
advising graduate students, etc. etc.
There is something very exciting about this opportunity. Starting anew now feels a bit like
graduate school, when I launched into my dissertation project in earnest, even
though I was not entirely sure what my research would uncover or what the final
product would eventually look like.
That uncertainty can be unsettling, but it’s also full of possibility
and excitement. I’m reminded of
the closing scene of my favorite movie, The
Shawshank Redemption, where Red is on the bus to Texas, wondering if he’ll
make it across the Mexican border to see his friend, Andy Dufresne, once again:
“I think it is the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start
of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain.” Indeed, for the first time in
a long while, I’m truly excited about my research and looking forward to diving
into the work.
Well, that’s the professional side of things. But there were also a series of
personal and family reasons for wanting to go away for sabbatical. First, for a variety of reasons, this
seemed like the “right” year to go away, and the more Beth and I discussed
things, the more we thought this was a “now or never” situation…or at least
“never” defined as “until the kids go away to college.” Dafna just finished preschool in August
(at the wonderful and amazing Preschool of the Arts: http://preschoolofthearts.com/),
so she was already going to be starting anew in kindergarten at Franklin School. Micah would have been in the middle
year of Randall School (Grades 3-5) this year, which meant that he could go
away for 4th grade but come back to a comfortable and friendly
environment, without having to adjust to a new school for the second or third
year in a row. In addition, Beth was coming to the end
of her contract as Education Director at our synagogue in Madison, and she had
the opportunity to ask for a year’s leave before returning to work. This was a nice set of circumstances,
and we worried that – if we passed on the opportunity to travel now – the four
of us would not be in a good position to all go away together in the
future. Looking ahead, the kids’
schedules will undoubtedly be busier as they get older; their parents will
undoubtedly be more embarrassing to spend time with in public; and the ebb and
flow of our two careers might not coincide as well as it did this year. Putting all of that together, Beth and
I worried that waiting might mean that we would never take a family sabbatical
at all, which would be a shame. We
know many colleagues and friends who have taken their children on sabbatical
(or who went with their parents years ago) and loved the experience, and we did
not want to miss the opportunity to have that same experience together as a
family.
But why go to Berlin? Above all, it made a lot of sense for me professionally. Given Germany’s central role in shaping
the European Union’s response to the Euro crisis, Berlin’s geographic proximity
to lots of other places that I would like to visit for research reasons this
year (Basel, Frankfurt, London, Brussels), and the aforementioned advantages of
being at the Hertie School, Berlin seemed like an ideal place to spend an
academic year. Germany also turns
out to be one of the interesting case studies that I will be exploring in the
new book project, so being here and taking advantage of Hertie’s proximity and
ties to the Berlin policymaking community was ideal. My hope and goal is to
meet with a variety of scholars, policymakers, and officials here in Berlin
(and Frankfurt) working on issues related to the Euro crisis, financial regulation,
and other topics. Finally, I also
have a number of friends and colleagues at universities elsewhere Europe, and
spending the year in Berlin has the added benefit of enabling me to take
advantage of their generous invitations to visit and present my research
without incurring the time and cost of a transatlantic flight. Consequently, at several points this
year, I’ll be presenting my work-in-progress at various European universities
(starting with the London School of Economics in October and Trinity College,
Dublin, in November). This is one
of the real pleasures and perks of academic life, since one gets to travel to
nice locations, meet very interesting scholars, and get feedback on one’s work
from fresh sets of eyes with different perspectives than the “home crowd.” Now that I’m at a point in my career
where I have colleagues across the US and Europe, it’s also nice to catch up
with old friends and raise a glass or two together. Plus, the possibility of turning this work travel into a few
family weekends in new locations isn’t too bad, either (ok, so there is some
“boondoggle” factor here after all…!).
At the same time, Berlin seemed like a good place for us to
spend a year as a family. I have
been here twice before, and I am a big fan of the city. While I’m no expert, I had seen a fair
bit of the city during my previous visits, and I knew my way around enough to
get a feel for things and the impression that we would be happy living here for
the year. As those of you who have
been here know, Berlin really is a fascinating and incredibly vibrant city:
history, culture, food, neighborhoods, architecture, parks and green space,
affordability, great public transportation, bike-friendly, etc. It’s really all
here, and if you’re bored in Berlin, you’re really not trying hard enough. There’s also a vibrant Jewish community
(including an active Conservative (Masorti) synagogue that meets at the
restored Neue Synagogue, three kosher meat stores in close proximity, and the
lovely kosher apartment we’re renting in Charlottenburg), which was important
for us. Finally, while I’m trying hard to learn
German (and the kids will pick it up at school, while Beth picks it up at the
farmers’ markets), it’s not at all hard to function here with English, which we
thought would be important for at least the first couple of months.
So…here we are, three weeks in and feeling a bit more
settled into our year as Berliners.
I’ll cede the blogging floor back to Beth, who is infinitely more
entertaining and insightful in her posts.
However, I thought some of you might find this background useful as you
follow our adventures this year.
In the meantime, thanks for following along and keep reading. We miss you all and look forward to catching
up again once we’re back Stateside and in Madison. Until then, it’s back to the beer and brat….er….research!
Tschüß!
Mark
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