Dr Anita Garvey

Assistant Professor

School: Newcastle Business School

Dr Anita Garvey is an Assistant Professor in Organisational Studies at Northumbria University. Her research areas involve using the lens of political economy, critical theory and sociological analysis to analyse phenomena in the field of organisational studies accompanied by a particular focus on the influence of neoliberal capitalism. From a feminist perspective, Anita also has an interest in social stratification, patriarchy, class and equity including the intersectionality of inequality within these areas, and their repercussions for society and the workplace.

Campus Address

City Campus East 1

Newcastle upon Tyne
NE1 8ST

Email Anita

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

Dr. Anita Garvey is an Assistant Professor in Organisational Studies at Northumbria University. Her research areas involve using the lens of political economy, critical theory and sociological analysis, to analyse phenomena in the field of organisational studies, contextualised by neoliberal capitalism.

Anita is a critical scholar whose qualitative doctoral research focused on the concept of ‘moralistic' workplace bullying in a marketised UK Public Sector, using Gramsci’s theory of hegemony.

The UK public sector has undergone significant changes propelled by neoliberal marketisation, purportedly to enhance competitiveness, financial accountability and efficiency. Moralistic bullying explores how negative interactions towards bullied targets by ostensibly scrupulous individuals are erroneously justified in the workplace, legitimised through privilege, and reconstructed as 'moral' by the actors. Moralistic workplace bullying thereby involves actors of bullying abusing their power and legitimising their behaviour through falling back on organisational norms and mores. Simultaneously, actors of bullying engage in moral condemnation and disdainful criticism of the employees that they target, ultimately leading to the latter’s ejection from the organisation. The actors of moralistic workplace bullying justify their own behaviour through presenting and claiming moral probity, which exonerates their negative actions with the aim of keeping their positions in complex hegemonic workplace environments of financial instability.

From a feminist perspective, Anita also has an interest in social stratification, patriarchy, class and equity, entailing examining their intersectionality, and their implications for societal and workplace inequality.

Anita is a Programme Leader, Module Tutor and Dissertation Supervisor, and since her arrival at the university has been nominated for student awards in the category of Best Lecturer and Best Pastoral Support.
Critical Organisational Studies, Workplace Bullying and Harassment, Intersectionality, Decolonization, Gender Equity.

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Feminism, Intersectionality, Misogynoir, and Learning Lessons From the Past to Advance Equity Today: Review 1: Black Women Taught Us: An Intimate History of Black Feminism (First Edition) by J. M.Jackson, New York: Random House, 2024. 359 pp. £9.49 (kindle). ISBN: 0593243331 Review 2: The Black Feminist Coup: Black Women's Lived Experiences in White Supremacist Feminist Academic Spaces by J. L.Richardson, M.Konatè, S. M.Perryman‐Clark, O. M.McLaughlin and K.Grace (eds.), New York: Peter Lang Group, 2024. 177 pp. £23.74 (kindle). ISBN: 9781636677705, Garvey, A. 13 Jan 2026, In: Gender, Work & Organization
Power, institutional protectionism and the disinclination of minoritised employees to raise complaints in UK universities, Garvey, A., Kabuye, H., Ajibade, B. 9 Feb 2026, In: Culture and Organization
Biodiversity, Circularity and Business Education: Examining Organisational Ambidexterity within Ecopedagogy and Ecoliteracy, Kopnina, H., Smith, S., Thomsen, B., Garvey, A. 13 Oct 2025, In: Journal of Circular Economy
Coping techniques and strategies for pursuing anti-racism within academe: A Collective autoethnographic account from minoritised academics in the UK, Garvey, A., Talhouk, R., Ajibade, B. 27 Jan 2025, In: Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal
A critical discourse analysis of workplace bullying: A Gramscian lens, Samnani, A., Garvey, A., Geesin, B. 4 Jul 2024, 40th EGOS Colloquium
Book Review: The Reckoning: From the Second Slavery to Abolition, 1776–1888 by Robin Blackburn, Garvey, A. 1 Dec 2024, In: Capital and Class
Habermas, Relational Leadership, and Public Sector Workplace Bullying, Garvey, A. 18 Jan 2024, In: Annals of Social Sciences & Management Studies
Hegemony and Moralistic Bullying in a Contested UK Public Sector, Garvey, A., Mackenzie, E. 3 Mar 2024, In: Culture and Organization
Oil companies, capital accumulation and the climate emergency, Garvey, A. 29 Aug 2024, In: Ephemera
Northumbria University Faculty of Business and Law Athena SWAN Report 2019, Garvey, A., Callahan, J. 1 Sep 2019

PGR Supervision

Gillian Hughes Reclaiming my Time: A Qualitative Study of Gendered Job Crafting in Higher Education. Start Date: 23/11/2023 End Date: 28/02/2026
Gillian Hughes Reclaiming my Time: A Qualitative Study of Gendered Job Crafting in Higher Education. Start Date: 23/11/2023 End Date: 17/10/2025