Advertisement

New President to Face Restructured University

With President Pusey's resignation effective June 1971, the University faces simultaneously two huge decisions: the choice of a new President and the restructuring of the bureaucracy over which he will preside.

Yesterday's announcement said the Corporation "will welcome suggestions of all interested persons-faculty, students, alumni, employees and others concerned with Harvard." Details are to be announced shortly.

NEWS ANALYSIS

Everybody, of course, is eager to take part in the choice of the new President. Some universities (such as Columbia) have created faculty student-alumni search committees. But some Harvard Faculty members have objected privately that such committees actually narrow the range of available information.

The Faculty last week passed a resolution asking that its Council be consulted in the choice; the Overseers reportedly feel they have had too small a role in the University in recent years, and they are determined that their voice will be stronger this time.

Two professors were recently named to the Corporation, and some members of the community are counting on them to emphasize academic considerations in choosing the new President.

Advertisement

Most observers praise Pusey's management, especially his choices of deans, his fund-raising successes, his efforts to keep the University as free as possible of the federal government, and his courageous stand against Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the early 1950's.

But the feeling is widespread that Pusey has become an anachronism. His frosty image, it is felt, does not fit the highly-politicized University that now exists. Even conservative Faculty members tend to share that view; Pusey has had difficulties with the

Calming Effect
Faculty since he arrived in 1953.

Because of Pusey's isolation, he has become the target of much critical energy which might have more profitably been concentrated on substantive issues in the University. Several professors said last night they hope the retirement announcement will have a "calming effect" and redirect the Faculty's energy.

But the pressing issue of restructure complicates the whole situation.

President Pusey had strongly resisted plans for sweeping restructure of the Presidency (such as the creation of a Provost's office to oversee academic affairs).

Pusey believes in the power of his office, and did not wish to have his options limited. Another reason-perhaps just as important-was his firm belief that his successor must not be doomed to ineffectuality by a diffuse administrative structure.

Yet members of the Faculty and the Board of Overseers are known to feel strongly that the President's job is just too big to be handled well. Such power concentrated in the hands of one man can be disastrous, they feel, and they frequently cite Pusey's isolation last April as an example of the disasters which can result.

Almost everyone agrees that men must be added to the archaic administrative structure of the President's office-the question is how that is to be done. The stage is set for a gigantic and important guessing-game in University politics.

Some influential University figures feel that it is essential to split the President's powers now by University legislation. Tell candidates for the Presidency that the job will be limited in the future, they urge. Give the new President a take-it-or-leave-it restructured Administration.

A second group feels that the kind of men Harvard would want as President would "leave it" -refuse such a circumscribed job. It is impossible to prescribe the intimate inner structure of an administration in advance, they say.

Advertisement