Clark responded to charges that the Law School has been ignoring student grievances by referring to a recent faculty resolution asking the appointments committee to forward "several promising candidates who are not white males," to the full faculty by next fall.
President Neil Rudenstine is Scheduled to meet next week with the faculty appointments committee--which nominates scholars to the full faculty for tenure approval.
Clark focused his comments during the forum on hiring women, and some students said they were concerned that the dean was ignoring candidates from other minority groups.
Flanked by Professors of Law Randall L. Kennedy and Duncan M. Kennedy--who both sit on the appointments committee--Clark described faculty tenure decisions as the product of a highly politicized process.
He said the faculty has not been making enough appointments because it can rarely agree on acceptable candidates.
"Our basic problem has been factionalism--intellectual diversity is taken very seriously by each group--and its consequences," Clark said, adding that he hoped the school could make four to five ap- "The faculty is committed to diversity, butthere are different degrees of commitment," saidDuncan Kennedy, who lambasted right-wing scholarsfor not passing minority candidates. All three officials said there were women andminorities they would like to see on the faculty.They agreed that the problem was getting twothirds of the faculty to agree on specificpackages of candidates. Duncan Kennedy said he thought the package ofwhite men approved Friday would facilitate theapproval of women and minorities in the future. But most students did not seem satisfied withtalk of future hiring plans. "If disgusts me thatthe only way to get minorities and women here isto restock the number of white men," said onestudent at the forum. A coalition of minority student groups at theLaw School met with Rudenstine about theirconcerns earlier this week and demanded Wednesdaythat Clark offer a written hiring plan by March12